Ouch!

To start off, there is a right and a left 'star wheel' They must be in
the proper side or they will just fall out possible jamming the rear
wheel up.

The star wheel also has to line up with the adjusting clip that hits
them to turn them for automatic adjustment. This clip also prevents the
star wheel from turning backward and has to be lifted with a second
screwdriver to back it off at the end of the procedure.

The star wheel is usually on the back side of the bolt or the side the
adjuster cable runs on and should go click click click when you turn it.

Normally you only adjust the main lever cable when you install a new
cable. The e-brake adjustment is then done with the star wheel.

Yes you can just use a screwdriver(S).

Good luck!

Mike
86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00
88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's
Canadian Off Road Trips Photos: Non members can still view!
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kaig wrote:
>
> I replaced rear pads and discs on my zj, which actually turned out much
> easier than I had thought.
> In the process, I got to see that on one side there was no braking shoe
> lining left at all (e-brake shoes inside the disc), on the other side
> the lining separated from the shoe assembly when I took the rotor off.
> Searching here / on google, that seems to be a common problem, and I
> remembered that a couple of months ago I had some bad grinding noise
> from the rear wheels for a couple of seconds twice, it may be that was
> the time when the lining separated and got chewed up inside the
> rotors...
>
> When trying the e-brake, it hardly worked at all, as expected. -- I
> must admit I hadn't noticed earlier, since I'm not usually using the
> parking brake.
>
> So I got parking brake shoes and put them in -- quite a pain without
> proper tools (springs), but I managed. However, I went very loose on
> the adjustment as I didn't want to screw it up and get the brakes to
> permanently drag. Now the parking brake is still working only
> marginally when the lever is pulled all the way and I suppose I have to
> adjust it for real. I understand the basic procedure, jack up the car,
> adjust through the backing plate until drag and then ease off a little.
> But I still have some questions:
>
> Is adjusting the actual brakes all I need, or do I need to adjust the
> cable length, too?
>
> Since the star wheels are most of the way in, they aren't really very
> well accessible through the slot in the backing plate, if at all. I
> suppose that's just normal?
>
> Is an adjusting tools necessary, or will a screwdriver do the job?
>
> I forgot to take note which way the adjusting bolt/star wheel assembly
> goes, so at reassembly time I just picked a direction. Does it matter
> whether the wheel / bolt part is on the front vs the rear? The
> inaccessibility problem through the slot mentioned above exists both
> ways.