Wheel noise from hard brake pads?

[mutley]

Originally Posted by plaine

I'm hoping to give this a go this weekend. Any pointers for a new scuffer? Just going for a scuff, no material removal, I understand. Probably go the cut off wheel route since I have one already. Never worked on brakes, but the above diagram was a big help. Also looked at a few videos on brake repair just to see what I'll be looking at, though couldn't find one specifically on scuffing. Is there a particular spot to scuff? Maybe that'll be obvious once I'm in there. Thanks, all.

It's very common to do on disks, not so common on drums. If the drum is groved you will absolutely have to remove material for it to be of any use at all.
What you want is something like this.
https://www.amazon.com/50-Pc-2-Inch-.../dp/B00QW4QTDA
Preferable with a very flexible mandrel / pad holder. Then run it around the inside of the drum. You should also run it quickly over the shoe as well, but lightly and with a fine pad.

On a disk you can get build up of chemicals from a variety of reasons, and this will make the steering wheel and/or brake pedal pulsate making it feel like you have warped disks when in fact it's only the disk pad slipping and catching. You use a 3M style abrasive pad on the disk surface to scratch it up and clean the chemicals to fix the problem. On disks, it "seems" the stopped at lights with foot on brake and pad touching a small part of the hot disk braking surface creates the issue. Drums don't usually have this problem since the braking surface is not open to the elements, and nearly all the braking surface is in contact with the pad/shoe in the same situation. So that may be why you're not finding anything on it on youtube, as it's not a common thing to do to drum brakes.

In saying all that, as long as you are careful you can't do any damage and it won't have any adverse effect on the brakes, so there is no harm in trying. But if your drum IS groved it will not help the squeak (permanently) unless you sand it enough to remove all the groves. And doing that much sanding you can potentially be in a situation where you sand the drum out of round, and that will create problems.

Without pictures it's very hard to say if sanding is a worthwhile option or not. Of course your shop / mechanic could be just BS'ing you and you don;t have groves at all, he just didn't want to grease the brakes. Brake squeak can be a real pain & time consuming to trace down, and sometimes you only fix it temporary.

[DaveTM]

Well, on my TXT my rear brakes are factory drums. The brake shoes have good pad on 'em. Now, at least once a year.....or more like every 8 months, my rear brakes will begin to squeal when I first pull the cart out....the drum brakes will squeal for perhaps the first 3 times I hit 'em. To "get rid" of this, I will have my nephew (newest mechanic) come out and just remove the drums and wipe down the shoes and with a air hose, just blow the brake dust out of whatever it's piled up on. There really is no place for the brake dust that has worn off of the pads to "escape" to. Once he has done this, the squeal is gone for another 8 months or so.

I have no idea why.....but it just works.

[plaine]

Thanks again, everyone. What I plan on doing first is just taking the drum off and snapping a photo to post here, before I start with any scuffing. Since this is my first time doing this sort of thing, I don't want to end up doing something wrong or unnecessary. I heard back from the shop, they said given the brakes aren't bad, they have caused lines in the drums due to the brakes being hard. They quoted me $422 for parts and labor to replace all 4 drums and pads. No shot I'm going to pay $422 every 2 years to get rid of noise.

More to come.

[plaine]

Just wanted to post a follow-up to this. I started digging in. I jacked up the front end to test out my jack before loosening lug nuts. And just by chance, I spun one of the squeak wheels. Come to find it's rubbing at one spot rather horribly. Both front tires, which both squeak, also both dragged as if the brake is rubbing at one spot on each revolution. I've contacted the shop that did the work and recommended replacement to have them come and correct this. We've probably put 80-120 miles on the cart since this started. Do you think there will be damage to the brakes? Should I be pressing for brake replacement or just have them fix this at no cost?

[plaine]

They tell me it's supposed to drag a little bit. True? When I spin the wheel while it's jacked up, I can hear it drag on both front wheels at the same spot which equates to maybe 1/8 of the full rotation. The other 7/8 of the spin the wheel moves freely. But there's an obvious rub at one spot.

[Golf cart guy]

That one high spot is normal