Trailer brakes

[chrisheile]

Are trailer brakes pretty standard?  (02 American Skier trailer)  My father and I replaced wheel bearings and found that one of the shoes was broken so I might as well replace all of them. One shoe is much bigger than the other.  Just wondering if I can find them easily.

[RonT]

Trailer Brakes are a matter of DOT regulations and are set by individual states, most require them at 3000# GW a few at 1500 & 2000#GW & some mountain states require brakes on all axles. These laws were written before most trailer boaters began to downsize their tow vehicles, therefore brakes become even more important now than 10 years ago. Marine Drum brake arangements are a bit different from automotive counterparts as ours are designed as "free-backing" meaning they have little effect when hyd. pressure is applied when going backwards, this is why they wear differently as well. There is a distinct forward & backward mounting position of the axle and or wheel cylinder. (brake bleed screw should point aft.) I have seen this kind of problem when the brake s are installed backwards, normally they would last 20,30,K miles, actually I've never seen a trully worn out set of brake shoes on one of our trailers. 

[chrisheile]

Are the shoes easy enough to find??

[RonT]

If Elan was using the same axle assembly in 02 as I did in 2000 it would probably need to come from the axle supplier, but your the first to have worn out a set of shoes as far as I know. Trailer axle builders are known to use a variety of odd off the shelf parts that a typical auto parts store would have no way of cross-referencing. Example the single wheel cylinder is like from a 1962 rambler or Ford falcon or something like that (don't use this to find one please) I've never had one of the new torsion axles torn down to inspect the part numbers, you may get lucky & find some kind of part number on the shoe itself, if you have problems call me & I'll get with the axle Mfg. to find out what you need.