95 F150 Rear Brakes do not work

Start by making sure the rear brakes are properly adjusted. The shoes should JUST slightly drag in the drums. Just slightly. If you don't know how, I'd be glad to tell you. Let me know. That is the most common problem. You'll feel more "pedal" too.

Try it first before you replace any $$$ parts.

Spdloader

Thanks so much for your quick response. I believe the rears are adjusted properly. The pedal feels fine too.

wrote: (95 F150 230k Miles)

When I apply the brakes, the rear wheels did not stop at all. When I use maximum pedal pressure the rear wheels will stop momentarily then release. The shoes are adjusted properly and the the parking brake works perfectly. Is this a proportioning valve problem? _____________________________________________

More likely a failed seal in the master cylinder on the piston that operates the rear brakes. It has probably been bad for a long time. Install a kit or get a new MC. The rear brakes will share some of the stopping load and the front brakes will last longer.

Good luck.

Rodan.

I hope someone can tell me what to do.

Thanks, Harold

" snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@g30g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...

Getting old and mind is fuzzy at times but I thought '95 had RWAL. Your symptoms sound like a bad RABS valve which is located inside the left frame rail just foreward of the cab..Its mounted to the frame rail with three nuts, and only has two brake lines going to it as well as a bleeder valve and a wireing harness. Bad Master cylinder is going to result in a low pedal. The combi valve, , what you are calling a proportioning valve has four brake lines and would be just under the master cylinder mounted to a bracket on top the frame rail. It's function is to hold off the front brakes till the rear brake pressure builds enough to over come the return springs and start to apply the rear brakes at which time it re-centers and allows the fronts to apply. It also regulates braking, typicaly 60% to the front 40% to the rear on a rear wheel drive vehicle. It also acts as a safety device closing off one end of the brake system if it loses brake pressure. They typically do one of two things when they fail, they leak, or they get stuck and dont recenter in which case the fronts dont do to much and the complaint is generally poor stopping. I havent seen them block off the rears unless there was a leak at one point in the rear system. If they get stuck you typically have no brake fluid out the bleeders for that end of the vehicle when you try to bleed brakes. Sometimes you can get it to recenter and free up by opening a bleeder on which ever end ofthe vehcle the brakes are working on and then hitting the brake pedal hard. Still I would recommend replacing one that got stuck but its a good diagnostic tool. If the rears start working better you have found the cause. But like I said I am pretty sure 95 had RWAL.

Whitelightning

On Sun, 25 Nov 2007 18:51:13 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com rearranged some electrons to say:

Are you *certain* you don't have rear ABS on this truck? Even my old '89 F150 had rear ABS. If it has rear ABS, there's some other gadgets (accumulator, RABS valve) that need to be bled also.

You may not have adjusted the rear shoes properly. This is a common problem. The shoes need to be the correct distance from the inside of the drum.

You also need to ensure that you haven't accidentally installed the adjusting mechanisms in reverse, ie. left side on the right, and vice versa. They are *not* the same. If you don't install them correctly, the brakes will self-adjust the wrong way, and get looser every time they ratchet.

In that system, brake pressure is first sent to the rear brake circuit as the pedal is depressed. When resistance pressure is high enough, the circuit to the front brakes is opened as the piston moves forward in the master cylinder barrel and the front brakes operate. If the front brakes are working, then the rear are getting some pressure. The proportioning valve maintains equal pressure between the rear brake shoe "springs" and the front calipers. If the pressure between the front/rear is vastly unequal, the proportioning valve will "trip" to the weak side and stay tripped, and the dash indicator light will come on and stay on until the problem is fixed and valve reset. If the rear brakes aren't properly adjusted, then the rear shoes aren't reaching the drums on their stroke before the front brakes start to work. Rears only move about 3/16 to 1/4 inch total in their stroke. You said you bled the rears and didn't get any air. The fact that you can bleed the rear rules out a bad master cylinder or tripped proportioning valve. Unless they weren't properly bled. It's impossible to speculate any further based on information given. But based on what you have said so far, more than likely the rear brakes are out of adjustment.

Good luck, it's an easy fix.

Spdloader

RWAL and 4WAL were available. Spdloader