Soak/immerse your droms for 72 hours in vinegar of any kind. flip them once every 24 hours. I got a large plastic box with a lid (crucial regarding stink and evaporation) and filled it with about 15 gallons. You could do less and do one drum at a time? Scrub with fine steel wool or SOS pad as you rinse with a garden hose. Do this on dirt. rusty vinegar concoction will stain cement. So will carrying a dripping drum to the dirt to hose it. You will have a drum (and any other rusty parts) that look almost like virgin metal. Use Engine paint. Semi Gloss Black is always a safe way to go. Wire wheel will remove all else from the other parts for painting. I use a bench grinder for little stuff. 10k RPM grinder with wire rope wheel for the big stuff like rear end and leaf-springs. You're doing all components on the brake system, including pads, 3 hoses, all wheel cylinders, Master cylinder, and inspecting existing metal lines for rust? I took apart a 66 Tbird the other day, and moved the MC while it was still on the rigid lines and should have just hung there away from the booster/firewall, no problem, right? It snapped off in my hand with a 10th the pressure that they should support. It's a rusty car. Scared me and made me happy that I wasn't going to trust them as I had planned to. One weak link anywhere on the brakes and you're going to need body work and a lawyer. DO NOT LIVE AND LEARN on those - overdo them!! Hope you get back on the road soon!! -Kenyon --- JCantor791@xxxxxxx wrote: > Now that I've passed the hurtle of getting the rear > drums off, I expect > (notice I didn't say 'assume') to have little > difficulty in assessing the condition > of the brakes and cleaning and adjusting the working > parts back to spec. The > weak effectiveness and somewhat soft peddle I > suspect will eventually be > traced back to the master cylinder. > > Anyway, while I have the drums off, I thought it > might be a good idea to > clean them well and perhaps paint them to minimize > future rust damage. A while > back I seem to recall seeing a thread either here or > elsewhere about a good > technique for cleaning brake and suspension parts > and painting them where > appropriate. Anyone have any suggestions? I > couldn't find much in the archives and > ended up looking through the Eastwood and Crosswell > (?) websites. Both > companies have lots of interesting sounding albeit > expensive solutions. What I > remember was a technique based on common everyday > tools and inexpensive cleaners. > > Also, if I proceed down this route, what type and > color of paint would have > been used in '56 on brake drums from the factory? > Black? Grey? > > Thanks, > Jeff > '56 Sedan > Trenton, NJ > > > ----------------- http://www.imperialclub.com > ----------------- > This message was sent to you by the Imperial Mailing > List. Please > reply to mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and your > response will be > shared with everyone. Private messages (and > attachments) for the > Administrators should be sent to > webmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > To UN-SUBSCRIBE, go to > http://imperialclub.com/unsubscribe.htm > > ===== Kenyon Wills ----------------- http://www.imperialclub.com ----------------- This message was sent to you by the Imperial Mailing List. Please reply to mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and your response will be shared with everyone. Private messages (and attachments) for the Administrators should be sent to webmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To UN-SUBSCRIBE, go to http://imperialclub.com/unsubscribe.htm