Drum Brakes Howl
 

2005 Ranger, 2WD, auto, 3.0 litre. Just replaced shoes, drums, wheel cylinders, spring and hardware kits, adjuster kits on rear. Have had problem in past with right rear wanting to over adjust on its own. Right rear keeps howling at about 20 or so MPH, particularly when trurning left. Had apart again today, to check the adjuster, and clean and wire brush the dust off the pads, with brake clean. New adjuster.adjustment was fine. Re assembled, adjusted so just touching/dragging drum lightly, on both sides. Ran it down the hiway for about 10 miles, same result??? Scratching my head on this. Adjusters are NOT on backwards. Thoughts????

Wheel bearing?

Block front tires
Jack up that wheel
Put trans in Neutral
spin the tire
apply the brakes
Then spin tire again to see if it is releasing after brakes were applied
Could have something in the brake line acting as a valve, allows brake pressure but doesn't allow quick release of that pressure

Thanks RonD. The right side rear drum keeps tightening up. I backed off the adjuster today, and gone. Question is, why does that side keep tightening up? I just don't get it. WTF did I miss?

The adjuster(star wheel) only tightens when you use the brakes when backing up, or when you use the e-brake.

People with automatics often get loose rear brakes because they never use e-brake

So the star wheel is either not being locked in place by the lever so free to move on forward braking or slave is not releasing pressure fully


When you remove the rubber plug to access the star wheel you should not be able to loosen brake shoe pressure without pushing lever out of the way
And it should be hard to tighten but turnable without pushing on level
Could be lever is worn, but never seen that happen