Hi all,

I am new to this forum so be kind, I have a 2000 Mk5 Fiesta 1.25 Zetec that has developed a problem with the offside rear brake.

History: Bought the car, decided to do a brake shoe & pad change as the car is for her indoors. All went well, fronts are fine and nearside rear is fine, good pedal feel, hard and it bites well, so no issues with the braking. I have changed the handbrake cable and fitted a new wheel cylinder to the offside rear.

Here is the problem, before I changed the shoes the brakes worked fine and so did the handbrake, a little bit of excess travel but nothing serious. Now when you apply the foot brake, you hear the rear adjuster click, but when you pull on the handbrake there is a bit of a noise and the rear adjuster slips off and you are left with virtualy no handbrake on that wheel.

I have tried the two screw drivers trick, same problem, new handbrake cable, same problem. The drums are a little bit worn they are about 181mm, but they worked before, so new shoes should make it better???

The shoes are the ones with the adjuster built in so new shoes new adjuster, the springs are fine, no lube on the ratchet, it just will not hold. The new handbrake cable has given a better brake pedal but still no handbrake.

Please could you help, it's up for it's mot in six weeks, so it will fail at the moment, and to be fair, it's do my nut, tried everything I can short of drilling the adjuster cam and locking it off, but that's a nasty bodge.

 

I have figured out what is wrong and decided to post my findings.

A word of warning for people, I assume I may of just been unlucky a got a bad batch but anyone buying Pagid brake kits should be wary.

The fault turned out to be from the new adjuster ratchet, it or the spring were to weak. The near side one was fine, the adjust locked perfectly, but the offside one was weak. I was able to push the adjuster back with my finger, the old shoe I was replacing was rock solid and could not be moved with your finger. As a test, I put the old shoe back on, and bingo the handbrake worked perfectly, swapped it again with the new shoe and no handbrake.

After explaining to the guy in the shop I got them from, I got a refund and bought a kit from another shop, fitted perfectly and no problems.

 

Good to know, I was thinking faulty part after all your checking

 

thanks for posting up your findings, it will help people fault find in the future if they come across this issue