Morris Minor Owners Club

Checked my front brakes last weekend, as they were starting to pull to the right. I was expecting to just do a quick adjustment, and carry on as normal.

I decided to take the drums off, to clean out the dust, and check the cylinders were ok. That's when I had a bit of a shock on the passenger side.

One of the springs had snapped, so the shoes weren't returning properly.

Here's a pic of the shoes I replaced.



Looks like they were getting a bit hot!!!

I'll always be taking the drums off when I adjust the brakes from now on. You never know what's going on in them.

Yow! they look like bits of charcoal

thanks for sharing the trauma and the tip

I take the drums off my brakes farly regularly (mainly because it is left for months at time and gets "stick cylinder syndrom)

I found similar crazing on the shoes of one of my front wheels due to a sticking brake cylinder. The cracking wasn't as deep though so I re-used the shoes after I filed off the top 1mm of glazed & cracked friction material.

Wasn't there some kind of clue like an unpleasant smell of hot friction material and a feeling that the car wasn't rolling freely?

The only sympton was brakes pulling to the right, thats why I thought they only needed adjusting.