Hello. This one has me stumped. Wife’s car is a ’98 Ford Taurus with disc brakes front and drum brakes back, no anti-lock. About a week ago she went to make a normal stop and the back wheels locked up about half way through the stopping distance and she slid into the intersection. This was at the start of a light rain and speed was 45 mph. Brakes were fine before and after this. Saturday while driving 35mph on a sweeping turn she applied brakes lightly and the rear locked up and caused the car to fish tail; the road was wet. Again, brakes were fine just before and just after. Because it is wet(both times)there is no screeching tires and smoke. She says she believes that at least one and maybe both tires lock up. Says the pedal feels just fine. She has some hearing loss and notices no odd noises. She feels it is definitely the rear brakes. She is also not good with mechanical things
I’ve done my best to replicate the problem without success. Dry pavement, wet pavement, from gradual stops to hard stops, cold brakes and hot brakes; lots and lots of stops. The car stops well without any significant pull to either side for me.
I replaced the brakes 10 weeks ago. Used Monroe ceramic pads on the front and DuraLast shoes on the rear. Also put new Wagner wheel cylinders and a Wagner hardware kit on the back. The front rotors and rear drums were in good shape so I reused them after deglazing. I also flushed the system with Prestone DOT3 brake fluid. Fluid level remains constant in the master cylinder.
A couple of weeks ago I made a hard stop from 45 MPH to see how everything was working with some miles on the new brakes. Stopped OK. Since then the above problem has cropped up. Don’t know if it’s related.
I pulled both drums Sunday and everything looked fine. No leaks, wet linings, damaged or out of place hardware. Shoes and drum look fine. There was a small “rock” partially embedded in the lining of the left rear leading shoe, at the top. It looked like a small piece of crushed limestone, same color as the lining, and around 0.040 – 0.050 inch across. It had plowed a short groove, about 3/8-inch from the edge of the lining to where the rock was, in the direction of wheel rotation. I couldn’t see any corresponding groove in the drum. I think that maybe the rock is a hard chunk of the lining material, with the color match. Removed the rock, put it back together and all seems to work fine.
Does anyone have any ideas? Could this be an issue with the proportioning valve? I looked at the proportioning valve and could not get the little actuating buttons to noticeably move. Does the valve need to have hydraulic pressure for the buttons to stick out to be actuated? Thanks in advance for your help. Sorry for the long post but wanted to give as much information as possible.
I’ve done my best to replicate the problem without success. Dry pavement, wet pavement, from gradual stops to hard stops, cold brakes and hot brakes; lots and lots of stops. The car stops well without any significant pull to either side for me.
I replaced the brakes 10 weeks ago. Used Monroe ceramic pads on the front and DuraLast shoes on the rear. Also put new Wagner wheel cylinders and a Wagner hardware kit on the back. The front rotors and rear drums were in good shape so I reused them after deglazing. I also flushed the system with Prestone DOT3 brake fluid. Fluid level remains constant in the master cylinder.
A couple of weeks ago I made a hard stop from 45 MPH to see how everything was working with some miles on the new brakes. Stopped OK. Since then the above problem has cropped up. Don’t know if it’s related.
I pulled both drums Sunday and everything looked fine. No leaks, wet linings, damaged or out of place hardware. Shoes and drum look fine. There was a small “rock” partially embedded in the lining of the left rear leading shoe, at the top. It looked like a small piece of crushed limestone, same color as the lining, and around 0.040 – 0.050 inch across. It had plowed a short groove, about 3/8-inch from the edge of the lining to where the rock was, in the direction of wheel rotation. I couldn’t see any corresponding groove in the drum. I think that maybe the rock is a hard chunk of the lining material, with the color match. Removed the rock, put it back together and all seems to work fine.
Does anyone have any ideas? Could this be an issue with the proportioning valve? I looked at the proportioning valve and could not get the little actuating buttons to noticeably move. Does the valve need to have hydraulic pressure for the buttons to stick out to be actuated? Thanks in advance for your help. Sorry for the long post but wanted to give as much information as possible.
