New Rear Drum and Shoes - What brand to buy?

Rust belt. Most of the parts are there but the cable is cut at the middle of the frame and the parts on the back of the wheel are rusted and need replacement. Who knows what it looks like inside of the drums. IDK how long it has been since it has been inoperable as I've only had the truck for 9 months. Really hoping that my vibration issues are related to these drums/shoes and that repair will resolve it.

 

While you're in there- you can get affordable (I think dorman sells them) replacement brake bell crank kits to free up the rusted bits on the backing plate. If you at least it working to the mid section of the truck, you can pull that lever manually and get the same effect as pulling the brake in the cab. Then find yourself a new cable to connect up the rest of it later. But for sure do the bell crank while you do the brakes. Super easy when it's all apart.

 

Just did mine last weekend.
I used

$179 TRQ Rear Brake Shoe & Drum Kit Compatible with 2005-2021 Toyota Tacoma

Amazon.com: Brake Drum & Shoe Kit Rear Set for 05-14 Toyota Tacoma : Automotive

$19 Raybestos H17432 Professional Grade Drum Brake Hardware Kit

Amazon.com: Raybestos H17432 Professional Grade Drum Brake Hardware Kit : Automotive

Bought new cylinders and adjusters but did not use them. Just returned them.
No special tool needed unless you have to cut the drum off. - Don't laugh, it happens. Shoe creates an inner ridge that can be impossible to overcome.
I just used a small screwdriver for the springs extension and a pair of pliers on the holding springs keeping the shoes in place.

Seriously spent longer getting the drums off than the replacement. Used a couple of cold chisels to wedge the drums off. - But I don't recommend it.

New brakes are great once properly adjusted.

 

Here what I'm working with. Plenty of rust on them backplates.

 

Those are not 1st gen parts.

It's easy to overcome that ridge if you back off the star adjustor through the hole in the backing plate all the way. No need to reach for a torch when a screw driver will do.

 

I'm basically planning on torching the drums to get them off. Not hopeful at all about them coming off without a fight

 

You might want to consider new backing plates too.. Not sure attaching new shoes to those is advisable. You'd have to pull the axles and bearings for that though...

 

No argument here. I had not been inside the drum before and TBH could not find the little adjuster wheel on the back by probing around with a screwdriver. I looked it up after I finished as saw a dozen videos of people cutting the drums off.

 

Ik, new backing plates would be great, but now we're really going into a fair amount of work and money. I wonder if I can just slap the new drums on there? Still would have to adjust the shoes. Ultimately i started down this path to see if the drums were the cause of the vibration and the acknowledgement that mine are pretty fucking rusted so a replacement is justified.

 

There are two threaded bolts for bolts that you turn in to remove the drum. Just make sure your parking brakes aren't engaged.

 

Got this done today. Took me way too long but that's standard. Thanks to all who chimed in.

The drums slid right off. Couldn't believe it. Those things are so rusted, as was much of the inside and backing plate. The parking brake has been broken for a few years at least (rust) so the brakes haven't been adjusted in sometime and therefore had a decent gap between the shoes and the drums. The pin that held in the front shoe on the passenger side had also rusted away. You can see it missing in the before picture i uploaded. I lost about 1/3 of the outer part of the backing plate on the passenger side. That stuff was barely hanging on. Not ideal, probably going to have to take everything back apart sometime in the future Also replaced my seized bell cranks which were probably the original source of everything going wrong.

I think this might have actually resolved my vibration issue, and it would make sense given the condition and missing spring/pin. My brakes are feeling much stronger now. Thanks all.

 

Make sure you set the pads correctly before buttoning everything up. There should be very light...almost neglible drag on the drum. You're going to also have to adjust the handbrake cable when you replace it. I take the slack out of the cable. There is an adjustment on the drum side and another near the fuel filter. I believe the FSM says that the brake should fully engage after approx 16 clicks.

 

Yeah I would slowly gather all the stuff to go back and replace most everything....

Whats really a pia is your gonna have to seperate that hub/axle to get at the back plate, and that requires special tools and a press....
not to mention you'd want to do seals, axle races, and maybe axle bearings.....thats over $300 in parts alone....

Found the backing plates everywhere for little over $100 a side....

Long time ago ....had a highschool buddy do his brakes.......one wheel locked up at about 50.......ended up in a cyclone fence.......boy he got lucky.....only destroyed his newly restored classic mustang......

When I got my tacoma I replaced everything in there but the backing plate.....cause its sooo important......
......and it was worth it to get the oem shoes.....did the bendix's and one other $30 set.....and they didnt auto adjust right....dicked with them over and over til I pulled them off and got the stealership oem ones.....mcgeorge had best price.....



Just as important as those little bitches.....the LBJ's.....

 

Yea, you're basically explaining all the reasons why I didn't do it . The backing plate overall is fine, its really the lip that is falling off.

 

Yeah I wasn't suggesting you go do it tomorrow.....just need a plan...
getting that axle apart and back together is an all day job....


Took me over a year to collect all the stuff I needed to do rear seals and bearings....
Watched all the videos......
Even my press was too low for that long of axle....couple weeks ahead of time built a platform to raise it.....

And was just in time, gear oil was just starting to seep thru driver side seal....

There's a number of repairs that I just patched up......until I got the parts, intel, and tools....

Have a bad habit of redoing anything in that vicinity while everything is apart and easy to get to....like rust hunting.......always have a rattle can of chassis black paint with me on these adventures.......silver Krylon rust convertor.....

Most non oem chassis parts......rust.......
On especially after market drums....I would carefully put a light coat of fluid film on outer surface.....

Thngs that can kill you like brakes, universals, tierods....get extra special attention too....

Best way to set a broken arm........dont break the sob to begin with.....

You know rust flakes are going to keep fallin on them shoes.....