My 98 F250LD4x4 has rear drums, and it smells like the parking brake is dragging. The wheel is also getting hot, as is the drum assembly itself. What could be the cause of this and how can I fix it?

 

My 2000 F-150 with rear discs is doing the same thing. Driver wheel was getting warm, and I could smell hot pads after driving. What I found was that the parking brake, which is actually a small drum brake setup inside the rotor, was dragging on that wheel. Took the whole thing apart and couldn't find anything wrong. If I tried to turn the tire back, it would be locked up. If I rocked it forward, the brake would release and it would spin fine. Then I noticed that the passenger side parking brake cable was unhooked, haven't figured out what is wrong yet but it seems like the cable got stretched because it's way too long to hook back up. I don't think my brake is releasing correctly because of the other one not being hooked up, you might check that. It could also be something binding, or the adjuster got pushed out too far.

Has anyone else had a cable that seemed to long? How do I find out if it's stretched? I can't see any place to adjust the cable at all.

 

You might check to see if your drums are out of round.

 

I had the same problem last Summer, however mine was due to the inside of the 'drum' becoming rusted badly from not using the parking brake regularly and the the rust eventually ate away at the shoe linings, causing brake shoe vibrations that also caused the destruction of the shoe expanding mechanism, which resulted in the cable on the passenger side from ejecting itself from the mechanism attached to the backing plate. The one inside parking brake mechanism was total junk as a result and the other one was ready to self destruct as well...

There is no cable adjuster that I could find but there is a cable 'equalizer' that more or less helps the cable tension stay the same on each wheel. For shoe clearance adjustment here is a brake shoe "star" adjuster near the bottom of the backing plate, between the bottom edge of the brake shoes. The adjuster is accessible from behind a oval rubber plug on the back of the backing plate. You can back those off for a TEMPORARY solution, however you should have the rust removed from the drum and clean and lube everything up so nothing is binding against each other.


However if you need parts.... Ha !

This is one catch: You cannot (could not) buy the emergency brake parts separate, except for the shoes (about $80 for a set of 4 from Ford.) You also cannot find the parts in the aftermarket except used from a junkyard, but the rear disc F-150s are hard to find around my area. I searched like mad and the only place that had them was the dealer. If any of the parts on the backing plate are broken or rusted or missing you will have to buy the whole backing plate, parts and all. Those are sold in left and right sides and cost about $95 each. You get all the springs, adjusters, shoes, retainers, etc... I bought new rear rotors, rear brake pads and backing plates and then just transferred the parts onto the old backing plates and put everything back together after coating all the moving parts with anti-sieze. They work great now... $300 later.

Your problem may not be as bad as mine was but the key seems to be to get all the parts really clean and working together properly, with no binding. Lube them lightly with anti-sieze or a good hi temp brake caliper grease and put everything back together.

The deal also gave me the advice that those of us with the rear discs should apply the parking brake while moving once every 500-1000 miles to reduce the chance that rust will build up and infringe on the brake shoes.

Maybe they should have printed that in the owner's manual. It would have saved some of us a lot of grief, time and money.

Hope this helps...

 

Thanks, I actually stopped by the dealer and talked to the service manager tonight. He suggested basically the same thing as you said, that the springs and stuff are probably bad, so the cable seems too long. He said to pull the rotor and take a look before I try anything else so I'll do that soon. I don't think the rest of the parts are bad since I use my parking brake all the time because I have a 5-speed tranny.

 

My springs were slightly damaged but the adjusters were toast. I tried to find adjusters in the aftermarket and had no luck. Hopefully you don't have as much rust and whatnot that I had. And, yeah, since you use your PB a lot you probably don't have as much rust buildup.

 

I just had a similar problem on my 97 F150. The driver's side parking brake wasn't releasing. Found that the cable had been crimped in the middle (where it passed through a bracket). The cable rusted seized up. I ordered a set of 3 cables (front and two rear) from RockAuto.com. Fortunately they sent the corrrect rear cable for the drivers side, so I was able to fix the problem. The other two were not the right ones for my truck...

The rest of the story goes like this. I was driving down the freeway, doing about 80 and hear a horrible screech. Thought it was a u-joint. I took out the rear drive shaft and drove around on the front one until I got a new u-joint to replace the one I though was bad (it wasn't, and I broke my vice in the process). I don't really know why I was using the parking brake, just seemed like a good idea with no rear driveshaft. I got a rear transfer case seal too, since it has leaked a bit for the last 20k miles or so. U-joint, $15; seal, $20; vice, $50

Since the parking brake was stuck on, it started to stink after driving for a little while. I thought that was the culprit of the noise I heard. BTW, it's a real pain to get a drum off with the brake stuck on. Needless to say, I still hadn't found the real problem. brake shoes & springs, $40; parking brake cables, $50

Turned out to be the stupid tensioner pulley on the drive belt.

Priceless....

 

Well I said I'd check back when I got my problem figured out, and I did so this weekend so here goes.

I removed the right side rear disc to see why the p-brake cable seemed to long, and long story short, the part that pivots to spread the shoes and apply pressure to the drum had rusted up even with regular p-brake use. I took it out, cleaned it up, applied some caliper grease to it and everything works great again. It's nice when you can fix something free with just a little bit of time.

 

I just went through the frozen parking brake thing with my 2001 F150 with rear disk. rockauto.com has the parking brake shoes for about $30. raybestos part number 752PG. They also have a parking brake parts kit for about $27. It includes the springs, piviots & star adjuster. It's motorcraft part number BRSK7303A

Jerry