Sunday, July 5, 2009

Rear Brakes & Bearing Replacement Complete

Today I finished up repairing the rear brakes and bearings. Since I had already painted everything, it was not a very difficult job. However, it has been over 100 degrees for the past 10 days so it was not relaxing my any means.

I stripped the rear axle flange and about 1" inward. This cleaned up the mounting points. This also gives me a little more flexibility when the time comes to strip and repaint the entire axle. I can leave the brakes installed and bag off the ends of the axle if I want.

I purchased brake shoes, cylinders, drums, deluxe hardware kit, and gaskets to finish off the rear axle job. I was pleased with the parts as they are all by Wagner. However, the deluxe hardware kit was missing a spring for a bar which presses out on the pads and the cylinders did not come with the push rods.

After I installed everything, I took the car for a drive around the block. There was previously a chirp or squeak type noise with each rotation of the passenger tire. As I drove, I could here a tick type noise from the same side. Once I made it home, I found the GT emblem on the hubcap was loose. I fixed that but have not taken it out for a drive to confirm it was the source.

I'll likely wait to install the carburetor for a couple of weeks. I've been really busy and want to have the car together for a while. It is so hot I don't know that I will drive it but I don't want a another project waiting on me when I get home from work.

I'll test out the car with the G-Timer in the next few days. I plan to make a spreadsheet to track all the items I change and the results on the G-Timer. I'm not sure if it will be worth the effort but it will be nice to actually see the improvements made.

I really wish I could have done the first run before I switched to synthetic oil, changed to an open element filter, rebuilt the carb, and set the timing. These things seemed to make a difference in performance but I can substatiate it with numbers.

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