hi i am new and need a little help.

To get the drums off of mine recently, I had to use a big wheel puller. It hooks behind the drum and the pointed part fits into the hub after you take the grease cap off. That was the only way to get mine off.

To get the rear drums off my 64 Galaxie's I have to heat the drum around the center. I heat it until it "pings" then with leather work gloves on I just pull 'em off.
If your brakes and stuff are stuck and rusted you'll just have to yank them off with the drum. There is no way to get to them. You can grind the little retaining tabs off from the backing plate and the shoes should come off with the drum.

thanks for all the tips guys.
it seems the brakes themselve are still working. i pushed the ebrake to make sure they would still hold, so i am guessing it is just stuck at the hub of the axle.
i will try more heat/more time and hopefully get farther along.

i put the car back on the ground. i have no leaks that i can find. there is pressure at the pedal, and the brakes hold the wheels, but i am able to easily push the pedal to the floor.
my dad said the brakes have always been crappy, and has sat since i think 80 or so a little before i was born.
he couldn't remember what the brakes felt like except that they were not that great.

i used to have a 69 mach 1 with a similar setup: manual brakes with 4 drums. mine had a really hard pedal and just seemed hard to stop.
i know a pedal will go to the floor without much resistance if the master cylinder is bad, but most of my experience is with power brakes, the pressure slowly seems to bleed off.
i think a rebuild kit is less than $20 for manual brakes, but is this the way it normally feels? should i just rebuild?
can i work solely from the engine bay to get the master cylinder out? maybe just a clip on the top of the pedal inside the compartment?

It sounds like you have a leak somewhere in the system. A slow one but a leak just the same. Could be the MC, could be one of the wheel cylinders even. They should never slowly go to the floor and most times it's only a matter of time before they suddenly go and not slowling then you are in trouble.

Get all the wheels off and be sure the wheel cylinders aren't leaking, they have kits for those also, be sure the MC isn't leaking somewhere as sometimes they will leak on the inside of the firewall where you won't notice it.

If you still have the same problem follow the lines full lenght from back to front and see if there is a leak in the line somewhere.

They will never measure up to modern brakes but they aren't supposed to go to the floor either.


Deb