My son and I are rebuilding an 89 Iroc Z 5.7L. The car came with 4-wheel disc brakes. When we pulled off the rear calipers and other pieces, we noticed that the parking brake lever return springs were rusty, so we tossed them, assuming that replacements would be easy to find. As they say, assumption is the mother of all screw-ups.

After a LOT of searching, looking at web pictures of the old springs (I failed to take any of our springs and levers) and looking at pictures of parking brake return springs that we found at Rock Auto and Amazon, I decided to buy a couple that looked "close" to see if I could make one of them work. I found two GM springs: 13590527, and it's alleged mirror image, 13590526.

The 527 spring, which is listed as the RIGHT side spring for a late model Chevy Cruzer, fit the LEFT side of the Camaro pretty well.



With the parking brake lever pulled up. Everything still clears nicely.

The little "hook" on this spring (13590527) doesn't interfere with the parking brake cable or eyelet. Logically, since the 527 spring fit the driver's side, the mirror-image 526 spring should easily fit the passenger side. Rock auto sold both springs for about $2.50 each, so I ordered one of each. I noticed that the pictures showed the same spring, but all the online ads said to not use the photos as a guide - they were indeed mirror-images.

This is the 13590526 spring

And this is the 527 version. Mirror images?



After some more research, I decided to put one of the springs in a bench vise and reshape the end to fit the passenger side brake unit. This side was several times harder to get in place, but Vise Grips helped. The modified 527/526 spring works fine here also.

In a way, after I cut off the little hook and reshaped the wire to fit though the hole in the lever bracket, this setup looks more like a factory installation.


The wire that passes through the hole used to have a hook on it.

I'll put more information on my w3afc website under the Gen 3 Camaro Tab in a couple days, using a gallery format with captions.

 

Looks like pretty close to a solution to me. Maybe not "perfect", butt, better than no spring at all.

Let us all know HONESTLY over time how it works. Keeping in mind that brakes are a LIFE OR DEATH matter, not only for yourself and everyone in your car such as wife children parents friends relatives whatever, BUT AKSO for everyone else on the road at the same time: they have to work RIGHT. I recall one time my 83's parking brake failed, and the car rolled backwards down the driveway; fortunately got hung up on a curb before it hit a tree, or worse, a person. That's the kind of thing I'd be worried about. If it failed and unexpectedly let go, what could happen.

Brakes are NOT the kind of thing where "good enough" is "good enough". Either it's PERFECT, or it's ... GARBAGE. Even the factory's setups aren't always "perfect". Speaking strictly as someone whose VERY FIRST car wreck was coasting down a hill, AFTER THE BRAKES FAILED, and my car rear-ended a Pinto. And that Pinto rear-ended another Pinto. I would like to be a comedian and tell you that I was disappointed neither one blew up; but it's true. Everybody survived. Took me YEARS to pay off the judgments from that wreck though. DON'T go there.

 

Actually, the springs are there to simply push the parking brake levers back to their starting point as you release the parking brake inside the car. Since we rebuilt the entire underside of the car with Spohn, UMI, Koni, Moog, and Power Stop stuff, the levers have returned to their positions without these springs. We've been driving the car that way all summer and it stops on a dime. Of course, we don't take it out in the rain so crud hasn't had a chance to build up on the cables.

The stock rear calipers are the only OEM parts that we've used, mainly because we wanted to have working parking brakes. If you replace your brakes at all 4 corners with aftermarket performance stuff, you probably won't have parking brakes anymore anyway.

So far, the springs work great, They fit as tightly as the old rusty ones. Thank God we didn't throw out the brackets for the parking brakes, or we would be truly hosed. Those seem to be as rare as hen's teeth also.