Ok, yesterday I started noticing a noise coming from my right brake drum. I found it odd b/c my car is only a year old and I haven't had to replace the front pads yet. The rule of thumb is every second time you replace your pads you are also supposed to replace the shoes. Well the noise sometimes gets quiet then will get noisy again. My first thought is that I had a small rock in the drum. So I pop the wheel off (made sure the e-brake was off)and tried to take the drum off but it won't budge. I found this interesting b/c that is a symptom that the shoes are shot. I'm not sure where to go from here. I'm really kinda ____ed that the brakes could even possibly be gone when they only do 30% of the braking. On top of this I never have had all that great of an e-brake(kinda weak) Has anyone had a similar problems?What did you do? :?:

 

Bump?

 

Check and see if the drum is bolted on from the back. I've seen cars set up this way.

 

Yeah I checked, it's not.

 

Any luck with it yet?

 

You have to thread a bolt in one of the 2 holes in-between the lug studs. This will push the drum off. It's metric but not sure of the size.
The rear brakes do so little braking they usually last through 2 sets of front pads.

 

8mmx1.0mm

toyota tends to run a relavitely high rear brake bias on their drum setups, how many miles do you have on the car? Generally you should get around 30k at least out of a set of drums unless you are real real abusive on brakes. Even on my drag car i get around 3 seasons on a set of drums. before i get flamed for that, the drum setup is actually lighter than the disc layout ont he neons hehe.

 

BUMP

I have never changed my drums and i think im hearing squeel now too....cant find in tech how to swap drums and pads....any info on this?

 

OK, I figured out the problem. Yes, you do need the bolts to remove the drum.As you thread the bolts in,the drum is pushed off. Apparently, the squealing noise is caused by build up of brake dust inside the drum. After removing the drum, I used brake cleaner to hose down all the internals. This included the inside of the drum itself. Now that It is all bolted back together, I haven't heard a sound. Apparently, Toyota suggest that this is done every 15k. It didn't take long and it was a pretty easy process.

 

Rule of thumb: every second time that you change your front, you will then need to change the rear. How many miles do you have? Chances are that they just need a good cleaning.

 

Well finally checked my shoes...and after around 95,000 miles of driving, where i have changed the front brakes around 4/5 times ( i guess i ride em hard)....and never the shoes in the rear...

AND THERE STILL FINE!....guess we dont use em or something....but i atleast cleaned it out.....full of residue...hmmmm...weird...