Front shoes are wider than rear shoes.
Something is seriously wrong if you have binding when buttoning it all up.
You shouldn't have to modify anything to make it fit.
Do your axles have the correct wheel bearings and retainer plates?
Is everything back there all original design?

 

Yep, all stock ... '56 stuff.

First shoes also only lasted 10K miles in the rear – but we put that down to being softer brake material. The second set were Raybestos and lasted same. I never sensed the rears were doing more of the work ... only in the middle of all this (recent two weeks) when the brakes would lock up easily.

Last year, and with the second set of shoes in place, a brake booster was fitted (Hydrovac style) but that is plumbed right after the master cylinder so could not favour one end over the other. Except for a more responsive pedal there was no change to the actual braking.

New hose set 5K miles back as well.

But like I said, when we ground off the corner edge of the linings and took 0.5mm off the edge of the shoes (both sides) the wheels bolted up fine and now brakes fine too.

 

Besides the drag, seeing the fts like new and the rears gone in 10K, sounds like a system issue where the rears are doing all the work.

 

Oh ... when I said there fronts were "all good" I meant the set-up of the new styled hubs ... nothing there to cause noise.

But I do recall when the previous set of shoes were changed it was just the rears that had expired, the fronts still had 50% on them. And that was about the same case we saw last week.

I am just figuring that it was the lower return springs had stretched and the rear shoes were just staying slightly 'on' the whole time.

 

How wide are the rear shoes?
Just to make sure, the shoes with the lesser amount of lining are toward the front of the car, on all four wheels?

 

46.5mm (1.83") – current and previous sets are the same.

Yes, the rear sets have the thicker lining material to the rear. But we noticed last week that the fronts are the wrong way around – and are changing them to be correct when we replace cylinders (one has started to leak) on Thursday.

 

IIRC, front shoes are 2" and rears are 1.75"
So it sounds like yours are a bit wider.

And thicker doesn't sound right.
The shoe with the shorter lining should be toward the front of the car. Servo action means the front shoe uses force from the rotating drum to apply pressure to the rear shoe., so the rear shoe would wear too fast if the linings had the same amount of surface area.

 

Thanks!

And thicker doesn't sound right.
The shoe with the shorter lining should be toward the front of the car. Servo action means the front shoe uses force from the rotating drum to apply pressure to the rear shoe., so the rear shoe would wear too fast if the linings had the same amount of surface area.

Probably with service replacement shoes there are variations all over the place. Both recent sets came from the same specialists 567 Chev parts company, albeit different brands – so nothing is 'brake shop generic'. We could see that recent shoes had only marginally longer material for the back, whereas the earlier Raybestos brand was noticeably longer. But both sets had thicker/thinner variations.

And the previous shoes are now up at the brake shop getting relined with bonded linings – so I will have those as ready-to-go replacements for next time.

 

I have been harping about the organic material currently used on brake shoes for a while now. It is not as good in terms of friction and longevity as the old asbestos brake shoes were. I used name brand organic shoes in 2015, did not work. Scary stopping with four wheel drum brakes. Immediately changed to another name brand, not much better. Then swapped over to a complete set of Muscle Car Brakes ceramic matrix shoes. Big difference in both stopping and longevity. Not cheap, I think they are still around $120 per set but after having them on the car for a couple of years now, there is no way I would go back to over the counter shoes.

 

It looks to me like that rear shoe isn't seated against the anchor pin. If so, that would cause problems in a hurry.

 

Here’s another view of same:

The braking function was all fine as we re-assembled … and it was just the shoe edges catching as it was all tightened up that have problems – but the grinder fixed that.

Just my lasting question is, should I be putting a washer onto the pin to get rid of that slight bit of in/out play of the shoe ends?

 

No. I'd worry about the shoes binding and not be free to move around a bit.

 

I was taught to tighten the adjustment out until I couldn’t turn adjuster any more even after it has locked the drum and then loosen adjuster till wheel barely dragged when turning,I use praise muscle car brake shoes and they stop great.

 

Update:

The new cylinders went into the fronts yesterday and we are all good. (And the shoes on one side that were the wrong way around were rectified.)

Next I am going to buy a set of replacement spring sets all round – just to change over when the thing is next up in the air.

And the mechanic helping me with this asked about a dual master cylinder – what would be an appropriate upgrade to fit behind a PS generator. Is this sort of thing going to do it?

55 56 57 CHEVY MASTER CYLINDER DUAL CONVERSION DRUM BRAKES | eBay

Last time I searched these things were not around – there was an expensive 60s Corvette items around ... or early Camaro, as I recall.

Advice welcome.