I've had the problem whereby my rear right drum would lock up the tire. This particular phenomenon only occured under specific conditions. There has to have been moisture on the ground, and the vehicle must have been sitting for at least an hour or more. Once I start out down the road and ever so gently depress the brake pedal the tire would lock up. :gee: This would continue to be the case for roughly 1/4 mile until it sorted itself out.
I was told (by a senior Jeep Mechanic) that this is a classic Jeep condition. Additionally, Jeep had tried many different solutions but could never isolate the problem and that the only thing that I could do was to take it easy on the stoppy pedal for that first 1/4 mile. Well CRAP!
Anyway, I've been living with this condition for a couple years now and it just plain old sucked.
Recently, I put the back end up on a jack to listen for a possible bad bearing in the axle and quickly discovered that the rear left brake cylinder wasn't actuating at all. I had known for quite a long time that the braking was really poor in my heap, but never got around to dealing with it.
So, it all started to come together in my mind. For a long time now, the rear right brake has been doing double duty and getting no assistance from the left side. Once I removed the bleepin' drums I found the conditions back there were atrocious. I ended up spending $180 at NAPA to get the following replacement parts: new drums; new shoes; new springs; new adjusters; one new brake cylinder; fluid. I took all the parts that were going to be reused (which were very few) out and cleaned about 10 years worth of rusty grimy nastiness off with a steel wheel brush. FYI, I had recently replaced only the right side cylinder and thats why I didn't buy two this time around. For future reference, I will replace them both at the same time. I pieced Humpty Dumpty back together again and took it out. All went well.
I've been driving it for several weeks now in MA. We've had our share our rain, sleet, ice and snow in that time and I haven't had the lock up problem, and an added bonus is that the sphincter pucker factor has been greatly reduced while going steeply down hill off road.
I still don't understand what moisture and sitting stationary have to do with the problem, but I don't care either.
One last note, is that I have a 94 XJ with a Chrysler 8.25 rear.
If this gremlin does return, I'll post the bad news back to this thread.
Hope this helps some peeps out there suffering from this condition.
I was told (by a senior Jeep Mechanic) that this is a classic Jeep condition. Additionally, Jeep had tried many different solutions but could never isolate the problem and that the only thing that I could do was to take it easy on the stoppy pedal for that first 1/4 mile. Well CRAP!
Anyway, I've been living with this condition for a couple years now and it just plain old sucked.
Recently, I put the back end up on a jack to listen for a possible bad bearing in the axle and quickly discovered that the rear left brake cylinder wasn't actuating at all. I had known for quite a long time that the braking was really poor in my heap, but never got around to dealing with it.
So, it all started to come together in my mind. For a long time now, the rear right brake has been doing double duty and getting no assistance from the left side. Once I removed the bleepin' drums I found the conditions back there were atrocious. I ended up spending $180 at NAPA to get the following replacement parts: new drums; new shoes; new springs; new adjusters; one new brake cylinder; fluid. I took all the parts that were going to be reused (which were very few) out and cleaned about 10 years worth of rusty grimy nastiness off with a steel wheel brush. FYI, I had recently replaced only the right side cylinder and thats why I didn't buy two this time around. For future reference, I will replace them both at the same time. I pieced Humpty Dumpty back together again and took it out. All went well.
I've been driving it for several weeks now in MA. We've had our share our rain, sleet, ice and snow in that time and I haven't had the lock up problem, and an added bonus is that the sphincter pucker factor has been greatly reduced while going steeply down hill off road.
I still don't understand what moisture and sitting stationary have to do with the problem, but I don't care either.
One last note, is that I have a 94 XJ with a Chrysler 8.25 rear.
If this gremlin does return, I'll post the bad news back to this thread.
Hope this helps some peeps out there suffering from this condition.
