TheSamba.com :: View topic - 58-65 drum brakes on an oval

Thu Sep 24, 2009 5:17 am

Hi All,

I'm replacing my oval's original drum brakes all round with the ones from a 58-65 car.

My question is that whilst I need to fit everything from the backing plates outwards, does this also include the cast bearing caps on the rear, or can I reuse the oval's original caps? It is still running it's original short axles and tubes.

Cheers,
Ed :)

Thu Sep 24, 2009 6:58 am

I believe that those bearing caps didn't change between oval and post oval, but you'd probably want to check that. If you can get an oval one and compare it, you should be able to tell. I know that the seal did not change (111598051A) all the way up until '68, so I can't imagine the cap changing.

Thu Sep 24, 2009 7:34 am

That depends on what kind of oil slinger setup you have. If you stick with the oil slinger that fits into the brake drum, then you can keep the early style bearing cap. If you go with the oil slinger that fits the bearing cap and discharges the oil out the backside of the backing plate, then you need the later style.

Thu Sep 24, 2009 8:24 am

Snort wrote: That depends on what kind of oil slinger setup you have. If you stick with the oil slinger that fits into the brake drum, then you can keep the early style bearing cap. If you go with the oil slinger that fits the bearing cap and discharges the oil out the backside of the backing plate, then you need the later style.

If you keep the oval style oil slinger, you will need to drill holes in the rear drums.

Thu Sep 24, 2009 10:20 am

Excellent, thanks for all the help guys, I hadn't even given thought to the oil slinger. In that case, I guess I'll retain the oval bearing cap and drill the hole for the end of the oil slinger.

Thanks again,
Ed :)

Thu Sep 24, 2009 3:34 pm

I had to grind part of the bearing cap to fit the later backing plates, but remember that converting to later rear brakes doesn't actually increase the size of the drums like on the front. I think it changed the size of the wheel cylinder though. Not worth it IMO unless you already have no rear braking parts.

Thu Sep 24, 2009 4:05 pm

I had no such issues with oval bearing caps and 58-65 backing plates.. ?

Thu Sep 24, 2009 5:23 pm

OvalWindowBucket wrote: I had no such issues with oval bearing caps and 58-65 backing plates.. ?

Are you sure? It's only an issue if things begin to leak!

If you kept the oval caps and used the slinger on the drum, then no problem.

But if you kept the oval caps and no slinger, then the gear oil has no way to get out of the drum.

Thu Sep 24, 2009 7:22 pm

drscope wrote: OvalWindoBucket wrote: I had no such issues with oval bearing caps and 58-65 backing plates.. ?

Are you sure? It's only an issue if things begin to leak!

If you kept the oval caps and used the slinger on the drum, then no problem.

But if you kept the oval caps and no slinger, then the gear oil has no way to get out of the drum.

I was talking about the need to grind my bearing cap. I'm keeping the old style oil slingers.

Fri Sep 25, 2009 1:57 am

As far as I can remember there are three sets of backing plates and bearing caps:

1952-57 stock Oval

1958-64 are slightly thicker than the 52-57 backing plates

1965-66 no oil slinger - oil drains through hole in backing plate

You should not mix and match these. Use the bearing caps and backing plates as the factory intended. 1958-64 backing plates with 1952-57 bearing caps will give play in the bearings.

Fri Sep 25, 2009 8:15 am

HenrikL wrote: As far as I can remember there are three sets of backing plates and bearing caps:

1952-57 stock Oval

1958-64 are slightly thicker than the 52-57 backing plates

1965-66 no oil slinger - oil drains through hole in backing plate

You should not mix and match these. Use the bearing caps and backing plates as the factory intended. 1958-64 backing plates with 1952-57 bearing caps will give play in the bearings.

Really? I had never heard that before, I had always intended to use my oval bearing caps with the later backing plates but I have not filled the trans with gear oil yet.. I am almost ready to torque the drums down..

Fri Sep 25, 2009 10:05 am

HenrikL wrote: As far as I can remember there are three sets of backing plates and bearing caps:

1952-57 stock Oval

1958-64 are slightly thicker than the 52-57 backing plates

1965-66 no oil slinger - oil drains through hole in backing plate

You should not mix and match these. Use the bearing caps and backing plates as the factory intended. 1958-64 backing plates with 1952-57 bearing caps will give play in the bearings.

52-57 bearing caps have straight sides all around, and they are open on the outboard side so that you can see the face of the oil seal. Brake drum slinger fits this style.

58-63 caps have two curved sides to fit the redesigned backing plates, and they are open on the outboard side so that you can see the face of the oil seal. Brake drum slinger fits this style.

64-65 caps have two curved sides to fit the redesigned backing plates, they are partially closed on the outboard side (can't see the face of the oil seal) and a few mm taller. Oil slinger works inside the bearing cap, and directs oil out the backside of the backing plate.

I'll call them A B and C respectively to keep it simple.

A caps could be used on the B and C backing plates if you relieve the cap edges and use the drum slinger.

B caps could be used on the A and C backing plates if you use the drum slinger.

C bearing caps could be used on the A and B backing plates if you drill the backing plate for the oil hole.

I only have the B caps in hand to measure, but the bearing recess in it is about 9.3mm. I imagine the other caps are the same, but perhaps someone else could measure to confirm. If so, then they should not have any affect on the fit of the wheel bearing.

I haven't actually tried all of the above combinations, I'm just speculating based on the apparent design changes.

Fri Sep 25, 2009 10:35 am

This is the only picture I have to show right now. This is a picture of my brake setup from a while back. They fit on the backing plate fine as far as I can tell and look to have the curve you talk about for the 58-63 caps? Maybe they were replaced at some point, but they came off my 2-bolt oval brakes and oval axle tubes. If you double click the pic it is a little larger..

EDIT: Oval bearing caps do have 2 curved sides:

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1927160&highlight=#1927160

Fri Sep 25, 2009 12:12 pm

That does look like the 58-63 style. I looked at the thread you pointed to on the different caps showing different bearing depths which was very interesting. I like the fact that he is measuring both the cap depth and the axle tube bearing seat, which makes more sense than any change in backing plate thickness. The cap I measured is closest to his second photo which he measured .379 inches (my measurement converts to .366 inches). nlorntson showed that his axle tube casting was .266 inches deep, and concluded he needed a deep bearing cap, but his bearing protruded from his deep cap .412 inches, so I assume the excess came from the backing plate.

I suppose it is also possible that the bearing cap was not designed to contact the bearing face anyway, so that the bearing can float, with the centre race doing the job of positioning the bearing when the drum is fastened to the axle. If this is the case, then the depth of the bearing cap should only be a problem if it is too shallow to fit the bearing. But then, why would VW change these dimensions at all, unless perhaps they also changed the axle tube seat and the bearing cap to reflect a change in the axle where the inner bearing race pushes against it?

Fri Sep 25, 2009 12:58 pm

I had to make a thin washer to keep the bearing from moving. It was about 10 yrs ago I did the swap, so I don't exactly remember the year of the "donor", but I think 63 or 64. "Small window" almost certainly, which would roule out a 65?

Fri Sep 25, 2009 2:03 pm

Snort wrote: That does look like the 58-63 style. I looked at the thread you pointed to on the different caps showing different bearing depths which was very interesting. I like the fact that he is measuring both the cap depth and the axle tube bearing seat, which makes more sense than any change in backing plate thickness. The cap I measured is closest to his second photo which he measured .379 inches (my measurement converts to .366 inches). nlorntson showed that his axle tube casting was .266 inches deep, and concluded he needed a deep bearing cap, but his bearing protruded from his deep cap .412 inches, so I assume the excess came from the backing plate.

I suppose it is also possible that the bearing cap was not designed to contact the bearing face anyway, so that the bearing can float, with the centre race doing the job of positioning the bearing when the drum is fastened to the axle. If this is the case, then the depth of the bearing cap should only be a problem if it is too shallow to fit the bearing. But then, why would VW change these dimensions at all, unless perhaps they also changed the axle tube seat and the bearing cap to reflect a change in the axle where the inner bearing race pushes against it?

Now that I think about it, one of my oval axle tubes had a cracked shock mount on the end casting so I replaced it with another oval axle tube. The lip shown here with the red arrow is not as tall on my the replacement as the oval tube I already had. I thought nothing of it at the time, as I figured an oval straight shock mount axle tube were all the same. But upon reading that nlornston thread it looks like there is different bearing seat depths..

So now maybe I have one tube with the "deep" casting and one tube with the "shallow" casting.. Im going to have to get to the bottom of all this ASAP as the car is almost drivable and I thought the rear end was taken care of but now Im getting confused by bearing caps!

Also, I dont see how you could have bearing play with the bearing/axle spacers and the drum torqued down.. maybe on the outer race, but doesnt seem to me that the inner race would move in/out with it all torqued.

Sat Sep 26, 2009 5:30 pm

I measured the thickness of two styles of backing plates today, at the point where they fit between the axle tube and the bearing cap. The 52-57 style was 0.45mm. The 58-63 style was 0.50mm. I don't know how that relates yet to the different axle tube designs, but I thought I would post it up as part of the general discussion in case anyone can use it.

Sun Sep 27, 2009 2:29 am

OvalWindowBucket wrote: Snort wrote: That does look like the 58-63 style. I looked at the thread you pointed to on the different caps showing different bearing depths which was very interesting. I like the fact that he is measuring both the cap depth and the axle tube bearing seat, which makes more sense than any change in backing plate thickness. The cap I measured is closest to his second photo which he measured .379 inches (my measurement converts to .366 inches). nlorntson showed that his axle tube casting was .266 inches deep, and concluded he needed a deep bearing cap, but his bearing protruded from his deep cap .412 inches, so I assume the excess came from the backing plate.

I suppose it is also possible that the bearing cap was not designed to contact the bearing face anyway, so that the bearing can float, with the centre race doing the job of positioning the bearing when the drum is fastened to the axle. If this is the case, then the depth of the bearing cap should only be a problem if it is too shallow to fit the bearing. But then, why would VW change these dimensions at all, unless perhaps they also changed the axle tube seat and the bearing cap to reflect a change in the axle where the inner bearing race pushes against it?

Now that I think about it, one of my oval axle tubes had a cracked shock mount on the end casting so I replaced it with another oval axle tube. The lip shown here with the red arrow is not as tall on my the replacement as the oval tube I already had. I thought nothing of it at the time, as I figured an oval straight shock mount axle tube were all the same. But upon reading that nlornston thread it looks like there is different bearing seat depths..

So now maybe I have one tube with the "deep" casting and one tube with the "shallow" casting.. Im going to have to get to the bottom of all this ASAP as the car is almost drivable and I thought the rear end was taken care of but now Im getting confused by bearing caps!

Also, I dont see how you could have bearing play with the bearing/axle spacers and the drum torqued down.. maybe on the outer race, but doesnt seem to me that the inner race would move in/out with it all torqued.

My drum (on one side) could move if you pulled it hard, hard to be seen, but making a "clunk" sound. Not much, but made me not feel right. Looking at an exploded view of the bearing and drum, I came to the conclusion that the bearing is the part keeping the drum from moving along the axle. The play was in the outer race. I did the measuring, just like pictures above and saw that a thin washer would fix this play, had a friend manufacure two washers and since then it has not made any more clunk sounds, nor leaking anything...

Sun Oct 18, 2009 12:41 pm

After getting the drums & wheels on and the car off the jack stands, I realized what you were talking about. I do have play in my rear bearings, and the later backing plate is about a millimeter thicker than the oval so I believe thats where the play comes from. The bearing cap needs to be a hair shallower for the bearing to seat in there properly.

I need to get the proper later bearing caps now. I could try to make up some washers some how but then Id still need to drill my drums and Im thinking id like to use weep hole instead.

Fri Aug 18, 2017 11:27 am

Snort wrote:

52-57 bearing caps have straight sides all around, and they are open on the outboard side so that you can see the face of the oil seal. Brake drum slinger fits this style.

58-63 caps have two curved sides to fit the redesigned backing plates, and they are open on the outboard side so that you can see the face of the oil seal. Brake drum slinger fits this style.

64-65 caps have two curved sides to fit the redesigned backing plates, they are partially closed on the outboard side (can't see the face of the oil seal) and a few mm taller. Oil slinger works inside the bearing cap, and directs oil out the backside of the backing plate.

I'll call them A B and C respectively to keep it simple.

A caps could be used on the B and C backing plates if you relieve the cap edges and use the drum slinger.

B caps could be used on the A and C backing plates if you use the drum slinger.

C bearing caps could be used on the A and B backing plates if you drill the backing plate for the oil hole.

ok, so can I just ask, as I have read many different views etc here on samba,
I have a '54, and if fitting '58 rear brakes I can do this without changing the axle tubes or anything like that.
so I use '54 axle tube, '58 backing plate, '54 bearing cap and '54 oil slinger.
correct?