I'm in the midst of redoing my rear after a bearing failure and just got in some parts from Chev's of the 40's today. In with the parts are my new brake shoes. Problem is, the friction material is the same length on all 4 shoes. I expected to have the short brake material in the front and the longer in the back. Is this the way they come now as repop? Been a while since I did shoes - like years - and the last ones I bought had the differing lengths on the friction material.
Shoes are sold as fitting 36-50. Thanks for any insights.
Link is breaking for some reason - copy/paste the entire URL.
Just can't figure these new ones that are all the same. Anybody that's redone brakes recently let me know what you found when you bought new shoes. Thanks very much.
I believe Hucks have the same shoe for both. That is the way mine are. With the Huck brakes, the forward shoe does most of the work going forward and the back shoe in reverse.
Huck brake has a "floating" pivot. Link arms at the bottom allow the "shoes" to move more lateral. The Bendix shoes pivot and become a wedge. That makes for a "leading"(longer shoe) and a "trailing"(short shoe). The rotation of the drum "wedges" the leading shoe(more pressure and friction) so it is longer. The "trailing shoe is just pushed against the drum and has less force on it. This might help explain: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-leading-shoe_drum_brake Any way the shoes on the Huck system are the same. The Bendix shoes are long and short. Advantage Huck vs, Bendix? Cost and availability. Bendix parts are cheaper and easier to get. The effect is much the same. Properly adjusted Huck brakes work well. Properly adjusted Bendix brakes work well. Stopping is about the same with either system. The company(GM) changed for cost reasons, in my opinion.
If I remember correctly, the Bendix system has the shorter shoe as the forward shoe. Contrary to the link above, the rear shoe ends up doing most of the work.
