1978 GE Sigma/Galant Rear brake drum question

[camB]

Hi everyone, I'm back in the country and need to finish repairing the poor old beast.

I'm just about ready to repaint the car, and the only other thing necessary to make it roadworthy is to fix the rear brake problem (which probably lead to its demise in the first place... see below)




Problem: The rear left brake wheel cylinder is leaking - and has been for ages by the look of it. The drum is filled with brake fluid and the shoes are soaked in it too. The handbrake would have only been gripping the one, dry brake drum, hence the picture above when my wife (whose arms are not what you'd call muscular) applied the handbrake on a hill.

Question: Can I clean the drum, shoes (which have plenty of material left on them) and brake assembly with something and replace the leaking cylinder?

[Superscan811]

Question: Can I clean the drum, shoes (which have plenty of material left on them) and brake assembly with something and replace the leaking cylinder?

Why bother cleaning the brake shoes.

Get some $2 degreaser from Super Cheap to clean the drum and general area.
AND
New Brake Shoes $20

Replace both of the rear slave cylinders.

New Rear Slave Cylinder $15.

Cheers.

[75wagon]

I've always used metho to clean brake fluid from brake shoes etc...

[camB]

Thanks,

[karl_2ltgc]

I have always just pressure washed the whole shebang with the drum off, put a new wheel cylinder on for all of $10-15 and then bleed brakes and then your good to go.

[camB]

I like this one
I'll try it first and move on up to more extensive replacements if necessary.

EDIT

Thanks, the metho cleaned it up nicely. New LH cylinder and they're fine now. Dunno if anyone else has the imported drums, but those springs are a bitch!