Parking brake released, no go: shoes rusted to the drums.

[dangerousdave]

My wife drove through some deep nasty water about 20 yards from our house, then backed it into our driveway, and set the parking brake.

About a week later, she starts it normally, warms it up a little, then sticks in Drive; torque twisting is noticeable as she revved it, but the tires seemed stuck to the ground!

Reminded me of an 18 wheeler parking in snow after a long hard run fully loaded; Sub zero temps overnight ice-glued that truck stuck tight. I have lots of stories from the OTR days, ran the I-90 and I-80 coast to coast in winters... never mind.

The brake pedal and cables released correctly, but both rear drums were rust-glued to the shoes;
BMF hammer to release them, rotary wire brushed interior of drums, scuffed the shoes with scotchbrite. After greasing the pivot points and reassembly, everything was A-OK.
Always grease or anti-seize the hubs to keep the drums and wheels from rust bonding them together. No snow here but we're about 150 yards from the Pacific Ocean and get the salt spray with the breeze.

It only rains like that a few times in a year, but she knows now. I've told her not to use the parking brake in our driveway, it's FLAT.

Just wanted to share the love.

 

[jeffrey98335]

:thumbsup:

Thanks for sharing, and THANK YOU for your service to our country!

 

[saratoga]

Moved to Drivetrain

 

[RI Chevy Silveradoman]

Good advice Dave! Not to use the E-brake on flat surfaces. I very rarely if ever use mine.

 

[ak diesel driver]

From my experience you use it all the time or not at all.

Sent from my Studio 5.0s using Tapatalk

 

[bison]

What he says ^^.

 

[btfarm]

From my experience you use it all the time or not at all.

Sent from my Studio 5.0s using Tapatalk

What he says ^^.

X 3. I haven't used a parking brake on any car or truck since I had one take several hours to fix on my'69 C10. Never again.

Sent from my SCH-I535

 

[bison]

My wife drove through some deep nasty water about 20 yards from our house, then backed it into our driveway, and set the parking brake.

About a week later, she starts it normally, warms it up a little, then sticks in Drive; torque twisting is noticeable as she revved it, but the tires seemed stuck to the ground!

Reminded me of an 18 wheeler parking in snow after a long hard run fully loaded; Sub zero temps overnight ice-glued that truck stuck tight. I have lots of stories from the OTR days, ran the I-90 and I-80 coast to coast in winters... never mind.

The brake pedal and cables released correctly, but both rear drums were rust-glued to the shoes;
BMF hammer to release them, rotary wire brushed interior of drums, scuffed the shoes with scotchbrite. After greasing the pivot points and reassembly, everything was A-OK.
Always grease or anti-seize the hubs to keep the drums and wheels from rust bonding them together. No snow here but we're about 150 yards from the Pacific Ocean and get the salt spray with the breeze.

It only rains like that a few times in a year, but she knows now. I've told her not to use the parking brake in our driveway, it's FLAT.

Just wanted to share the love.

Dave, sounds like you're a better man than me.

My Wife got stuck the other day in the snowbank in the ditch on a wide open stretch of road 2 ml from home for no reason at all if it wasn't for the yap yap on the FFen phone.:rolleyes5:
I first tried pulling her out with my truck but had to get back to get the wheel loader,....by that time the loving feeling had utterly left me and was replaced with a whole lot less tender feelings :mad2:
It took a while to wear off :hihi:

 

[SnowDrift]

Anytime I drive my truck in heavy rains and park it (not driving through deep water) I have to break the rears loose next time I drive it. I don't set the parking brake when it's parked, though, since it's sitting on a level floor and the shoes still rust solid. I hate it! Not sure if it's crappy shoes, or what, but the drums don't have the large inner lip like the factory drums did, so maybe that's why water gets in easier?

 

[dangerousdave]

Dave, sounds like you're a better man than me.

My Wife got stuck the other day in the snowbank in the ditch on a wide open stretch of road 2 ml from home for no reason at all if it wasn't for the yap yap on the FFen phone.:rolleyes5:
I first tried pulling her out with my truck but had to get back to get the wheel loader,....by that time the loving feeling had utterly left me and was replaced with a whole lot less tender feelings :mad2:
It took a while to wear off :hihi:

Good job, Simon. You didn't leave her there, that's nice. With the medical situations here, we have to have a backup vehicle at all times, so it was good for me too.

jeffrey98335 , I am privileged to have done a little for this great country. We're either sheep, wolves, or sheep dogs; victims, crooks, or protectors. I was raised by a big sheep dog family.

 

[RI Chevy Silveradoman]

From my experience you use it all the time or not at all.

Sent from my Studio 5.0s using Tapatalk

What he says ^^.

X 3. I haven't used a parking brake on any car or truck since I had one take several hours to fix on my'69 C10. Never again.

Sent from my SCH-I535

X4. The park pawl inside these Allison 1000's is very stout!

 

[Big T]

Semi-metallic shoes plus water and salt air = rust.

We don't use semi-metallic on boat trailer brakes for this reason.

 

[3500GMC]

When you get a stuck drum brake (light truck and auto) roll it in reverse, it'll 'un-wedge' or de-energize the shoes.

 

[RI Chevy Silveradoman]

Good point.

 

[dangerousdave]

Semi-metallic shoes plus water and salt air = rust.

We don't use semi-metallic on boat trailer brakes for this reason.

I've driven in the salty shore water in many trucks over the years, this is the first brake 'freeze up'. I've always washed them up and down soon afterwards, except this time.
These are the same shoes that were on it 76,000 miles ago when I bought it. I doubt they're all organic, so most likely semi-metallic. They're about 1/2 way worn to the rivets. It was a good time to lube the friction points.

When you get a stuck drum brake (light truck and auto) roll it in reverse, it'll 'un-wedge' or de-energize the shoes.

We tried that several times several ways.

At least here in south Southern California we don't have to park in the snow... unless there's a road trip involved.

Thanks for the responses, guys.
I really appreciate this forum and all the help, usually before I need it. This time I winged it, worked out OK.
Happy New Year, or just another day.

 

[swinters]

Too many hills and mountains here in Western WA so we always use the P-brake. When I was wrenching for a truck shop that had a car and light duty section (and a AAA contract) we used to get calls to deal with transmissions stuck in Park. Always on some nasty hill, too. Being near military bases, a whole lot of the time it was a spouse recently transferred here and not using the P-brake because they were told never to. Over the years I've just gotten in the habit of very lightly lubing the various rub and pivot points with high temperature synthetic grease when I reassemble my brakes. Have never had a lick of trouble since, not even on my Alaska truck.

 

[ak diesel driver]

it's almost always the cables that rust/freeze up. by using it all the time you keep the corrosion from building up. I never had a parking pawl stick that I couldn't get out. It would take a pretty steep hill

 

[swinters]

it's almost always the cables that rust/freeze up. by using it all the time you keep the corrosion from building up. I never had a parking pawl stick that I couldn't get out. It would take a pretty steep hill

Exactly right. I always try to get the ones with zerks when I buy new cables. If they're the old spiral wound type without the plastic lining I take them off, coil them up, throw them in the solvent tank, then soak them in a bucket of old ATF. Definitely steep hills. Was in Tacoma, WA and the business district, County and City offices, etc. are all in the steepest part of town. And then we're usually talking people who don't even know where the dipstick is...

 

[Will L.]

Those dipsticks are the one behind the steering wheel- sheesh!

Iirc a couple of years of Caddys would have problems if you didn't use p-brake all the time. I slept sin e then so can't remember what ones now...

 

[swinters]

We used to get a lot of service calls caused by the loose nuts and misplaced dipsticks at the steering wheel. On the other hand, I've seen plenty of loose nuts and dipsticks on a wrench, too...