1950s Brake parts

[Bob Kielar]

Going to do a total brake job on my 1955 Cadillac Fleetwood. Other than Kanter does anyone know of another vendor for brake parts?

Thanks,
Bob

[Jeff Rosansky CLC #28373]

I'm not a fan of the online places unless I have to go to them.

Our 55 needed everything, and I mean everything.

I got the shoes at Napa. Autozone had them too and a little cheaper, but it sounded like a school bus when stopping. Autozone took them back and have the Napa ones now.

Had the drums turned at O'Reilly. They wanted to charge the price for truck drums because they couldn't believe a car had drums that big. The manual has the machining limits.

I did get the wheel cylinders online. It may have been Rockauto, but not positive. Cheaper to buy new ones than to resleeve and rebuild the old ones.

I went to my local Carquest for hardware. It was the kind of place where they actually knew what cars were. They took out an old dog-eared catalog and matched up the springs and hold down pins and ordered  a custom set for me.

I had to send the master and booster out yo be rebuilt. Couldn't find a kit for the booster and the master had to be resleeved- I don't have the ability to do that.

[Bob Kielar]

Thanks Jeff great information. Did you do this recently?

Bob

[Lexi]

There was a fellow selling complete brake drum spring sets on Ebay. Think they came with the rubber brake spoon window cups as well. I did buy shoes from Rock Auto. The big problem up here is to find someone who can turn the drums especially the front ones. And no one even has the ability to arc them anymore, at least here. Assuming you can find a place with a machine, they got to have the correct adaptor to fit. Clay/Lexi