Brake drum leaking - shoe removal necessary?

[rgk]

One of my drums is leaking brake fluid, and I suspect it's the wheel cylinder. The Haynes manual says to remove the brake shoe assembly before removing the wheel cylinder. Is this necessary, or is it possible just to remove and replace the cylinder itself without touching the shoe assembly?

[4xq]

Those springs are fairly strong, so you'll need to remove them to get the wheel cylinder off. They pull the top of the brake shoe back against the wheel cylinder pretty strongly.

Don't know if you've done many brake jobs, but if those brake shoes have had brake fluid on them for awhile, they should be replaced. Brake fluid doesn't really damage the shoe material, but if it has soaked down into the shoe it can essentially dissolve the bonding adhesives that hold the shoe to the metal.

You could clean the shoes with brake cleaner, and the heat from braking will burn the rest of the fluid off, if you want to reuse the shoes. But its just better to use new shoes. And if you put new shoes on one side, you must do the other.

Sounds like you are doing quite a bit of work on this truck!

[NismoPick]

The Haynes manual says to remove the brake shoe assembly before removing the wheel cylinder. Is this necessary,

Why use a repair manual if you aren't going to follow procedure? If you look at the pictures, or pull off the drum, you'll see why. It takes 10 minutes to get everything off, 10 minutes to get everything back on. You'd spend HOURS fiddling with all those parts if you don't remove them.

[rgk]

Thanks. I've performed a lot of car repairs, but never drums.