Separating front hubs from brake drums. Any tips?

[Staxbro]

Hi all. My front 10" drums are shot. Well just one actually. Have ordered a pair of new drums from Rock Auto. Should be with me in the UK in a couple of weeks..... so I need to get the front hubs out of the old front drums.
Looks at best difficult, at worst I could wreck the hubs or at least the studs. Any top tips? Do's and don't?
I'm guessing penetrating fluid and patience isn't going to get me far here.....
Thanks in Advance, Nick.

[green69rt]

I'm not sure what you are trying to do.  The hubs stay on the car, they are part of the spindle.  Getting the front drums off is fairly straight forward.   But it may take one special tool, a brake drum adjusting tool.  (sometimes a screwdriver will do in a pinch.)

Remove the tire.
Pry off the grease cup.
Straighten and remove the cotter pin holding the hub nut retainer.
Slide the retainer off
unscrew the hub retaining nut
At this point the drum may pull off, if it doesn't you may have to get behind the brake backing plate.  Look behind the drum and find the two oblong rubber plugs.  Pry them out and reach in with a drum brake shoe adjusting tool.  Back the shoes away from the drums.   The drums should just slide off the hub and the lugs.
The outer wheel bearing will now fall out of the drum.
The inner bearing is held in place by a pressed-in grease seal.  Get a small stick and put it thru the front of the drum and just knock the seal out, the inner bearing will now fall out.
Your new drum may or may not come with new inner bearing races installed.  In any case you'll need new shoes, new bearings, new grease seal and new cotter pin.  I guess you could try reusing some of the old stuff but I wouldn't.

Maybe you know all of this, sorry if this is not what you need.  If you need to get the drums off and they are stuck, a rubber mallet helps a lot.


I got this completely wrong and I didn't realize the front drums had removable hubs.  Lugs yes, but not hubs.

[70 sublime]

Hey Nick I know what you are saying
Get the drum off the hub
My last Charger working on the front brakes one side the drum was loose and would just come off the hub like a back wheel after the wheel nuts and tire came off
Other side was stuck together
Luckly I did not need to change my drums but yes they should come apart
Maybe someone in the past had unstuck one of mine already to change the drum

Do you have a blow torch to heat up the drum around the studs and center to get it to expand a bit ?
Might be my first try

[Staxbro]

Thanks both for your replies. Yeah, the front hub looks like it's a "press fit" in the drum. I haven't tried getting them apart yet. Read something on a different Mopar forum (a bodies I think) which said that the drums were "swedged" onto the hubs and the only thing to do was cut the lug studs off. I don't know what "swedging" is... think it's one of those words that hasn't. Made it back across the pond... either way I'm not keen on chopping studs off to swap out a drum!

[b5blue]

IF 10 inch 1st off there are 2 types, the drums are not the same for both types so you may have the wrong drums coming.    2nd they may be swedged on, look closely at each stud for pinch marks. "The Ramman" (Look up online) has been help full for others as all he does is Mopar. (If you end up in a pickle.)

[Staxbro]

IF 10 inch 1st off there are 2 types, the drums are not the same for both types so you may have the wrong drums coming...

Ah man.... yeah they are 10"......
Costs a fortune to ship over too....

[Staxbro]

Just taken some pics .
Back and front shot

Any thoughts? Ideas of what type I have would be a great start.
Thanks

[Staxbro]

Of course...they aren't both the same.....

Thanks,
Nick

[b5blue]

Same thing happened to me, that's how learned. Use to be you just yanked any 10" drum from any B body in a junkyard for 2 bucks sanded it and slapped it on. Look at it this way, know matter what you'll only need to find one hub!

[Staxbro]

Same thing happened to me, that's how learned. Use to be you just yanked any 10" drum from any B body in a junkyard for 2 bucks sanded it and slapped it on. Look at it this way, know matter what you'll only need to find one hub!

Why just one, mate? I need to replace both drums......

[green69rt]

Thanks both for your replies. Yeah, the front hub looks like it's a "press fit" in the drum. I haven't tried getting them apart yet. Read something on a different Mopar forum (a bodies I think) which said that the drums were "swedged" onto the hubs and the only thing to do was cut the lug studs off. I don't know what "swedging" is... think it's one of those words that hasn't. Made it back across the pond... either way I'm not keen on chopping studs off to swap out a drum!

Let me try again.  I remove lugs by stacking nuts on the lug till the last nut sticks out more than the end of the lug threads.  Then use a wooden block and hammer on the last nut to drive the lug out.  The nuts protect the threads and prevent the end of the lug from mushrooming. 

[Staxbro]

[quote author=green69rt link=topic=138080.msg1711357#msg1711357 date=1592504620
Let me try again.  I remove lugs by stacking nuts on the lug till the last nut sticks out more than the end of the lug threads.  Then use a wooden block and hammer on the last nut to drive the lug out.  The nuts protect the threads and prevent the end of the lug from mushrooming. 
[/quote]

Ah right. So you reckon if I can get the lug out the back, I should be able to separate the hub and drum? Cheers. I'll
Give that a go..

[John_Kunkel]

Let me try again.  I remove lugs by stacking nuts on the lug till the last nut sticks out more than the end of the lug threads.  Then use a wooden block and hammer on the last nut to drive the lug out.

That's the wrong way. The studs are swaged onto the drum and the only way to remove the studs correctly is to remove the swages with a cutter. Driving the studs out without removing the swages risks enlarging the hole in the hub so the stud will then be loose and it's possible to bend the hub flange.

I know, some folks do it all the time but it's the difference between doing it wrong and getting away with it versus doing it right.

[b5blue]

Same thing happened to me, that's how learned. Use to be you just yanked any 10" drum from any B body in a junkyard for 2 bucks sanded it and slapped it on. Look at it this way, know matter what you'll only need to find one hub!

Why just one, mate? I need to replace both drums......

You'll match new drums to both old drums and need one more hub to match the "matched drum/hub set".

[green69rt]

Let me try again.  I remove lugs by stacking nuts on the lug till the last nut sticks out more than the end of the lug threads.  Then use a wooden block and hammer on the last nut to drive the lug out.

That's the wrong way. The studs are swaged onto the drum and the only way to remove the studs correctly is to remove the swages with a cutter. Driving the studs out without removing the swages risks enlarging the hole in the hub so the stud will then be loose and it's possible to bend the hub flange.

I know, some folks do it all the time but it's the difference between doing it wrong and getting away with it versus doing it right.

Good to know John.  Not that I will ever do it myself, again.   

[b5blue]

Post in "parts wanted" when ya know what you need, I've sent stuff to you guys across the pond and we've Brit members also! 

[Staxbro]

Post in "parts wanted" when ya know what you need, I've sent stuff to you guys across the pond and we've Brit members also! 

Thanks Blue. 

[Staxbro]

Ok, so this is what I think I've sussed out.

I need to get my drums off the hubs. Only way that can be done is via brute force which probably/possibly wreck the hub.
The correct way is to cut the swage off the lug studs. This really needs to be done with a Swedge Cutter:

https://goodson.com/products/swedge-tools

It costs $100- probably $150 by the time I get it here.
Then I would need new lug studs, as the old ones would be scrap.

BUT! It doesn't seem possible to get LH thread studs now? Or am I missing something?

What I'm still not sure of is that the drums will stay centred on the hub if it isn't swedged on?
The available studs seem to be splined press fit and no one is set up to swedge drums onto hubs these days... certainly not in the UK anyway!

Does that all sound about right?

[b5blue]

No need yet. Have you the new drums?

[Staxbro]

No need yet. Have you the new drums?

No- they are still in transit.
Got the hub/drum assemblies cleaned up today. Found a faint "KH" mark on one, so one is a Kelsey Hayes. That's the one with no Swedge on the lugs, but the centre of the hub where the outer bearing sits appears to be part of the drum itself. The other one, that section is very obviously separate and swedged onto the drum. The aftermarket replacement drums I have a ordered definitely have a big whole in the middle to sit on the shoulder of the hub, so I reckon I'll definitely be after at least one hub....

[b5blue]

Right see what comes in first. Soak everything in PB Blaster daily. 

[Staxbro]

Right see what comes in first. Soak everything in PB Blaster daily. 

Cheers, Buddy. We use "WD40"  over here, but I guess it doesn't the same job!

[John_Kunkel]

The correct way is to cut the swage off the lug studs. This really needs to be done with a Swedge Cutter:

https://goodson.com/products/swedge-tools

A cheaper alternative to the Goodson cutter is a simple 3/4" hole saw. When removing only as much of the swage as necessary, the studs can be reused.

[b5blue]

WD stands for "Water Displacement", you need "Penetrating oil" that attacks rust. "Liquid Wrench" is good also. 

[69hemibeep]

You may have to turn the new drum to true it up to the hub that is part of the reason for the swage. if you were to rotate an old drum on the hub it can cause brake surge it would be like an egg shaped drum

[Staxbro]

You may have to turn the new drum to true it up to the hub that is part of the reason for the swage. if you were to rotate an old drum on the hub it can cause brake surge it would be like an egg shaped drum

This is how I understand it.
I like John Kunkel's plannof cutitng off the Swedge and residing my LH thread studs, but so wonder if the shoulder of the hub is enough to centralise the drum.

This is without even going near the RH drum, that is unswedged and has the outer bearing area apparently part of the machined face of the KH drum.....

Totally seeing why my unscrupulous mechanic didn't bother even getting that drum off when it was stuck..... what a crook!

[John_Kunkel]

Rear drums rely only on the hub to center the drum, as long as the drum center fits snuggly on the front hub there shouldn't be a problem. On fronts, leaving as much of the stud shoulder as possible is added insurance.