Broken hub ?

[Lou013]

Hello,

While trying to remove the rear brake (I have an S2 so drums), I tried to unlock the big 41mm nut with a long ratchet, I heard a loud CLICK and since, the nut is moving but not coming out...

Should have used a blowtorch I know

is it possible that I broke the thread ?

it's the rear-left, so I think I should buy a new hub... is it from a Sierra ?

Thanks

[Lou013]

Thanks for your answers.

How did you removed the drum hub on your cars ?

My nut was blocked and my handbrake is not tight enough...
So I used the spare wheel (it has a hole big enough to allow the socket to be inserted), so wheel on the ground, with a short ratchet, I was making the wheel roll ! (Our cars are quite light, I am not that strong ! ) so with a long bar I could un-bolt it slowly (until the big CLIC).
So now, nut is loose and the shaft is still (made a mark on it , turn and the mark is still at the same place)

Of course I looked at the thread to see how to turn the nut (a friend warned me about this could be a left or right)...

I think I will try to cut the nut carefully and hope for the thread to be intact and if not, hopefully a new one should not be that expensive ?

[Lou013]

glenrobbo said:

There is no need to undo the hub nut to remove the brake drum.
The drum should pull off as long as the brakes are not binding.
( Sometimes a heavy rubber or hide mallet can help it on its way. )

Oh my god... Didn't know that...

I can't tell you the full story, it would make you laugh for years...

[Lou013]

gifdy said:

Go on ! It's a Friday, we could do with a laugh.

If it makes you feel better I spent several hours trying to get the rear drums off my old VW...then realised I left the handbrake on. Felt pretty stupid.

Hello all, totally forgot to follow my thread, sorry :/

So here it is for the good laugh:

I decided to change the rear drums brakes and so, looking at the thing (not even reading in Steve's bible), "okay let's un-bolt it"
Measuring the size of the nut with a ribbon (any foot slide available), 40mm okay ! let's go buy a 40mm socket !
visiting 5 stores "40 mm ? that's and odd size"
... Finally ordering a 40mm socket online, about 10£ and 7 days after trying to unbolt it, good guess, everybody knows it's a 41mm nut

Re-buying a new socket (keeping the other as a souvenir to prevent me from being too confident) 41mm pretty standard and easy to find.
Trying to unbolt, impossible (torque of this is 350 Nm for the recall), wheel was even moving with the car on the ground... I found a big spanner, CLIC "yeaaah", and shortly after, the spanner broke down (Facom tools are not solid anymore), finally found a longer spanner and victory! : now the nut is loose, you know the rest...

So I broke my car by trying to unbolt something perfectly fine, buying 2 useless sockets to perform this.
All I wanted to do was change the drums pads, which do not require to unbolt anything except the wheel...

You can mock me

[Lou013]

Actually I am trying, opened a new thread here :
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=149...

best thing to do would be to cut the nut and see if the shaft is damaged, but my car cannot stay not movable where it stays right now...

So i plan to order the whole part if I can find one and only replace what's broken and send the rest back or keep it as spare...

[Lou013]

Thanks for the advice, I didn't know the existence of this tool...

[Lou013]

End of the story, the end of my shaft was totally worn out, so ask a workshop to make a new thread, 1 size smaller.

I am not very confident about reducing the size of this part, any thoughts ?