Servo drum brakes - anyone advice?

Early Bay Forum

Help Support Early Bay Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

starbiscuit

Well-known member
Joined
Jul 18, 2012
Messages
189
Reaction score
1
Location
Herts UK
Hi all,

Looking for some servo advice for drums all round. I know similar questions have been asked here before, but not exactly this one, as far as I could see.

The other half has declared my bus brakes dangerous on account of the effort needed to emergency stop.
I'm OK with the 1970 drums and they sail through MOT, but you do need some leg muscle to achieve short stoppage.

I read some threads, and looked at the Spanish dual-servo that a number of places supply (VW Jim etc.) which is well documented, and I looked at various VW servos, the current Brazilian OEM being possibly best value.

Has anyone tried fitting a VW servo on the standard between-beams plate, but pushing the original 1970 4 drums master cylinder?
Do the servo-to-master cylinder mounting holes and push-rod line up?

Does anyone know if the Brazilian servo-with-master-cylinder will work with 4 drums, or are the circuit bias and residual vales setup for front discs, rear drums only?

I understood that the Brazil buses had wide-5 drums to 1983-ish, and servo option from 1976, so such a thing must exist, but it's not obvious if it's currently available.

Thanks for reading :)
 
As far as I know fitting a servo on the front beam like a late bay is difficult because there is no mounting plate, and also the servo would foul the hand brake cables. The handbrake cable setup is different on on a late bay, where there is only one cable until further back under the chassis. I think the best option is to go for a remote servo which can be put out of the way somewhere under the van.
I've got one with drums all round and it's one of the best things I've done. :)
 
Another one for a remote servo. I'm planning to do the same on mine. Don't (people will have) use the disc master cylinder on drums, the residual valves will be around 2psi rather than the 10 required. Means your shoes will settle further away from the drum than is ideal.
 

Latest posts

Top