Can anyone give me some help on how to adjust my parking brake cable. It is a 98 1500. I read the manual but it didn't make sense to me. Thanks.

 

You remove the rear drums (if you don't have a slot on the back of the back plate like mine)and tighten the star adjuster, until the shoes just rub the drums.

 

is ther not a phisical aduster on the cable itself? so you can take out slack out of the cable as well.

 

Yes, there should be. At least on my 95 it's on the driver's side near the fuel tank. It looks like a turnbuckle.

 

The one by the tank adjacent to the front of the leaf spring is suppose to be an adjuster! It is probably already bottomed out.According to the FSM to adjust the E brake you adjust the rear shoes at the same interval as rotating the tires IIRC. Which are suppose to automatically adjust , but never do. 95 may be different than 98 (I doubt), but If the shoes are adjusted correctly and you still have play in the cable, one , both or all cables are stuck and need to be replaced.

 

Thanks for all the advise. I'll try adjusting the shoes at the drum.

 

one surprising thing that I have found over the years is that if you have your rear drums correctly adjusted up the parking brake is also 'right'

in fact I now use how loose the parking brake 'feels' to tell me how often I need to remove the rubber plugs and manually adjust the rear drum brake star wheels

 

Hankl, that's a good way of putting it. When not adjusted properly, the parking brake easily goes to the floor. When adjusted, it is stiff and you can't put it to the floor.

 

I just tightened the cable. But I guess that was just me. It worked fine on my truck.

 

You still have to adjust the rear shoes at recommended intervals, eventually your pedal will get softer and softer and you'll notice alot more brake dust on front rims.