Adjusting Self-Adjusting Brakes

[Shannon Boal]

So, my parking brake works, my rear brakes work, and my self-adjusters work. Most of the problems seemed, to me, to be poor manufacturing.

 

[DanR]

Rear disc will fix that

 

[Shannon Boal]

And then, I find that the shoes foul the brake lever. These shoes were on the car before I got it.... I ground away 1/4" of material around the parking brake/self-adjusting lever... My guess is that Dad got the wrong shoes.

 

[Shannon Boal]

Rear disc will fix that

Hard to beat that, might be simpler than making the factory mounted self-adjusting units work!

 

[Shannon Boal]

Hard to beat that, might be simpler than making the factory mounted self-adjusting units work!

Very, very nice work on that conversion!

 

[DanR]

Our friend Bill Blue was instrumental in the development of the rear disc brakes that I am running on all my Alpines.

One of the many "Best" improvements I have been able to accomplish

 

[Shannon Boal]

Our friend Bill Blue was instrumental in the development of the rear disc brakes that I am running on all my Alpines.

One of the many "Best" improvements I have been able to accomplish

Is there any need for a disc brake splash shield? Is that needed for snow?

 

[Gordon Holsinger]

Have finished the rear brakes.....far more trouble to fix the self-adjusting feature than it is worth. Biggest things...the wheel cylinders have to move freely, slide with finger pressure in the backing plate. I filed burrs off the wheel cylinders and backing plates. I stoned burrs off the horseshoe clips. Furthermore, the levers have to hit the star wheel, mine were both bent. I straightened one, but broke the other!... I made a fixture and precision-welded the lever with nickel-silver-bronze alloy. The star wheel teeth were worn flat, I filed those and the lever edge nice and sharp. The star wheels did not fit in the wheel cylinder bores, one too tight, one too loose....I cleaned up the tight spots with a tiny scraper, and made a tiny spiral shim for the other, cut out of a beer can....

New self adjuster brake parts are available from Guestie’s garage he is an MGC parts guy!

 

[Shannon Boal]

New self adjuster brake parts are available from Guestie’s garage he is an MGC parts guy!

Good to know....the parts that had to be finished, stoned, scraped and shimmed; were new parts! Quality control was.... spotty.

 

[Jay Laifman]

If you read the book The Classic Sunbeam, McGovern indicates that Rootes was instrumental in helping Girling figure out why the disc brakes were burning through pads. And the solution was the correct configuration for the splash shield. So I would not rush to remove one or use one different than stock.

 

[alpine_64]

If you read the book The Classic Sunbeam, McGovern indicates that Rootes was instrumental in helping Girling figure out why the disc brakes were burning through pads. And the solution was the correct configuration for the splash shield. So I would not rush to remove one or use one different than stock.

Jay think the issue is with the SV self adjusting rear drums. Dan has a conversion to replace them with a disc setup

 

[DanR]

I wish there was someone making the replacement splash shields for the Sunbeams. I have a couple pairs that are in need of repairs because of extensive rust. To "patch" the rusty area is difficult due to the close tolerances between the rotor/caliper/spindle/etc.

Not sure if I can get my Draftsman/Engineer/Laser Buddy to take on a project to make them.

Rootes made them in a press..... I assume the dies are not available ? Perhaps The Trust will fine them one day ????

I have also looked at several different vehicles that have the shields on the rear. None found appear to be adoptable to the Sunbeam. Not sure if they are really needed?

 

[260Alpine]

I've ran a lot of disk brake swaps without the splash/dust shields. They run cooler and have had no problems.

 

[Bill Blue]

Jay think the issue is with the SV self adjusting rear drums. Dan has a conversion to replace them with a disc setup

And I ran them for tens of thousands of miles and never saw any wear issues.

Bill

 

[Jay Laifman]

Going back to the self adjusting aspect. I have self adjusting and had the drums off today to check out longer brake pedal travel than I had. Turns out, one of the slave adjusters rotated all the way down. I spent some time with it and discovered or relearned an issue.

There is a spring on the outside that pulls the adjusting lever down. The spring has to pull the arm all the way down so that the lever can "click" down to the next point on the star wheel. If it doesn't go all the way down, the arm no longer holds the star wheel from turning, and stops tightening.

Turns out, I have a kink in my parking brake cable. Not that long ago, I tightened the cable because I thought the parking brake handle in the car was coming up too high. I didn't realize I was also creating more tension on the self-adjusting lever - more than the return spring could handle. So the adjusting lever stopped clicking into place. This let the adjusting wheel slowly rotate in, and therefore my longer pedal throw.

So now I need a new cable and possibly new return springs for the adjuster arm.

 

[mikephillips]

And with the return springs you want to put a retainer of some kind on the top of the pin as they can eventually pop loose and fall off. Most of the cars I've run across are missing these so I suspect it happens all the time.

 

[Gordon Holsinger]

Dan if you drive the car a lot you will find that road grime will accumulate and wear the rotors and pads on the inside. This is the problem Dunlop has when they were developing disc brakes!

 

[Jay Laifman]

I did some searching in the MGC world. Seems they don't work any better there. But even worse, they don't have a return spring for the lever arm. At best, they have the rubber boot that goes over the back of the slave cylinder. Now that I've looked at ours, I simply have no idea how the MGC version ever worked without the spring. And it makes our spring that much nicer. I note that Sunbeam Specialties does carry the springs. I'll be getting those.

However, Mike, I have no idea how to hold it on - other than maybe a twist wire. Once on, I don't think they can really go anywhere - unless they break. So I'm suspecting that what you've observed are ones where the spring ultimately rusted and broke off.

I still have faith I will get this to work right!

 

[mikephillips]

Anything's possible. I know in 74 when I got my first one the springs were already gone. Perhaps they failed, maybe they were knocked loose changing brakes shoes at some point.

Funny thing, my first is a spring 65 built series IV and it was delivered to the dealer that sold it with an August 65 marked rear end assembly. Car was damaged in transit and repainted when it entered the US at Detroit and I think when they put back together what they removed for repair the first rear end on the top of the pile is what went in. So may be the only series IV sold new with self adjusting brakes. Didn't know that was wrong as a teen, but it did make for ordering and sending back parts a couple times before I knew what to get. Still have that car out in the garage with the same rear end...

 

[Jay Laifman]

You've got me beat. My car was a late 67 that I got in 78, and it's in the garage - at least it's as much the same car as my grandfather's axe is the same axe.

As usual, thanks for all your help.