I have just sorted out a problem I've had with my E/brake. Ever since I've had the car I noticed how high th E/brake handle comes up when it is applied on my car! As in this pic of my car taken before I did the adjustment.There is no way to adjust the E/brake cable so this is how I did it.




I found out when my car had it yearly MOT test that the drivers side E/brake or hand brake as we call it in the UK was not working. So I decided to take the wheel of and investigate.

I removed the two bolts that hold the brake caliper behind the disc or rotor as you guys call it. Then I pried it off with a large screwdriver and rested it on a house brick because the rubber hose for the brake fliud is still conected.

Then I pried the horse shoe shaped brake shoe to remove it, it pulls up and forward and then you can jiggle it a bit to get it off past the end of the drive shaft.

At the bottom of the brake assembly on the righthand side behind the drive shaft you will see a cog with lots of teeth on it and it has a slot where the brake shoe locates in. I found this small assembly was seized. The bit with the slot is threaded into thr cog and all I had to do was hit the cog in a clock wise direction with a screw driver and hammer to free it off. You can pull this assembly out to free it off if you like as it just slides out once the brake shoe is removed. So you can clean it and make sure it's working ok.

The cog can then be clicked a tooth at a time clockwise as you look at it and the innner pice with the slot for the brake shoe to locate in will move out to pre load the brake shoe.

Put the brake shoe back on using a couple of screw drivers and tap it down at the top so it locates behind the clip at the top.

Then get your screwdriver and hammer and tap the cog clockwise a few teeth at a time clockwise as your look at it from the back of the car.

Then try to put the rotor back on and see how it fits. If is is still a loose fit take it off and tap the cog round a few more teeth until the brake rotor just slides over the brake shoe with some ressitance. In other words you are pushing the horseshoe shaped brake you outwards so it just comes in to contact with the brake drum on the back of the rotor.

So you are taking out the slack of preadjusting the E/barke. Now put the brake caliper back on and bolt in up tight and refit the wheel and your done.

I had only to do the drivers side e/brake as the other side was working fine and preadjusted ok. Now try your E/brake and it only comes up half as far as before and you have working E/brake on both sides now!

I hope this decription makes sense to you guys as everything goes by a diiferent nane in the UK! We call brake rotors brake discs over here for examlpe. This adjustment works on my 99 Z28 car and will work on other cars Firebirds and T/A's than have the drum for the E/brake built into the rotor. I know my 95 Z28 LT1 had a different system.

Cheers Andy