Touringcuda

I have located a brake shop to reline my shoes. Do I just remove the spring and pivot the shoes free on the lower shoe anchor bolts or are the bolts removed first? Pictures are on previous post. Thanks Bob

Sorry for delay in reposting. I removed the drivers side front brake drum and found that 1 of the rivet heads, on the front facing shoe, was beginning to lightly score the drum. The adjacent rivet on the shoe was just starting to touch, (shiny). The other 6 rivets on this shoe still had a good bit of lining remaining. The rear facing shoe was fine with lining thickness over all 8 rivets comparable to the 6 good rivets on the front facing shoe. I appears that the troubling rivet was not counterbored deep enough when the lining was replaced. When we got the car back in 2011 I was told the brakes had been done which is probably true. The passenger side front shoe lining is fine with lots of, (half ?) lining left. We have put close to 10,000 miles on it since then. It would appear that maybe 20,000 miles might be a normal expectancy of front shoe wear? I pulled the rear hubs last year to troubleshoot a hot rear drum and it was just a shoe that was hung up on a clip. The rear shoes looked almost new. I have attached pictures of the brakes. Should I replace the lining on, both front brakes drivers side front just the lining where rivet is an issue I may have located a local shop to reline shoes. Front facing lining is 1 1/2" wide by 11 3/4" long. Rear facing lining is 1 1/2" wide by 10 1/2 long. Drum is 11 " diameter. I used 0 - 1 mics to rough gauge lining thickness. Front facing lining checked close to rivet top to bottom (lining still on shoe) 0.285 0.260 0.280 0.300 Maybe original lining 3/16 ? Does this sound right? I now know to remove drums and inspect brakes for wear at least every other year. And as an added question both rear facing shoes on front brakes have an approximately .030" shim under the lining. Is this common to achieve a certain diameter overall? Thanks in advance Bob

Thanks for the help. 🙂 That looks a lot like my front wheel except for the lug nuts. When we got the car it needed new tires. We had 4 flats the first year. Bad tubes. Coker replaced tubes no charge. I bought 4 bolts (9/16 fine thread I if I remember correctly) cut off the heads and slotted them for a screw driver. It made it a lot easier changing tires. Did Dodge always have lug nuts? Were they left hand on one side and right hand on the other? Now I have to find someone to reline my shoes. Bob

I want to pull the front brake drums to inspect the shoes. The bearing cover is an 8 sided stamping. I looks to me like you would tap it side to side to loosen for removal. With a dead blow hammer I gave it several opposing hits but no movement. Do I need to hit harder or am I approaching the task wrong? Sometimes we over thing the problem. I do not want to destroy anything. Thanks in advance Bob

I have been following this post and took an interest because I used an identical puller on our car a month ago. Is the picture at the beginning of the post the actual setup now in use or a stock picture. I might suggest results would be better with an even pull using all 3 arms of the puller. One lug nut is missing. When you first put tension in the puller the threaded screw should try to center on the axel. A secondary question. Did dodge always use lug nuts? Our 32 DeSoto has lug bolts. What a pain changing tires. I use 2 headless bolts to remove and mount tires.

I tried to copy and paste my spreadsheet from excel but it did not want to work for me. So here goes with the math. Redline on our engine is 3400 revolutions/minute. (75 horsepower) 4.62 final drive ratio will give me 735.93 tire revolutions per minute wide open. 92 inch tire circumference takes me 67,705.56 inches in that minute. (18 x 5.50 tires) That is 5,642.13 feet (a shade over a mile) 1.0685 miles. 60 miles per hour is a mile a minute. I would be going 64.12 miles an hour to cover that mile and use up all of my tire revolutions. I will try to get the spreadsheet posted. Bob

I saw your post and it reminded me of a similar question I had with our 32 DeSoto. How fast can it go. If you measure the circumference of your tire in inches. Knowing there are 5280 feet or 63360 inches per mile. Also you need to know your final drive ratio. With this information our DeSoto with 4.62 final drive and will red line at 63 miles per hour. I usually drive between 45 - 50. As an added note the speed limit in Ohio in 1932 was 45 MPH. This should give you an idea of what your car is capable of speed wise. I generated a spreadsheet for our car to see rpm per miles per hour. It aggravates me that I cant keep up with a Model A Ford because of their 3.73 rear end. Bob

Piston #6 Any thoughts on "B" "C" 117 maybe machinist or inspection All bores are .010 over size. I do not know if engine was ever rebuilt. #6 Intake valve is different than the others. there are some small stencils also..... s on #6 for example. Bores look good. Compression test last fall were all a touch less than 90#. Looks like SC DeSoto and DK Dodge were the same pistons. There was lots of carbon. I scraped it with a utility knife blade. Bob

Piston #5

Piston #4

Piston #3

Piston #2

The history of our car is vague. In 1991 it won a trophy in Carlisle Spring Car Show when the restoration was done. I believe it had a AACA Senior. It appears to have been a rust free car. As far as the engine we can only guess. We have had the car since 2011. This is the first that I have had the head off. A good friend miced the bores the other day and found them all to be 10 over. I will post more pictures of piston tops and maybe we can decode further the stencils. There was lots of carbon. My plans are to put head back on for now and pull engine this fall for further exam. We have 2 tours planned this summer. Bob

One more pic that dodge bros. may find interesting. note stencil on #1 piston. 2 thru six are the same. Number 1 is for #1 piston. What does B signify? 117 may be an inspector? Obviously Kilroy was not here. I would load the other 5 pics but I might overload the internet...........😉 SC-DK.

Rear of radiator