I've replaced all the rubber lines, blead the old fluid with new in order rr, lr, rf, lf, new pads and shoes, new front rotors, adjusted the rear for slight drag but the rears won't grab unless i use the ebrake. With it on jackstands at idle I they don't even slow down. Was like this when I got the car, stops ok when I can stop regular but lots of people here cut you off run stop signs and lights (we only have two in town). The other day I was cut off doing 45 was cut off and the fronts locked up i slip about 2 car lengths. Is this a sign of a bad master or one that needs to be bench bled or is there a front/rear adj?

 

Wheel cylinders okay? If they are old factory ones they could be sticking (they usually leak versus stick, but do stick sometimes)....

I'll be you have an internal master cylinder issue. They are pretty cheap if its the stock one I'd just replace it for peace of mind. Make sure you bench bleed it, then bleed it once its installed, then bleed the wheels in the same order you did. Also make sure the front caliper slides move in and out freely, if not lube them up or replace them.

I haven't really messed with third gen brake systems a whole lot but you could also have some sort of proportioning malfunction.

 

sounds like bad master or frozen whl. cylinders.

pull the rear drums and and make sure shoes are good and adjusted and all hardware is present and attached. if the cylinders are old just replace them they are cheap.

do you get good fluid and pressure out of the rear bleeders?

without seeing anything and based on what you say i would replace the whl. cylinders and master cylinder.

 

Ok, thanks I'll get to that asap

 

I had this same EXACT problem, however, my solution was extreme. I didn't do it to FIX my brakes though. When i changed rear ends from an open drum rear to a posi disc rear, the problem fixed it's self. this leads me to believe that the problem was physically the rear brakes. I don't think that it's your master cylinder though. That's just my opinion. Wheel Cylinders have my vote. I would bet that if you changed those, You'd be good. The good part about it is that it's not expensive to do or hard to accomplish.

 

Possibly something you overlooked. I haven't looked at a thirdgen rear shoes for a while, but on the rear shoes, at the bottom, there should be a spring. The long hook comes off the side of the center coil, it is not centered. If the hook is at the top as you look at, it can rub against the adjuster and keep it from turning. It causes the problem you talk about. Just turn the spring over so the hook comes off the bottom side of the coil.

 

Believe it or not, That might be normal if you search on here a ton of people complain about third gen brakes, they really suck, on my GTA i can stand on the brake pedal 2 feet and the car won't lock up when going under 40 but if iam going fast i can lock them up go figure, looking for a solution i read a lot of solutions posted on here, the best and cheapest solution that i am going to test out is buying a spring from Grainger that replaces the factory proportioning valve spring, it takes about 5 minutes but since the newer spring has more pressure you need to be careful when installing the new one since you don't want to cross thread the nut onto the P.V being that it's aluminum..I just ordered the spring today,comes in a pack of 5 only from what i've read it makes a big difference , sends more pressure to the rears. here is the part number 1NCR5

http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/wwg...eadSearch.y=-5