Morris Minor Owners Club

Took the car out for a long run today and as I neared home again after being out a couple of hours I became aware of a high pitched whistle noise coming from front brakes when applied. It did not sound like anything scraping, and as the pads are brand new I doubt it would be anything metallic scraping. More of a whistle/squealing noise, also there very faintly at times when brakes not applied. It was a very hot day, and the noise only appeared after driving some time. Any ideas?

Do you have the conical shoe retaining springs fitted? If not then it could be the metal brake shoe moving sideways and touching the drum
A slight rubbing could be caused by the drums being out of true
Drum brakes have shoes, disc brakes have pads

The whistle should help to clear Roos away from the road in front..........

Woops, yes shoes.

Ummm...now I think of it I am not sure the conical springs were present when I reassembled them recently.....at least I don't recall having to fiddle around with needle nose pliers so prob not fitted. Good tip, will check.

Never ever used the bee-hive springs, and no whistling. If the shoe return springs are not fitted correctly they can rub on the hubs - until they wear through........

Hmmmm possibly......but have done a thousand miles or so since the front end rebuild and it happened for the first time yesterday. Guess I'll wait and see - pulling the brake drums on the car is a bit of a pain as it's MM style combined hub/drum.

Perhaps as the shoes wear down slightly - the springs have come into contact....... Best check - because if they wear through the shoes will 'self servo' onto the drums........

Thanks Roy, will have a look see. The tricky thing is that with the MM styles drum/hub you cannot check for the springs rubbing against the hub as the drum and hub are one unit, hence one you pull off the drum to have a gander you have also removed the hub!...At the least I can pull the wheels and listen very carefully as I turn the hub/drum I guess..

Yes - but when you pull the hub off there will be wear marks if they have been rubbing.

Well, went for another long drive today and whilst the whistling squeak was gone I was getting a humming noise at medium speeds. Once home I jacked up the front and checked the spin of the wheels, and found they were a bit tight - shoes adjusted up too much. I slackened them off a notch on each wheel cylinder and we'll see what effect that has.

However, new problem has emerged - water pump leaking and noisy See seperate post...