How reliable is the drum brake shoe wear indicator?

Can this be trusted or is it better to pull the shoes and measure with a caliper?

Thanks

In theory it's pretty darn good. A direct link to the brake shoes.

Problem is that it has to be set properly when the brake shoes are installed. You can put that needle anywhere when the rear hub is disassembled.

So - it depends on the reliability of whomever last serviced the brakes.

-S

Given a couple of decades of use and previous owners' disassemblies - consider the indicator to be useless - have a look yourself!

Like salvy said, it's a very good indicator if it hasn't been fooled with on its positioning. Thing is, it really is not that necessary to even have, since rear tires wear out at the rate of one every 5-10,000 miles just look at the brakes every time you change tires. The pads last a good long time, normally well over 60,000 miles even with a lot of stop/go. At least my experience anyway.

As the needle can be repositioned to the wrong place, it is an unreliable method of gauging brake wear. I know of one person who move the needle to get the bike to go through an inspection. The bike was previously failed as the needle showed full wear...

Will the shoes give you any sign of being close to worn out such as screeching? Or maybe it's too late and you are scoring the drum by that time.

I've never taken any down that far - in all the bikes I've seen, I've never had one where the shoes are totally gone...

Wow, it sounds like they really do last a long time. I'm not going to worry much about mine then until the next time I have the wheel off.

Thanks

Post edited by: savedrider, at: 2005/11/10 22:42

For the little time it takes to do a tear down aan physically look at them so you know for sure their condition, just the peace of mind would be worth it. We all try to get our bikes to run faster seems to me we would want them to slow down just as fast and know we are safe.
Ride safe,
Les