Citroen AX Brakes

Yup. Lump hammer. Whack the drum very hard at either side a few times. If it then doesn't come off, rotate the drum whilst tapping it towards you with the lump hammer.

And lump hammer doesn't mean claw hammer. You're doing nothing more than pissing in the wind with a claw hammer.

Apply the foot brake and release it a couple of times. It worked getting a Pug drum off when the cable had snapped.

Or, get all of the tension off the handbrake cable. Find the adjuster (behind the handbrake somewhere) and slacken it may help.

Or both.

Or use a bigger hammer.

I've never come across one that wanted more than finger tight or less and needed to be locked in place in some way. Most I've come across use a cover with pins to stop it rotating, but my Pug needed a new nut for me to destroy by putting a crimp in it.

Warwick

This unfortunately doesnt apply to the AX tho. Rather than use 2 seperate bearings with the nut finger tight held with a split pin or crimp the AX , along with simailar french cars , Clio , Saxo etc use a solid one piece bearing which must be tightened up pretty tight using a breaker bar , but I cant give you the torque off the top of my head. Steve the grease

General only since I don't know your car.

There's usually a fair 'lip' on drums caused by wear after a while which is what the shoes catch on. If there's a self adjusting mechanism, release this. If manual, adjust to zero. Make sure the handbrake operating lever is fully at rest on that drum. If not, disconnect the cable etc. If it still doesn't come off, open the bleed nipple. Use a tube into a jar to collect the fluid to avoid making a mess. This should allow the shoes to go back to rest under spring pressure - a few taps round the drum may help this.

Yes, the last time I removed the drum on a Renault (similar?) there was an access hole at the back through which you shoved a screwdriver to adjust a star shaped nut. That allowed the shoes to go inwards to free the drum.

Ah, I hoped that the crimp was a French bodge that went across the board. Split pins are cheaper. I've not come across that kind of arrangment yet.

Thanks

Warwick

rear hub nut torque is 140 nm

The adjuster has a little spring-loaded wedge which engages with a ratchet in order to do self-adjustment of the shoes. You need to rotate the drum until you can see the wedge through one of the holes, then get a screwdriver in and raise the wedge so that the ratchet disengages and the springs retract the shoes fully. Unfortunately it is pretty much impossible to give any better directions than this unless you've seen inside the drum and tried it for yourself.

Funnily enough I have to take a drum off my AX later today, if I remember I'll take a pic and mail you it.

This is assuming it's the same rear brakes on your AX as on mine, anyway - being a French car, they just chuck on whatever brake bits happened to be in the parts bin on the day it was assembled, so there are about 1,235,810 different variants.

Bloody tight. Can't help you more than that.