Uh oh... It's me again. I'm the guy that went to Maaco and they told me it was going to cost me $1400 to replace shoes, drums, and wheel cylinders. Anyway, I had my mechanic buddy put the new shoes and cylinders on, and bleed the brakes. The master cylinder was bone dry at the time. We bled all of the brakes, and I pumped and pumped as he went around to each wheel and bled them, etc. The brakes pumped up nicely, but after finishing the last one, they fell flat again. So this time we bled the master cylinder. Well, once we were done, I couldn't move the car because of some other issues. But yesterday, when I finally got the car up and running again, and pulled forward, I had to use all of my power to get that car to stop, and that was just when it was drifting. If I had been going down my driveway, I'd probably be dead right now. The brakes barely engaged. He's gotta come back out and look at them again, but what could that possibly be? There's no fluid in the driveway, the lines don't have leaks, the shoes are new, the cylinders are holding, assuming the master cylinder has fluid in it... What gives?
New drum brakes aren't braking on my 72' Malibu
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When M/Cs go dry, the inner valve can sometimes get some surface rust/corrode. If the surface rusts, the seal can get ripped/damaged causing the M/C to bypass and not generate pressure.
One test you can do is get some fittings with either barb ends or tubing and have the tubes go back in to the reservoir, immersed in brake fluid. After a few strokes, you should be getting mass volumes of fluid being pushed through the tubes, if there is little to no fluid being pushed, your M/C is bypassing and it needs to be replaced.
One test you can do is get some fittings with either barb ends or tubing and have the tubes go back in to the reservoir, immersed in brake fluid. After a few strokes, you should be getting mass volumes of fluid being pushed through the tubes, if there is little to no fluid being pushed, your M/C is bypassing and it needs to be replaced.
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Are your brake shoes adjusted to the drums. You might want to check that also.
x2 - I've had this problem before- You can have everything bled and working, but if the shoes are not adjusted out far enough in the drum, they'll never stop the car.
They should be adjusted out far enough that when you spin the drum by hand you hear/feel the shoe dragging slightly.
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