Follow Our Progress
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January 11th 2004
I just couldn't take the grinding noise and the lack of brakes on the
Jeep. With the wheels making the grinding noise even when the
brakes were disengaged, I knew that we couldn't tow it on the trip to
Quartzsite. Today being Sunday I had two choices. Ignore the
Jeep problem until Monday when I could pay a mechanic to fix it (and get
some more work done on the bus for the trip), or dive in and get the
parts that I think MIGHT fix the Jeep and hope for the best...
I couldn't ignore the Jeep. It's our only form of
transportation to and from the bus. In addition, without the Jeep
I would not feel comfortable taking the bus to Quartzsite. The
Jeep is our "life raft" and with the brakes grinding away I
needed to do something...
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I found a parts store that was open and after
talking about it with my friend Alan, decided that the problem
was most likely the wheel cylinders.
That didn't explain the emergency brake problem, but it was a
good place to start, so I drove the Jeep to the parts store and
picked up both rear wheel cylinders.
I pulled the left side first to get some idea of what shape
the "normal" one was in so I could identify the
problem with the one making all of the noise... |
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When I pulled off the right wheel things were
quite different. For one, parts started falling out...
The brake adjustment assembly was just hanging there.
The lower spring was dangling and the adjustment rod had separated
and was grinding against the inside of the brake drum. |
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Here's all of the parts that I found that were
literally ground with flat spots and just loose inside the right
rear drum brake.
As far as I can tell, what happened is that the tension cable
for the automatic brake adjustment assembly broke in half which
released the spring and allowed the brake adjustment rod to spin
freely and disconnect.
I suspect that one of the hitch installers pulled the
emergency brake up hard enough to break the tension cable (not
all that surprising considering how rusted out everything
was)... |
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At this point it became obvious that I was going
to have to replace a lot more then just the wheel cylinder, and I
couldn't think of a graceful way to get the wheel back on and
drive the Jeep to the parts store, so I called on my friend Alan
for some help.
I called around and found a brake repair kit that
contained the parts I needed. Alan headed right over and
drove me to the parts store and back. I picked up the rear
brake pads, some tools and a decent floor jack while I was there.
Alan not only took me back to the house with the
parts, but stayed until late this evening making sure that I did
the job to his high level of perfection <grinning> |
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Since I had them, I put the new wheel cylinders in
and Alan and I installed all of the new parts.
After some joking around and trying to follow the manual which
made no mention of the parts that were broken, Alan recommended
that we just compare the two sides and forget the manual.
15 minutes later everything was back together on the right side
and we went to work putting the new wheel cylinder and pads on the
left side. |
Alan stuck around to make sure that the brake lines were
free of air bubbles and for the results of the test run around the
block... Everything seems to be back to normal - the brakes work
fine and don't make any noise and the emergency brake is back to being as
crappy as it was before it was broken. All is good with the Jeep
again.
Unfortunately, the Jeep project lasted until this evening,
so I got absolutely nothing done on the bus other than to turn it around
and back it into Tedds yard again... We have only tomorrow to take
care of the turn signal, get new tires, mount the gray water tank and a
host of other miscellaneous things related to the bus... Somewhere
in there we have to think about packing for a 2-3 week adventure...
I think I'd better get going! |
