Parking Brake

I tend to generally go the junk yard route but for my parking brake on my 67 CJ5 (I know this was a flat fender post ) I went with the Lokar handle and cable/housing assemblies. It's super clean and easy to do. I have 11" drums on the rear and they work really well.

 

Used Lokar handle and cables. Little pricey but good quality. Straight forward installation with no problems and they work great. Just have to find a boot now, the Lokar boot did not work as the trim ring hit the handle mounting bolts. Need a wider boot, guess it's off to the junkyard to look.

 

As in .... cool!

 

Why wouldn't you just put your foot on the brake mash down and pull out on the handle? Didn't everyones dad teach them that's the way to set a can type E brake handle. Or was that just us kids growing up driving old pickups and farm trucks?

 

That's how I've always set them. I plan on trying it with the stock T-handle, since it's there and all. We'll see how it goes.

 

That's how I used to set my F100's brake too. But I think it's less effective than more leverage. My feeling is the extra leverage lets you stretch the long cables - cables will stretch - and this is what makes the parking brake hold well. All you can do with the foot brake is to put the shoes against the drum, and then take the slack out of the cable.

 

Yeah, it's entirely possible I won't be happy with the results, but my T-handle is still there, and the cable, and a floor-mounted one actually interferes with my center console plan, so we'll see how it goes....

 

Foot pedal is an alternative. Works very well IME.

 

Your not stretching an 1/8" steel cable with any amount of leverage from any kind of E brake lever. Not unless your super man. And if you did stretch it you would have to stretch it even more each time you did. Steel is not elastic.

 

Found a T-case boot from an older Geo Tracker that worked out for $2.50 at the local junkyard.

 

Actually, steel is very elastic. If it weren't, the springs in our Jeep suspensions would be made with a different material.
All materials will deflect under stress. And, if the material's yield point hasn't been reached reached, it will return to its original size/shape.
Because of wound and counter-wound strands, steel cable will stretch significantly, and, if not overloaded, will return to its original length.
Yield (engineering) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The "stretch" isn't in this cable itself, but in the casing. As much pull force as you put on the cable, an equal and opposite push force is put on the flexible casing.

 

Exactly as cadwelder and ITLSEZ say, on all counts.

Plus, the various parts of the system and it's anchor points, including the jeep body, deflect and deform slightly under stress and introduce functional "stretch" to the brake operation.