# Parking Brake (No) Adjustment



## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

Usually I keep my ECO/MT in the first gear when is in parking. But since I installed the remote starter I have to leave the gear stick in neutral and use the parking brake too. I realized that the lever is starting working just after a 3/4 of the entire travel. So I achieve the proper parking force almost at the end of handle movement. I asked the dealer to adjust the cable and he told me that it’s impossible, the brake is self adjusting! Technically the parking brake works. But my wife has to try harder for that and even for me is not a pleasure. For my parking place it’s OK, almost flat, but when is a hill I have to check twice…. For all the cars I had, I adjusted the hand brake to start engaging under a half of travel and get the maximum at approx. 3/4. 
I’m planning to check myself the brake but when the weather will be warmer. In the meantime, anybody did this cable adjustment? 
Thank you.


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## 70AARCUDA (Nov 14, 2010)

...time to possibly consider carrying a pair of *wheel-chocks* in the trunk?


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## gfxdave99 (Feb 26, 2011)

I'm pretty sure that's the way it was designed. You dont want the brake to fully engage as soon as you lift up. 

You could always do the grab the handle push the button in with your thumb and yank up method which is less effort..


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

gfxdave99 said:


> I'm pretty sure that's the way it was designed. You dont want the brake to fully engage as soon as you lift up.
> 
> You could always do the grab the handle push the button in with your thumb and yank up method which is less effort..


I want the hand brake fully engaged at 1/2 of total travel. I’m using often the hand brake during the winter when is snow or ice!  Of course, different than my other cars, now I have to take out the stability and the traction control. However I’m working in the “filed” but at different scale vehicles (off road) and not having an option to adjust the play for the hand brake sounds strange for me. I can bet is an adjuster at the brake core, something that moves the pads close each other. I’ll check this week at work a few upscale parking brakes.


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

Here is the official information I have:


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## TSURacing (Jan 1, 2011)

So..... you have to lift it and then stroke her a few times........Sounds like a party


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

TSURacing said:


> So..... you have to lift it and then stroke her a few times........Sounds like a party


 It doesn't work! 
How it's working yours?


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

*Fixed!*

Finally over the weekend I got time enough to fix this. This is for the drum brakes. After taking out the wheel, you have to get out the screw from first picture. The adjuster is right there (see the 2nd photo)! After a few tries, I spun mine approx 270 deg. and put back the drum to test if it was rotating without rubbing the pads. When I was close enough, I put back the safety screw (+blue loctite 242) and the wheel. Overall work 20-25 minutes. The parking brake is engaging now starting under a half of travel of the handler. It is now fully engaged at ¾ so I don’t have to move back the rest arm anytime to when I have to use the parking brake.


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## NBrehm (Jun 27, 2011)

There isn't a rubber plug on the back of the drum backing plate to get to the adjuster?


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## Dale_K (Jul 16, 2011)

Can somebody repost the links that don't work? My Cruze manual trans LS has a parking brake problem too. The handle will hit the console lid before fully engaging the brake in some cases but reading this thread it's not clear whether there's supposed to be an adjustment for the parking brake handle or only one for the rear brake shoes.

And another thing, shouldn't the rear shoes adjust themselves? My brake pedal is kind of low and I've been trying to "self adjust" the rear shoes by backing up and hitting the brakes. That's how older vehicles work but I don't know about the Cruze. Maybe if I got the rear brakes right the parking brake handle issue would fix itself.


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## NBrehm (Jun 27, 2011)

The adjuster is on the shoes, don't mess with the cables until after you try adjusting the rear shoes


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## Ian_12 (Aug 19, 2011)

How many miles were on the car when the adjustment was needed? But they are suppose to self adjust. That little arm that rests on the adjuster is what turns it to adjust whenever you apply the brakes. When shoe wears down enough, the adjuster lever will turn the self adjuster to bring shoes closer to the drum.​


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## Crewz (Jul 12, 2011)

Interesting. BTW, I have always put my manual tranny cars in 2nd gear when parked with the e-brake on. The weight of the car can turn over the motor too easily in first if the e-brake wasn't on for whatever reason. Think about when you push start a car. You dump it in first. I would probably consider even putting a 6 speed in at least 3rd.


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## Ian_12 (Aug 19, 2011)

Crewz said:


> Interesting. BTW, I have always put my manual tranny cars in 2nd gear when parked with the e-brake on. The weight of the car can turn over the motor too easily in first if the e-brake wasn't on for whatever reason. Think about when you push start a car. You dump it in first. I would probably consider even putting a 6 speed in at least 3rd.



Actually the higher the gear, the easier it is to roll car. Put car in 5th or 6th and you will probably be able to move it. I rock motors over in highest gear when engine has sat for years to make sure it isn't locked up. And whenever I have to pop start a car, I use second. It is far less harsh due to speed needed.


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

Ian_12 said:


> How many miles were on the car when the adjustment was needed? But they are suppose to self adjust. That little arm that rests on the adjuster is what turns it to adjust whenever you apply the brakes. When shoe wears down enough, the adjuster lever will turn the self adjuster to bring shoes closer to the drum.​


I had the issue with the parking brake from the day I bought the car. I went to the dealer to fix it and they told me the story with “self adjustment”. They gave me the manual I posted on the first page. It is not any cable adjustment there! I’m working with military vehicles and I could bet the brake can be adjusted from inside. Just hadn’t enough time by the last weekend to fix it. The parking brake is working now nice and I can park the car even without engage the stick. The pedal is higher too. The concept could be much better, this kind of adjusting is not the best they could use.


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

Ian_12 said:


> Actually the higher the gear, the easier it is to roll car. Put car in 5th or 6th and you will probably be able to move it. I rock motors over in highest gear when engine has sat for years to make sure it isn't locked up. And whenever I have to pop start a car, I use second. It is far less harsh due to speed needed.


 Ian has 100% right!


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## Quazar (Apr 28, 2011)

CRUISE-CRUZE said:


> I had the issue with the parking brake from the day I bought the car. I went to the dealer to fix it and they told me the story with “self adjustment”. They gave me the manual I posted on the first page. It is not any cable adjustment there! I’m working with military vehicles and I could bet the brake can be adjusted from inside. Just hadn’t enough time by the last weekend to fix it. The parking brake is working now nice and I can park the car even without engage the stick. The pedal is higher too. The concept could be much better, this kind of adjusting is not the best they could use.


The brakes are adjusted for fuel economy. Being able to park the car without engaging the brake means that the shoes are touching the drum, which means more friction and heat. Which means less MPG and more brake fade effect.

The advantage to shoes over disk brakes is the over all friction is less, specifically because they can be adjusted not to touch the drums. This currently is not the case with disk brakes.


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## Ian_12 (Aug 19, 2011)

Parking brake itself isn't self adjusting. The drums are. Your car must not have been properly set from factory and adjusters must not have been able to get brakes to where they needed. The piece you adjusted is the self adjusting system. So if they told you parking brake self adjusts, then they are stupid or thought you were stupid and didn't want to explain. Too many dealers think people will believe what they say. The days of the honest, helpful mechanics seem to be a thing of the past.


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

Quazar said:


> The brakes are adjusted for fuel economy. Being able to park the car without engaging the brake means that the shoes are touching the drum, which means more friction and heat. Which means less MPG and more brake fade effect.
> 
> The advantage to shoes over disk brakes is the over all friction is less, specifically because they can be adjusted not to touch the drums. This currently is not the case with disk brakes.


Quazar, I adjusted the pads, I didn’t lock them! J
I tried a few times and I stopped at the point I still could spin the drum “free”. The small distance I gained changed the fully engaged position of the hand lever with approx. ¼ of the overall travel. And the pedal also is much higher now. When I went to the dealer he “demonstrated” that the hand brake it’s holding the car 100% on a 30 degree plane. I was tiered to explain to him that was for a maximum up lever position and my wife will have to use both hands to do that! J However everything looks fine now.
BTW, I got yesterday an average of 41.2MPG for a 232 miles trip. Just highway and maybe 5% on secondary road with 55MPH speed limit.
“Engage the stick” means the stick for changing the gears! lol I realize you thought I locked rear brake at all! That would kill the brake in a few miles. Sorry for confusion.


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## sciphi (Aug 26, 2011)

Bump to this...

My 2012 was adjusted the same way. A simple adjustment, and I was all set to go. The parking brake now stops at 3/4 of its old height. The drums should also work better, to boot. 

I also sprayed some oil onto the cable where it enters the drum backing plate. I can see ice building up and sticking the parking brake in the winter for those of us up north.


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## Dale_K (Jul 16, 2011)

I'm thinking the brakes will go back to the way they were before. Over time the linings will wear down and the free play will increas until it reaches the point when the self adjusters start working again. You'll be back at the same spot as you were before you made the manual adjustment. Let me know if the free play stays tight because my brakes could stand to be tightened up. The pedal is kind of low and the parking brake hits the console lid when the lid is in the forward position.


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## jpeloke (May 26, 2011)

this is something I'm interested in too. My wife has a 2Lt with 4 wheel disc brakes and the pedal is much higher and not near as spongy feeling as my ECO. I can see where if you adjust them tighter they will wear and go right back to where they were. There must be a fix somewhere.


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## sciphi (Aug 26, 2011)

The fix is to re-adjust every second oil change. The OLM's on these cars have us go 8-10k miles or longer. Every 16-20k miles, or once a year or so, pop off the rear drums and re-adjust. I had to do that on my old Buick with rear drums. It takes maybe 30 minutes from jacking the car up to putting the tools away. That way you also can monitor the wear on the shoes. Doing this reduces wear on the front brakes since the rears are now doing their jobs.

Driving around today after adjusting, the pedal was much higher and firmer than before. The parking brake also stopped well short of the armrest.


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## nobog (Oct 25, 2011)

*Brake dust*

Its a good idea every 20K or so to pull the drums off and get rid of all the accumulated brake dust and dirt, this makes your shoes last much longer. Get a can of brake cleaner and hose everything down real good, drums, linings, everything. Thats a good time time to check the adjustment, just a very slight drag and then back off (as mentioned).

Jim


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## DonPatrizio (Jun 14, 2012)

Thanks for the how-to. When you spin the adjusters, do you spin them clockwise of counterclockwise, and on which sides?


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## thaicruze (Jul 21, 2011)

What do you do if you have rear disc? 

http://www.mpbrakes.com/uploads/documents/rearadjust.pdf

I'm having issues with noises and the inner pads getting loose. I can move them with my finger. Wasn't like that the day they installed new pads. Couple of weeks later they're loose again. 

I never use the E Brake.


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## ProDigit (Aug 31, 2015)

I know this is an old topic, but I have the same problem.
Since the rear drums are self adjusting, I presume that once adjusting them manually for the parking brake, they will autocorrect hydraulically to their prior settings. Though the parking brake does not readjust.
I saw a youtube vid, of a guy removing the whole arm rest compartment, to see the handbrake mechanism.
I was hoping to avoid having to do this, but if there's an easy way to remove it and re-install it, underneath the armrest, there are 2 screws connected to a plate that's connected to 2 cable wires.
Those 2 screws are (I believe) adjustment screws.
Although I never would want to uninstall my armrest compartment.

Another issue I'm pondering,
Though the brakes on the cruze are self-adjusting,
I remember on older volkswagen beetle drum brake shoes, that over time, tend to get out of alignment (the top would wear out more than the bottom).
So after a good 50k miles, the bottom needed to be adjusted (lengthened), to balance out the shoes again, since they only had a single hydraulic cylinder.

I wondered if on the cruze, they need the same adjustment, or if the brake shoes have a starwheel self adjuster system like in pic?


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## dhpnet (Mar 2, 2014)

The drum brakes self adjust mechanically, not hydraulically. In the Cruze, every time you pull the hand brake it is supposed to adjust the drum brakes. Sometimes this doesn't work exactly as designed. 

An easy fix is to put your thumb on the ebrake button and pull and release the brake handle a few times while carefully and slowly backing up. This is what I do in my Cruze when the rear brakes are obviously not as tight as they should be. My brake handle engages at about 1/2 way, and I can feel the rear brakes working. If the rear brakes are not tight enough then the car will dip a lot in the front when braking. If they are correctly adjusted then you will feel both the front and rear dip a little, but not nearly as much. 

If that doesn't work, or if you just want to be extra sure your brakes are adjusted correctly, check out this thread. 
http://www.cruzetalk.com/forum/153-...torials/6485-how-adjust-rear-drum-brakes.html


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## NickD (Dec 10, 2011)

One kid had a 90 T-bird with an automatic adjusting temperature control, just move it to low than to high and was suppose to self adjust, worked for a couple of seconds, then was a mess again, tore all the crap out, standard cable with a clamp on the outside for a solid adjustment, never shifted again.

So much for automatic adjustment, Cruze parking brake is this way, when you pull it up, that dog is suppose to slide on the cable, if it digs in, or slips, won't adjust at all. Only cure is to completely replace the parking brake assembly. Can't quite recall the price, but think is was under 40 bucks. 

Daughter purchased a 2015 base model Kia Soul with rear disc calipers from the same factory that made the Cruze brakes. Was getting brake dray, levers for adjusting and the parking brake were not returning to the home position. Didn't know if this was self adjusting or not, said if it was, will have to take it to your dealer. But I popped off the rear cover of her console and saw a nut, just loosened to enough to where both levers hit the home position and a tad more.

Never had problems with the automatic adjusting parking brake on my Cruze, if it sticks to tight, will get brake drag, if it slips, no parking brake at all, and doesn't make any difference if you have drums or discs. Anything to save production an adjustment, but at times, wished they had an aftermarket with a nut on it.

But others on this board did have problems. Just replace it yourself if out of warranty, labor will kill you.


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## ProDigit (Aug 31, 2015)

Tried lifting a few times without success, but will try reversing.
If that doesn't work, I'll have to resort to taking off the rear wheel hubs, and adjusting the bottom star screw adjuster or something someone mentioned.


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## NickD (Dec 10, 2011)

Major age old problem with drum brakes are at the lower shoes where they go into the anchor, corrodes and the shoes cannot self center. Really helps if you can find shoes that are plated, but have to cleaned and the very best lubricant I found was Permatex anti-seize.

If the shoes do not self center, the adjusters do not work. Another spot are on the backing plate where the shoes make contact and where they fit into the cylinder on top. Also the best lubricant I found is on the threads of the adjuster, again, anti-seize, any kind of grease dries up or melts away, have to be able to screw those in very freely.

04 Cavalier was not too bad, used a huge U-shaped spring to compress the shoes, took a strong man and a boy to put that spring back in. I feel too many mechanics complained about this, so Chevy went back to those tiny little springs exactly like was used on my 41 Chevy, they were also a problem. Shoes have to be able to compress after being release, small tab on the rear shoe advances the gear tooth adjuster of the gap is too large.

I always set my shoes loose, back up in a clear area, hit 3 mph, then tap on the brakes, if the pedal does not come up after so many tries, didn't do it right, but always have, ha, going back about 60 years on this. Yet another problem is that DOT 3 tends to gum up, if you open the bleeder and can't push the pistons back in with your fingers, you have more problems.

Only thing I have left with drums is my Chevy P-30 motorhome chassis. That was a job, had to remove the rear axle first to remove the drums, get my wheel cylinder hone out and clean them up with new rubber. Was surprised my machine shop only charged me 5 bucks to clean up the drums. Ha, couldn't put those back on by myself, with duels, could not hold those hundred pound drums with outstretched arms. On my back, couldn't see what I was doing, so had to call my son to guide it, but sure working fine now, even after ten years.

But still have to back it up and tap on the brake pedal to take up the free play. It's not driven on road salt. Sick of road salt.


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## Wireman 2b (Sep 8, 2019)

Delete


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