Casa eccentric rear brake pins

[Knowledge]

I have a set of the above for assessment for a forthcoming Oily Rag article for Jetset.

These are selling very fast (SLUK have already sold out) so my article might arrive a little late for some LCGB members.

I will offer this advice ahead of publication. FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTION SHEET and you will be fine. The results are very promising so far, though the current snow on the ground is preventing me from testing the brake.

DO NOT follow Steelweasel's video in YouTube. He starts his video by stating we should read and follow the instructions and goes off and does his own thing. It takes him forever. He removes and refits the shoes time and time again when there is no need to do this. The video is 44 minutes long!

By comparison, I set-up the eccentric pins in the correct orientation in about 5 minutes and took another 5 minutes to secure them in that position using the shims provided. Simples.

Sticky has prepared a video to support this product which is less than 7 minutes long. TURN ON THE SUBTITLES via the settings icon. [youtube-share]https://youtu.be/Fdvd0prrR4U?si=kFABHOVfrqwC7XnY[/youtube-share]

I hope this, and my future article, help you guys with this very neat product.

[Adam_Winstone]

I look forward to trying these myself. They look like a great way to address the historic problem of poor rear brake on SIL casings.

Thanks for the heads-up Knowledge, I look forward to the performance update when road conditions allow.

Adam

[corrado]

The video is 44 minutes long!

44 minutes of my life I'll never get back.

[Knowledge]

I look forward to trying these myself. They look like a great way to address the historic problem of poor rear brake on SIL casings.

Adam

I don’t have a SIL casing to test and I am not certain that this kit can fully address the issues that are inherent with the badly drilled brake pivot. However, if it can improve the contact for the other shoe and most of the “bad-pivot” shoes, things have got to be better.

Having fitted my hub-with-a-window to check the tolerances, the new shoes I have fitted and adjusted look to be spot-on. I might find out tomorrow.

[hullygully]

additionally to this kit, mr knowledge, you could rectify any bad casings, where a hole is ovulated in the cam area, with a bush after drilling out to suit

[dickie]

I ordered some without checking and presumed incorrectly that they'd come with the alignment tool.

Not back in stock for a while yet. So watch out as they're pretty useless unless you have the right tool.

Oh well.

[al pushpak]

Hi all, bought one of these brake pin kits fairly recently which I must say arrived super quick in the post! So, armed with the instruction booklet that came with the kit & a brand new set of Makino brake shoes I set about fitting the pins this morning, all seemed fairly straight forward & I got both shoes set with them just touching the tool arm bolt, the bottom shoe touching slightly more so, but that was the best I could get it, unfortunately when it came to refitting the rear hub I found it was binding on the shoes after I tightened it down( I had slackened off the brake cable adjuster first before refitting the hub) so, removed the hub & started from the beginning again!! Tried again with the same result! ended up putting my old shoes back on & with the hub refitted all was fine ,so either my brake pin threads are really misaligned (SIL 200 casing) or my hub,which is a Uni one & only about 3 years old is slightly oval. Might have another go with it using a different set of shoes sometime in the future.....

[gaz_powell]

Rich, if you are stuck you can borrow mine.

I bought a set but won't get round to fitting for a while...

All the feedback is beneficial!

[Sticky]

Hi all, bought one of these brake pin kits fairly recently which I must say arrived super quick in the post! So, armed with the instruction booklet that came with the kit & a brand new set of Makino brake shoes I set about fitting the pins this morning, all seemed fairly straight forward & I got both shoes set with them just touching the tool arm bolt, the bottom shoe touching slightly more so, but that was the best I could get it, unfortunately when it came to refitting the rear hub I found it was binding on the shoes after I tightened it down( I had slackened off the brake cable adjuster first before refitting the hub) so, removed the hub & started from the beginning again!! Tried again with the same result! ended up putting my old shoes back on & with the hub refitted all was fine ,so either my brake pin threads are really misaligned (SIL 200 casing) or my hub,which is a Uni one & only about 3 years old is slightly oval. Might have another go with it using a different set of shoes sometime in the future.....

Interesting. When you fitted with new shoes were you able to get a pin setting where the tool wasn't touching the shoes at all (no tension on arm)? If not then it is possible that the pin holes are really out (Broady says he's seen 2mm on Indian casings, and also mis-drilling of the hole for the cam. If you can't get the tool to rotate freely then you won't be able to fit a hub. But you also wouldn't be able to fit a hub over new shoes with the standard pins. If you assemble with both arrows of the pins facing each other then there is definitely more clearance for any hub than with standard pins.

Is it a case that the hub was binding all of the time or only for part of a rotation? If it's on-off then the hub is warped.

When we checked an Indian casing we could not make it perfect (the shoe to tool gap was 1.6mm on std pins) but we could improve things enough to get a hub over new shoes; which was not possible without skimming before. We are considering making an XL-offset version for Indian casings to solve that problem but we need more feedback to know if it is definitely required.

[Adam_Winstone]

FYI - I have also had a situation where aftermarket shoes were not the correct size to fit with either the early brake cam or later (GP type) cam, not allowing the hub to fit. This instance was a number of years ago so unrelated to your pin product but is worth considering if people are fitting new shoes, as suggested.

Obvs, if fitting new shoes, do make sure that they are the correct design for the motor's cam. A pal with a rebuilt motor in his GP swore blind that he needed GP shoes but an inspection revealed an Li/SX cam fitted!

Adam

[Sticky]

FYI - I have also had a situation where aftermarket shoes were not the correct size to fit with either the early brake cam or later (GP type) cam, not allowing the hub to fit. This instance was a number of years ago so unrelated to your pin product but is worth considering if people are fitting new shoes, as suggested.

Obvs, if fitting new shoes, do make sure that they are the correct design for the motor's cam. A pal with a rebuilt motor in his GP swore blind that he needed GP shoes but an inspection revealed an Li/SX cam fitted!

Adam

The guys at RLC fit LI-style wide cams and LI brake shoes to all their engine builds.

[Adam_Winstone]

I don't mind the swap of components but how many people have been caught out by assuming what cam and shoes are in their motors (lol)?

Adam

[Covboy]

is there a easy way to tell which type of cam is fitted?

[Adam_Winstone]

As far as I am aware, the only way is to take the hub off to check visually. If in doubt, take a pic and post for others to help identify.

Visual identification is normally easy as the various types are quite different. Sticky's manual has clear pics of the different types.

Adam

PS - Not intended to be an advert for Sticky's manual but credit where it's due.

[Sticky]

It's easy to visually tell the cams apart. Not so easy to tell the different types of brake shoes apart unless you have both sets in front of you.

[dickie]

Rich, if you are stuck you can borrow mine.

I bought a set but won't get round to fitting for a while...

All the feedback is beneficial!

Thanks Gaz, I may well take you up on that. I need to drop both my motors for a refresh before the season starts and it'll be around again before we know it.

[Sticky]

Eccentric Brake PIN Questions and Answers

• Can I set-up Eccentric Pins with old brake shoes?

No, there’s no point. Worn shoes will have already started to wear to suit the original brake pin position. It makes most sense to set-up with new brake shoes.

• Do I really need a torque wrench and deep 14mm socket?

Ideally, yes. It is possible to fit these with a ring spanner but the temptation is to try to align the arrows on the pins by overtightening rather than selecting the correct shims. TIP: If you can only get a ½-inch 14mm socket but you have a 3/8-inch torque wrench then adaptors are available.

• Do the arrows need to be precisely aligned as per my photo?

No, they need to be as close as you can get them. The provided shims offer at least 11 possible positions for the arrows (0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8, 0.9, 1.0, 1.1, 1.2) which is like the hour positions on an analogue clock.

• Is it vital to get this perfect?

No, getting the pins to the closest position using shims should be enough. The shoes will wear concentric to suit the hub after that.

• I’ve bought a brake skimming tool (UNI or SIP Bremsenhexe etc) – shall I sell it?

No, the eccentric pins are a perfect accompaniment to brake skimming tools. The problem of skimming when the pin positions are wrong is that you remove a massive amount of friction material and then your shoes wear out quickly. If you set the pin positions and skim afterwards you should be able to have a perfect back brake from the get-go, and still have enough brake lining left for a lot of miles.

• Will this give me a back brake powerful enough to lock the rear wheel at will?

No, and that’s not what you want anyway. This is just a system to optimise the original drum brake design, not to turn it into a disc brake by magic. What you want from a rear brake is more ‘feel’ between off and on, to aid control. Correctly set eccentric pins seem to help with that ‘feel’ as well as increasing brake performance with new shoes.

• I can’t get my hub on!

The screw hole position in the tool was set-up for the measurement of a new Innocenti rear hub. Used hubs, as the cast iron lining wears, should only get larger in diameter so this becomes less of a problem, not more. However, it is possible that some new hubs are slightly undersized. If that is the case then you won’t fit the hub over new shoes with standard pins, however eccentric pins can help. Assemble roughly with the pin arrows facing each other, fit the shoes and try to fit the hub. If it spins then all is well, the positions the pins need to be in is close to that. You need to adjust the tool for a smaller diameter hub. You can either slot the hole for the M5 screw to move it slightly closer to the axle, or an easier way may be to add some layers of tape over the thread of the screw. Adjust the tool and optimise shoe position again with the arrows nearly facing each other. TIP: Remember to turn the hub cone the right way up – no hub will ever fit with the cone inverted!

• Should I try to centralise the shoes to the tool using a feeler gauge and without tension on the brake arm?

No, that’s pointless. The whole point of this exercise is to maximise shoe contact when you apply the brake. However, when you apply the brake, the cam end of the shoe moves much more than the pin end, so only the cam end of the shoes would touch the hub. It only makes sense to centralise the shoes with tension on the brake arm! Following the supplied instructions is the better way.

• I have an Indian casing and even with the eccentric pins I can’t get it perfect

The amount of offset on the pins was carefully chosen so that it can be of use on pretty much any engine casing. However, some Indian casings have brake pin positions 1-2mm out from the Innocenti positions. In our test on an Indian casing it was completely impossible to get a new hub over new shoes with the original pins unless you skimmed the shoes. With the Eccentric Pins we could adjust the position enough to get the hub over new shoes. From there at least you can ride and bed-in the shoes as normal. We are considering making pins with an XL-offset to suit Indian casings but first we need to get more feedback and find out if there is a demand.

[dickie]

I ordered some without checking and presumed incorrectly that they'd come with the alignment tool.

Not back in stock for a while yet. So watch out as they're pretty useless unless you have the right tool.

Oh well.

The tools are available again. Got one from Torbay today. I've no excuse not to go into the cold garage now.