Drum Brake Install on AMC 20 Rear Axle

I was going to wait for a while before I installed the new drum brakes, but I decided to just go ahead and get it done. 

When I first started working in the brakes I realized that I had throw away the original parking brake levers when I tossed the old pads.  Because of that bonehead mistake, I had to spend about $20 on new parking brake levers from 4Wheel Parts.

Here is the blank slate.  This is the passenger side of the rear AMC 20 Axle

Here is everything needed to install the new brakes and hardware.  I picked up the new hardware and brakes from advanced auto.  The parking brake strut (top left) is the original.  I just put some paint on it to keep it from rusting.

I removed the bleeder screw from the new wheel cylinder and applied some anti-sieze on the threads.

The wheel cylinder is put in first.

The wheel cylinder is held on by two bolts on the other side of the backing plate.  I used new bolts with locking washers.  I also put some lock tight on the threads.

I then put the bleeder screw back into the wheel cylinder.

The bolts were torqued down to 25 ft/lbs

I then slid the wheel cylinder links into the dust boot of the wheel cylinder.



I then placed a little bit of grease on the point of the backing plate where the shoes rub against.  I read online that this was a good thing to do.

I clipped the parking brake lever onto the larger shoe which will sit on the back side of the backing plate.

The hold down pins are then still into place.

I used this clamp to help me hold the shoe into the backing plate in the correct spot.  This made installing the hold down springs a lot easier.

The hold down springs are then installed to hold the shorter shoe onto the backing plate.  Using a pair of pliers was a lot easier than using the brake tool That I thought I would need.

The hold down spring was installed on the other shoe.

Both shoes are now on.

I picked up a new parking brake cable at Advance Auto.

The cable clips into the back side of the backing plate.

The end of the cable slides onto the parking brake lever.

The parking brake strut was then installed with the spring facing the front.

I put some anti-seize in the threads of the adjuster screw before installing.

The adjusting screw was put into place

The adjuster cable slips onto the support plate.

The return spring holds the cable guide onto the back shoe.

With the help of a pair of vise-grips, the return spring is clipped onto the support plate

You can see the return spring is also holding the adjuster cable in place

The primary return spring is then installed.

The adjuster lever and adjuster spring is then installed.

With a flat head screw driver, I slid the parking brake cable onto the cable guide.

All done!!!

Did the same on the driver's side.  I will figure out how to adjust everything later.

Here is a before shot.



Since one of the drums had a chip in it I found some used drums from a guy off craigslist.  I only spent $10 for both.  This is a picture of my original one which did not look that different from the new ones I bought.

The drums had some surface rust on them so I cleaned them up and sprayed some Eastwood Rust Encapsulator on it as a primer.

I then used some aluminum color Rustoleum.



Slid the drums on the axle.

Put the original screws back in.  I ended up replacing these screws with some new stainless steel screw.  I forgot to take a picture of those.

Did the same on the riverside and finished up.  It looks a lot better than it used to!

Before

After

Before

After