90 accord dx, 270,000 miles non abs. The car currently has almost no rear brakes. Pavement, gravel or snow I can mash the brake pedal as hard as i can and the rear wheels just keep rolling. On smooth ice it will lock the rear tires but nothing else. Pulled the rear drums off and checked the brakes. shoes looked rear good- linings were about 3/16 font and rear so i resurfaced the drums and took a sander to the shoes to take any glazing off. adjusted them up and tried it. The brake pedal is real good, very solid and no fade. ebake is solid but wont lock the tires on pavement(not trying to drift it just want it to stop better). The only thing I can think of is the shoes are just old and need replaced but Im not sure. I have been master certified for 10 years and have never seen anything like this. I dont work on many hondas(which is why I bought one) so I dont know if it is something common that im missing or what.
Thanks
Nick

 

Any Ideas?

 

You sure they are adjusted correctly? Cylinders aren't leaking either? Just go with a new set of shoes....they last a REALLY long time in those Accoords. Who knows how glazed/old they are

 

Take a feeler gauge and place the shoe inside of the drum off of the car, check for gaps, It could be that the shoes are not making full contact. Also as Evs-One noted, make sure the adjustment is correct.

 

If I go up one or two clicks on the adjuster the drums drag really hard when they are all the way on. The wheel cylinders are dry and move freely(thought maybe they were siezed up). Im really thinking that the shoes are just old and dried out and no matter how much pressure I put on them there is no friction in them left if that makes sense.

Nick

 

are the drums fully seated against the hub, when you try and spin them? I've had issues where the drum hardly spins, but you throw the wheel on and tighten the lug nuts, fully seating the drum, and it will spin for days!

 

Yep fully seated. with the wheels tight I can just feel the brake shoes dragging. Like I said I have been master certified for 10 years now and have never seen anything like this. Solid pedal, adjusted shoes, resurfaced drums, but no stopping power. Initally I thought it was a prop valve issue but after looking at it it has one front and one rear on each outlet of the mc so that rules that out.

Nick

 

Do the rear brakes grab when you pull up the parking brake handle?
Have you ruled out air in the brake lines?

 

On gravel I can drift it pretty good with the e-brake on corners, same with snow and ice. On pavement even if I really yank on it it wont come close to locking up the rear brakes. After setting up the rear brakes the park brake handle only comes up about 2 inches and its fully set. The rock solid pedal ruled out the air. Thanks for the suggestions though.

Nick

 

Put new shoes on last night. E-brake works much better, regular brakes still the same. Just about out of ideas. Can someone verify for me that the prop valve is indeed the split type where each half of the MC runs one front and one rear. I thought it was. Getting really frustrated here

Nick

 

http://manchestermotorsports.com/ima....007_00005.jpg

All oem brakes use a split hydraulic circuit for redundancy. With like 99% are split front driver/rear passenger & front passenger/rear driver. They call this diagonal split or x split and even though it's more parts and more cost it's safer. If you have front/rear split and the front circuit fails, most rear brakes are not strong enough to stop the car or slow it down in a reasonable amount of time. Are you sure it's the brakes? I mean jack the car up and see if rotates, I'm thinking maybe suspension related so it feels like the brakes aren't working. I dunno bro, it sounds like you are more knowledgable than most ppl. good luck man.

 

I traced lines this morning to verify that it is indeed a diagonal split system. I thought it was but wasnt sure. So that effectivley rules out the MC. The way I have been checking the rear brakes is open the drivers door, lean out watch the rear tire and mash the pedal as hard as i can. It pretty much never stops turning. Ice, snow, gravel, doesent matter. The only things left that I thing it could be would be the prop valve (very long shot considering it has been getting progresivly worse) or the rear hoses and swelled shut inside and maybe one went before the other and I didnt notice it at first. I have never had this much problem with sonething this basic. I really dont want to go throwing parts at it but I dont know what else to do.

Nick