Offset Trailing Arms & Parking Brake Cable

[Ludigdrums]

I have Offset trailing arms on my 81, and have adjusted my parking brake twice with the correct procedure, and it barely works. The trailing arms are complete assemblies from Van Steel and came with SS parking brake hardware. I'm thinking that maybe my cable is stretched too much and can't take the rerouting of the cable bracket. It worked fine before the trailing arm change.

Anyone else have this?

Thanks!

- Jeremy

 

[Ludigdrums]

Any thoughts?!

 

[Thumper]

Have you e-mailed Van Steel with the problem? They are super helpful and I'm sure that they've run into this problem before.

 

[The73vetteman]

I don't have the offset trailing arms but I do have some experience borne of many hours trying to make the parking brake work at all.

My car is one of those where a previous owner had removed the PB brackets on the trailing arms so as to run wider wheels. As the car is a 4 spd I really liked the idea of having a working PB (not too many hills in Michigan, but still useful to be able to stop on one!)

Tip 1 would be to make sure that the cable is secure both on the TA brackets AND at the bracket under the car (where it goes into the rubber sleeve on its way to the TA.)

Tip 2 is to get the brake shoes adjusted so they are just free of the drums. This is really tricky and takes a lot of lying on the floor tweaking the adjuster through the little peephole.

Then, try to tighten up the cable adjuster under the car. The cables do stretch and it is possible that yours has done so (you didn't say if it was new). I was surprised at just how much slack had to be taken up with a new cable - I imagine there are manufacturing tolerances on these; perhaps yours is at the upper limit?

Tip 3 would be to check the cable linkage at the hand brake lever. It doesn't take much to get at it and just verify that all is shipshape.

And last of all, tip 4, everyone tells me that the PB never worked well on the C3, so don't expect miracles.

Hope this at least gives you a few things to look at and think about.

 

[Ludigdrums]

Thanks for the tips guys.

Van Steel didn't have much to say, except that I probably need a new cable.

The73vetteman: I think the '73 and my '81 are slightly different because of some of the things you described. However, I did adjust them according to the shop manual which was: 1. Tighten both parking shoes until you can't turn the wheel by hand, and then back off 6-8 notches.
2. Pull parking brake lever to 13 clicks and then adjust the centering spring until it takes 80 ft/lbs. to pull the lever to the 14th click.

I did this procedure twice.

Thing is, I remember the brake working pretty well before the offset TA. I'm betting on the cable being stretched...just seems weird when it used to work not too long ago ya know?

Thanks again!

- Jeremy

 

[The73vetteman]

2. Pull parking brake lever to 13 clicks and then adjust the centering spring until it takes 80 ft/lbs. to pull the lever to the 14th click.

I found I wasn't getting the function I wanted doing it this way. My approach is to tighten it up until when the brake is applied about 3 clicks I see the levers going through the backplate start to move. (Takes 2 people to do this of course).

Then I put the wheels on and park on my driveway - it's not a steep slope, maybe 1 in 20 - and see if 13 clicks will hold the car there. If it does, great, if not, tighten the cable just a little and repeat.

One other thought has just occurred to me - the brake people do say that the liners need to be burnished for maximum effectiveness. It did make a difference on my car. Have you done this?

John

 

[Hib Halverson]

I have Offset trailing arms on my 81, and have adjusted my parking brake twice with the correct procedure, and it barely works. The trailing arms are complete assemblies from Van Steel and came with SS parking brake hardware. I'm thinking that maybe my cable is stretched too much and can't take the rerouting of the cable bracket. It worked fine before the trailing arm change.

Anyone else have this?

Thanks!

- Jeremy

There are two steps to adj. the 65-82 parking brake. The first is to adjust the shoes. There's a hole in the disc rotor though which you access a star wheel, like on an ancient drum brake car.

The second step is the cable adjustment.

For the p-brake to work right, the first adjustment must be done before the second.

If that procedure does not result in proper p-brake function, then there's a problem with either the p-brake mechanism itself, the cables or the p-brake handle.

 

[JohnZ]

Also, "new" parking brake shoes require "burnishing" to the hat-section in the rotor, just as the plant did when the car was roll-tested; they ran it to 40 mph, pulled on the parking brake for ten seconds at that speed, and the final cable adjustment was made after roll-test.

 

[Ludigdrums]

Thanks for the replies guys.

Yes, I did the procedure as you described Hib.
I also tried to "burnish" the brakes the first time I adjusted them, but I don't think it did much as I feel that they never really did anything.

Thanks for the tips!

- Jeremy

 

[Hib Halverson]

Thanks for the replies guys.

Yes, I did the procedure as you described Hib.
I also tried to "burnish" the brakes the first time I adjusted them, but I don't think it did much as I feel that they never really did anything.

If that be the case, then I suspect your belief that the cables are "stretched" might be correct.

 

[lone73]

Parking brake woes

I went thru all the above several times myself in years past. spent a bunch of $$ on new parts - cables, ss brake parts...etc. Mine will hold the car inside my garage - Steeper than that and it'll roll away. I gave up on getting it to work even a fair amount long ago. Too many other forum folks have the same prob so I assumed it was just never meant to be much more than a false sense of security for the owner. Now days my handle is about to break into two pieces from me yanking the he11 out of it trying to get a little bit of grab out of the brake shoes.

For the last 6 years I've been just leaving mine in gear if I'm parking it.

I'm actually hoping that the PB issue will be solved once and for all with the C5 brake upgrade that VB is (or was) working on. Maybe not though if they stick to the orig design. I know on my C4 the PB is integrated into the rear caliper and it works great. I would assume something similar is taking place on the C5 brakes. We'll see I guess...
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