My Durango has over 175K miles on the oem drums and shoes. is this normal? the front rotors and pads have been changed at least 6 times as i can remember. it would seem the front brakes are doing all the braking. everything else is fine and OEM. Now starting to add a quart of oil between changes. Will have to change valve cover gaskets soon.

 

My 2001 gets the rear brakes cleaned and adjusted every 10,000 miles for this reason. I found out the first few years that if you dont adjust them regularly they end up letting the front do all the stopping. It must be a design flaw. if there is a brake expert who has a "fix" for this issue I would like to know what it is.

 

Maybe they were changed at the dealer just before you got it.

 

Obviously the rear brakes do much less braking than the front ones, so they will wear a lot less than the fronts. From my experience the rears only need replaced every 3rd time the fronts need changed. The rear brakes have an auto adjuster mechanism in them that can wear out after time. You can get this as part of the drum brake rebuild kit at most auto parts stores for under $10. It's definitely a good idea to replace the springs and other parts every once in a while (I think mine have been replaced 3 times) since springs can become less effective over time. The rear brakes should keep themselves adjusted properly. If not definitely get a rebuild kit.



If you're loosing oil look down the throttle body and see if it looks oily. If so your plenum gasket is leaking oil into the intake and is likely where your oil is going. I'd be surprised if you were loosing that much through the valve covers.

 

its pretty normal to not have to replace rear drums/shoes, i have 105k on my factory installed rear brake parts and still have a ton of pad left. As stated the fronts do most of the work especially in something this big, the exception to that rule is when you are towing, then the rears will do a larger share of the work, this is by design and due to the laws of physics (ill explain in more detail if you want, just ask).

that said, if you live in the suburbs and park in parking lots/driveways where you can pull in pull out w/o backing up the drums are very likely out of adjustment, they adjust through a rocking motion which is not achieved unless you backup. so if you dont back up your drums will quickly wear out of adjustment.

 

thats nothing we have adelivery truck that has over 400k and just got the rear shoes changed. we would adjust them every 3rd oil change and they just never wore out. We only changed them because a wheel cylider blew out and got fluid everywhere on the old set