MTFCA Forum

A friend has some rear brake shoes for a big drum rear end and they don't have a lip around them to hook on the backing plate tabs, they have been used and appear to work but I don't see what keeps them in place. Does anyone have any experience with shoes like this or should we be looking for shoes with the lip? Thanks, Dennis

They should have a lip. Take a look at my thread "Getting Rattles Back On The Road" https://www.mtfca.com/phpBB3/viewtopic. ... &start=400 Page 5 about 3/4 of the way down you can see what I did with my E brake. Hope this helps.

I am aware that most shoes have a lip, these don't and never did, has anyone seen shoes like them in action or do we need to find others that have a lip?

Not an original 1926-‘27 T part. Either a different year, an after market part, or a part to a different brand of car. Not a Model T part. Look for shoes with a lip. Jim Patrick

A picture of the shoes would be good to see.
No evidence of grinding away the edges? Ford script anywhere?
Early large drum housings have the large hex drain plug.(same as crankcase)
They also had a large washer on the outside of the cam to retain the ends of the shoes. I have some of these early housings, however they all have tabs on the backing plates to hold the shoes in place. I have never seen a backing plate without some variation of tabs.
Its possible that the large cam washer was all there was to keep the shoe in place & was dropped for the tabs early on.

When I bought my 1926 coupe in 1970, all of the emergency brake shoe retainer clips were worn off. I was able to buy perfect replacement retainer clips from Snyder’s removed the remnants of the old clips and riveted the replacements on. They work great! Jim Patrick

" They work great!" The clips do work great if there are ridges on the shoes. The OP indicates the shoes do not have ridges, therefore the clips are only 50% of the solution. jb

Yes. Even though the OP does not need them, I figured this would be a good thread to inform others who might not know the retainer clips are available. Thank you. Jim Patrick

I’ll bet you can make your own lip by pop-riveting on four small pieces of strategically spaced angle iron, ground down to the right thickness to accommodate the catch of the retainer clips. Of course, before doing so, you will need to grind four grooves into the back side of the shoes the length and thickness of the angle so that the shoe fits flush to the backside of the plate. This is the only way I can envision these being used on a ‘26-‘27.

Thanks for all of the replies, I don't have the shoes here to take pictures. Evidently no one has seen shoes like this with no lip. We are building a rear end from parts but you can tell by the wear on the linings that these have been run before(enough to wear out the lining). We will probably do as Jim suggested and weld short sections on the shoe to ride in the tabs. Dennis

Here are a couple of diagrams. Even though my T is a 1926 coupe, manufactured in March of 1926, mine has the brake style shown in the 1927 diagram. Jim Patrick

Replacement shoes are available but somewhat spendy (for my budget). Here's a good photo from Lang's of a '26-'27 shoe, which also shows the followers that the brake cam rides on. Often the followers (aka 'lugs') are worn along with the cams, both need to be in good shape for the rear brakes to work well.

https://cdn.modeltford.com/i/c/475048l.jpg

Lang's may have a good pair of used shoes, they have many good used and NOS parts for sale that are not listed in the catalog, might be worth a call. And worth purchasing given the time and effort required to modify the old shoes, especially if the cam lugs are worn. Best, jb

PS I see a pair of used shoes in the classifieds tonight. I have no association with that seller, or the items offered, jb