How do you remove the drums on a 1974 volkswagen beetle?

Answer 1

In both cases you start by adjusting the brake shoes in as far as they'll go. Get a flashlight and a flat-tip screwdriver, jack the end you'll be working on up, place jackstands and crawl under. Look at the bottom of the brake backing disc and you'll find two holes. There should be but probably aren't rubber plugs in the holes. Stick a screwdriver in the hole and pry against the starwheel you should see inside the hole--pry up on the left-hand one, down on the right-hand one.

At this point, if you're working on a front drum you can remove the tire.

Next, remove the nut that's holding the brake drum on. The front uses what I call a "pinch nut." You loosen an Allen wrench, then use a big crescent wrench to turn it off. The one on the left side of the car is left-hand thread--if the Allen bolt gets loose, they want it to tighten, not loosen. Having a wheel fall off in traffic is bad. Once it's off, jerk the drum toward you just a little--this will free up the inner race of the outer bearing, and the bearing backing plate, so you can remove them from the hub. Then just pull off the drum. Older VWs require you to "stake" the nut in place by bending metal. I've never done it, but lots of people have.

The back is a whole nother story. It is held on by a 36mm nut that is secured with a cotter pin. It must be the correct cotter pin, and new. You get these from a Bug parts place, or from Volkswagen. That nut has 220 lb-ft torque on it when you install it, and it gets tighter as you go along. There are three ways of getting it off. The first is this steel plate thing. There's a hole for a 1/2" breaker bar, a hole for the socket and a place to beat on it with a three-pound sledge. This thing is rough on your bearings and your ears, but it works. The second way requires a three-foot cheater bar--you stand on it and bounce up and down until the nut gives up. This is better for your bearings but hard on your butt if you fall off the bar while you're doing this. The best way is to hit it with an electric torque wrench--the bigger the better. Once you remove the nut, the drum slips off.

The only problem with these ways are getting them torqued back on. They do make a new type of Nut remover. You bolt one part on the wheel with the lug nuts then it has a cam gear like gear on one end and the other end that connects to the Nut, you just turn it with a 3/8 inch wrench and it comes off. The best part is you mount a Torque wrench on to tighten it and about 30 lbs compounds to 225lbs of torque. It also has a gear for the Nut that holds the flywheel on. Also works with 6v or 12v flywheels. Some of the larger internet Bug parts company's are carrying them now. Awesome!!!!!

They've been making that "new kind of nut remover" for years. It's called a Kymco Torque-Meister and it's about a hundred bucks. I'd buy one if I was running the Baja 500. Otherwise...well, I've GOT tools that will get the nut back on.

I find there are two really good ways of re-torquing the rear axle nut. First is the brute force and ignorance method: flip the 400-lb-ft electric torque wrench to the "install nut" position and cut loose..when the wrench starts struggling to screw the nut on, remove the socket and check to see if the hole in the axle aligns with a castellation on the nut so you can get the cotter pin in; if it does, you're set. The other way is to put a 36mm socket on a 3/4" drive breaker bar and jump up and down on the end of it until a hole and a castellation align. Hold onto the gutter if you decide to do something this crazy.