[Vwdiesel] Who has rear brake drums turned?

[Nate Wall]

Hey, they charge the same to turn rotors around here ($16) too, although a gas
station told me $32 EACH and I just laughed. TRAK AUTO will turn them for free
if you buy their substandard pads, but they warped a set of Toyota rotors and
gave me new ones. But at $15.50 for new ATE rotors, I'll never have non-vented
VW rotors turned again! (Hey, I live where valve jobs on a 4-banger are $600
too, out great nation's capital!)

Well, I checked the rear brakes (and rotated the tires) last night. Plenty of
shoe left, drums and bearings in good shape, one wheel cylinder completely dry,
the other had one of its boots almost filled w/ brake fluid. I've replaced these
wheel cylinders in pairs about yearly for a little seepage, and now figure its
normal for some leakage. They've been in there about two years, so I just blew
out the fluid with "Dust Off", lightly sanded the shoes and drums and lubed the
outter bearings (I did not have grease seals for the inners, so I just smeared
some grease around them from the front of the drum) and put it all back
together. If it takes two years to leak a few CCs of fluid, I figure that's o.k.

Question:  One of the shoes (front) was noticeably thinner than its mate (I
guess it was doing most of the braking) on one side (the side w/ the leaky
cylinder). Hmmm...come to think of it, the leaky end of the cylinder is attached
to the least worn shoe (rear). What causes this? The other side (Right side) had
even shoe wear on both shoes. Perhaps the leaky cylinder should be replaced.
They say to replace in pairs because the other will soon fail, or because of
uneven braking. Can I do just that one side? I've gotten it down to where I can
replace the wheel cylinders w/ out removing the shoes!

--Nate

--Nate

--Nate

LBaird119 at aol.com wrote:

> > Last time I did
> >  the rear brakes I had the drums turned for about $16 each and had to wait
> > three hours for them.
>
>   Geez the wait is fairly normal but that's kind of high for a nearly
> automated
> process.  I can get new ones cheap enough to sell for somewhere from a
> little over that to double or so, depending on which ones and which size.
>      Loren
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