Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Stuck brake drum.

This SOB is putting up one hell of a fight. Hammer, pb blaster and just gave me a little wiggle. Gonna try heating it up with the torch now.

Is it the shoes grabbing? If so, try backing off the adjuster.

Whats it on?

The stink alone should have the drum giving up the ghost.

Be careful with heat near brake fluid.

Is the parking brake on?

88 Ford long bed I’m turning into a utility/off road trailer

Can you back the shoes off?

Some of those early GM's didn't allow that....not sure about Ford.

If the shoes aren’t holding it on, then try to get a couple of screwdrivers or pry bars on each side between it and backing plate. then whack the axle with a piece of wood and 4lb sledge or dead blow mallet.

Put the wheel and tire back one; the you will have more leverage for rocking it back and forth.

Hah that won't work!

Unbolt the brake line and wheel cylinder from the backing plate, and cut the heads off the brake shoe retaining pins with an angle grinder. The wheel cylinder and brake shoes will come off with the drum, at least far enough to get a pry bar inside the drum and dismantle things.
Jerry

BFH and a torch!

When I was a mechanic the ford drums would stick like this. It was usually the very center rusted on the knob of the axle. I would take a center punch and go around this several times to bust the rust loose. Always got them off this way. Good luck. Ed k

Does the drum have bolt holes on the face of it? Pretty easy to break it free from the hub with the correct size bolt most of the time. That’s what the holes are there for.

That's a good tip. OP never did answer bruinruin's question.

I used an air chisel once trying to cut off the nuts on exhaust manifold flanges, didn't get the nuts to split but in the process vibrated the rust loose and they came right off. So I got the idea of getting some Smoothing drifts for my pneumatic chisel and made it an air hammer and it works great freeing up rusted stuff.

Beans - If you have backed off the shoe adjuster and also applied penetrant it is not likely that the shoes are grabbing tightly enough to prevent removal with hammer blows and/or leverage between drum and plate. I would not yet start using flame/heat. More than likely the problem is tight fit/corrosion roughness/etc. between two metal components on the axle-to-drum fit. Am not familiar with that particular setup but penetrant on such surfaces and rigging some sort of pusher or puller mechanism should overcome that. Hope this helps.

Bigger hammer!

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