As my handbrake is non existsant I thought I had better examine my brakes. The handbrake cables are fully wound. I removed the wings and undone the four nuts holding the drums on. Removed the grease nipple, slid back the retaining ring and gater. Here's where y trouble is. I can not separate the driveshaft from the 2cv joint or the joint from the gearbox to remove the actual drum, making it a bastard of a job. I have removed the wheel cylinder again bastard of a job, there is no room behind the drum assembly and the gearbox for my fingers and 10mm bolts. Can anyone tell me how to remove the drums so I can actually get access to the brake shoes?? Incidentally the shoes are shot which is why no handbrake!
Any help on brake shoe removal / refit would be really appreciated
Thanks in advance

Make sure you back the shoes off using the adjusters and wind out the handbrake adjusters too otherwise the drums won't come free....

there wound back and the drum is loose on the driveshaft, cant remove the drum tho as i cant separate the driveshaft from the gearbox and the drum is in the way. such a pig of a job

Do you mean the back plate or you can't get the drum separated from the drive shaft? If its the latter and all 5 bolts are out just give it a wack!

Putting new shoes on takes time and patience as they have a right bastard spring that holds the shoes together and needs working over the end of the driveshaft mount.

Make sure the adjusters are wound fully back and then you need to use either a proper centring tool or fashion something that attaches to one of the driveshaft mount bolts that prescribes a circle with a pointer that lies outside of the edge of the shoes and you then use the concentric cam that's on the bottom mount to align the shoes so that your makeshift pointer touches gently all around the edge of the shoes - if that makes sense - oh forgot - your first put the drum back on and touch the shoes to the drum to start....

Actually if I remember rightly you need to use something like a long screwdriver to get in behind the driveshaft and flange and lever it free - if they haven't been off for a while they can be right bastards to shift......

http://66deuche.blogspot.fr/

This may help - half way down

No the drums have 4 mounting holes not 5. You may need to remove part of the heating box one the left side. From memory the master cylinder too even the exhaust clamp. You can't dismantle the drive shaft on the gear box side. Seperate the drive shaft on the middle, then the drum can slide down and be removed.

Oops my mistake! They have 6 mounting bolts not 5 to hold the driveshaft onto the drums and the gearbox stubs...how stupid of me!

Has yours got the jam-jar fluid reservoir? I had to take mine off to get at my brake cylinders then bleed the brakes afterwards.

My fluid reservoir is more test tube than jam jar asthetically Sam, it has either 4 or 5 nuts holding the drum to the stub axle, just can't see how to shift the driveshaft out the way so I can get the drum out the way, do I just whack it? There is 4 x circlips eithe end of the universal joint do I need to remove 2 and whack? The Haynes manual is crap, being a dyane 4 no exhaust or engine cooling metal is in the way.