Honestly, I can't stop staring at it. Might make it my wallpaper!

I fall into that category, lol. Plus they offer the advantage of easier clean-off of dirt and mud, etc. I went mudding in my old Ranger with drums, and I was ignorant back then but my drums held mud for long enough of a time to destroy my axle seals. lol

 

I stopped by my local 4WD Parts store the other day (first time there), and found that they were using a picture I'd taken as their desktop wallpaper on their parts computer.

I live in California, we don't have real mud. Not the kind of mud you can get buried in, anyway, so I'll likely never have to worry about packing up my drums on the trails I drive.

91Jeep_Man, I'll be around tomorrow and will help if I can. I'll keep an eye on the thread.

 

Hi Jeff! I forked out $70 and can control my ride higthtth. Air shocks. Sucks, seems a shock "amplifier" as opposed to absorbers. Anyway the old thing has it's **** up, even with a trailer.

I put the filler for the air-shocks up through the floor in the corner behind the spare.

Pushen 300 K witth the body cracken both around the hatch and forward of the hinges top of rear doors frsames. Anyway parked right the hatch hits the tail light lens.

Real springs and shocks might have prevented the dammage to the uniboty.

 

Please pardon me for "thread Jacking" ...Can we see it?

 

That sucks, Don. I was considering air shocks because I do a lot of long hiking trips and usually take several hundred pounds of camera and camping gear (you think it sags now?!) but decided to just go the conventional route and try to lighten and better pack the load. We'll see how that works when the new leaves are installed. Fortunately, it's a native California XJ with no rust and an uncompromised unibody, I'd like to keep it that way.

That's what he gets for going to bed, LOL. I'm sure he won't mind, I'll help him out with his brake issue to make up for our rudeness.

It was this one...



I've also seen it used on a facebook XJ group (run by someone from CF) but when I mentioned that I was the author they were very gracious and credited me in the photo caption.

 

Hey! too cool! Looks like it's gettn' ready to "take the plunge" in to laKe Taho! Yea the air shocks hold it up....we have REALLY mean washboard on a steep grade here, it really put's the rattle to things.

Having good springs and shocks that dampened both the up, as well as the down I think would be better than just the air>up I have.

(I tried to post a .mov file, nix on that!)

 

You people are hijacking my thread!!!

Lol, just kidding.

The pics are from the passenger side. Shoes are installed properly with larger surface area trailing and shorter surface area leading. Primary springs have plenty of spring left to them.. had to fight them with a pair of channel locks. The adjuster is all the way in. The ebrake lever arm did hang back behind the shoe before I put it in place. It didn't seem to fight me at all or have any tension.

I can say I have noticed the shoes do NOT stay centered when I put the drum on. It appears as though the drum going over the wheel studs and axle requires the shoes to be pushed to the right slightly.

Put me in the "drums are the spawn of Satan" category. I hate them.

 

Maybe this was mentioned somewhere in the thread, but if not, have you tried swapping the drums side-to-side to see what happens?

 

Yes, same issue. The drivers side is fine with either drum. The passenger side gets tight with either drum.

 

*** end of the jeep is about to go up on stands. Hopefully today I will fix this.

 

Folks real quick dumb question...

Can out of adjustment drum brakes (as in star adjuster too loose) cause vibration at higher speeds? Because after lifting the tail end up, I can spin the 'trouble' side tire with relative ease...

 

What condition are your hubs and bearings in? Have you checked your drum for warping?

 

So I can verify that the drums now appear to be loose. They slide off the shoes with ease and I can spin them forward and backwards relatively 'easy' and when turned they do not immediately grab and stop. Spinning one shoe however seems to make the other shoe unless secured come off the studs. I have both drums bolted down and can still spin them.

So with that said, can loose drums that havent been adjusted cause vibration at speed? Idk how the passenger one seems to have just fixed itself... but its 10x better than last weekend when I could barely turn it at all.

 

How do I check the drums for warping? Visual inspection shows no 'shiny' or recessed spots. The drum turns without 'loping' or anything.

Bearing must be good. No noise when turning and the wheel cannot be grabbed and moved vertically or horizontally.

 

No. If the drum were warped or out of balance it could cause vibes but not the brake components, themselves, because they don't spin.

That's pretty much how you check (unless you happen to have a dial test indicator laying around?). I just wanted to make sure there wasn't any visible wobble to the drum when it was bolted to the hub and rotated. I'm still a bit baffled as to why you are having so much difficulty with that one side and why the drum is forcing your shoes off-center when it's installed... that shouldn't happen.

I always recommend replacing the springs. Repeated heat cycles cause the spring material to degrade and, despite the apparent crudeness of drum brake systems, those springs are made at a specific tension required for the brakes to work properly. It's impossible to "gauge" how good a spring is by pulling on it with a pair of Channel Locks.