Ok, I need some advice. My brakes on my Z suck. They haven't bean good for about 3 years but as of last summer they got to an all-time low. The problem is bad brake pressure before, where i could pretty much get brake peddle all the way to the floor at any point when i was stopped. I did regular maintenance over the years of disk brakes, (rotors and pads), drums and pads and bleeding after i changed a rear wheel cylinder but nothing has improved. As of last summer i started running into the problem of my ABS getting to excited at 5mph where when i would pull in the driveway and slow to a stop the ABS would kick in. So i finally got around to changing the drums this fall and doing the pads as well. When I tried to adjust them, I can't spin the adjuster wheel with just my fingers, I have to use a screw driver. I followed protocol and everything, but now my E-brake won't completely lock my rear wheels up. I can put it in drive with the e-brake on and they will still break lose to move forward. I'm not sure where I went wrong with these brakes, but i miss that good ol feeling of being sure your brakes were solid. I find the ABS to do that over compensation more when i leave gas stations, as in the car has bean shut off, then when i leave and stop at the end of the lot to wait to get on the road they'll go nuts. However, it doesn't do it in stop and go driving in the city or when i come to a stop off of an exit on the highway. One of these days i'm going to call it quits on the drums and do the conversion, but for now, i'd like to figure this problem out. I never even knew that the drums came in 2 different sizes. I hope i still got my old drums at home so i can compare them. The autozone guy never asked me what size i had.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Sounds like problems with your brake booster. But wait for other replies, i just know mostly rotors, pads, brake lines and proportioning valve., and e brake.

You might have the wrong size drums. Check them.

The front ABS sensors are probably covered in crud, clean them up good.

Sounds like you need to bleed the system a good one. Did the MC ever get air in it? Like you let it run out? ABS module could have air in it too. I'd rebleed just about everything if I were you.

you may have to power bleed the whole system to get all the air out, and I'm with C.T.S. on the wheel speed sensors, I work on Chevy medium duty trucks, and the speed sensors are very sensitve. The hard part is going to be figuring out which sensor is going bad.


Lifes too short to drink cheap beer.

If I can't find my old drums, how can i find out what size of drum I should have on? Can the dealer pull that up from using my VIN?

BeachZ24 wrote:If I can't find my old drums, how can i find out what size of drum I should have on? Can the dealer pull that up from using my VIN?

yes! i would have a friend push on the brake while you check out the rubber lines in the front and rear. and completely change your brake fluid and bleed the system. clean and re-lube the front brake caliper slides and clean the rear shoes and hardware with brake clean. then remove the adjuster and clean it and re-lube it so it functions properly. also a bit of lube on the rear shoes where they touch the backing plate it a good idea also.


see ya!

Drums:
200mm 95-02
230mm 03-05

Got those numbers off Napa.. They don't seem right, I didn't think the difference was that much. I should look around some more.....

^ Correction: should be 200 and 225.