I too grew up on drum brakes, do not miss them, and appreciate the benefits of disk brakes.
My preference is disc brakes although drums have never been a problem for me. One exception is my antique Harleys.
The drum brakes are excellent and I much prefer them over the rear discs on later models Harleys.
The drums are mechanical linkage, leveraged well enough where the lightest touch will operate them, and in all honesty seem to bring the bike to a faster stop than the disc equipped ones.
Other than shoe wear or very aged and well worn linkage pins the drums work fine. Many years ago I learned a valuable lesson about inspecting those pins and replacing them if needed; which is very seldom.
No front brake, a pin snapped on a dead end street, and there was a lot of gear gnashing and feet dragging in an attempt to get stopped before ramming the barricade at the end or sailing through a deep ditch and onto the green at 11 on the golf course… 
@thesamemountainbike
Rick, if you believe drum brakes are truly better, what is your theory on why car manufacturers all went to disc brakes?
I do believe that overall that discs are better for today’s drivers and today’s vehicles. My argument is that drum brakes do have some advantages over disc brakes. I drive a 4 wheel drum brake equipped vehicle often and I have come to like them over the years.
I have a prius with 4 wheel disc brakes and I feel it should have 4 wheel drums, the disc brakes are not needed on that car since most of the braking is dynamic and the disc brakes will corrode themselves long before the pads ever wear out.
Overall though I agree with you guys, disc brakes are better overall.
@volvo v70
I will probably get flagged but I have theory where the OP's screen name comes from. That is what his co-workers ask each other so they can avoid goofy conversations such as this.
I hope no one flags you, I like the comment and found it humorous. The reason why I go with wheres rick is because I am a bit of a magician and when there’s work to be done I tend to pull a disappearing act, causing people to ask, Wheres Rick?
Drum brakes are efficient because they contain the heat and reduce the stopping ability. With disc brakes the heat is more easily dissipated and stopping ability remains the same (during similar conditions).
Wait a minute, that is the opposite of efficient.
Fair enough, Rick.
The only advantage drums have is the self-actuating tendency, but that’s far outweighed by the advantages of discs.
Rod mentioned earlier about the tendency of drums to lock up; that’s a not-uncommon problem for tractor-trailers. If you’ve ever been behind one when it locked a brake, it smells like a rubber factory. Smoke & stink come with the lockup. Tractor-trailers have plenty of axles and plenty of length, so it doesn’t drag the vehicle sideways like a car would, but it’s a common problem.
@WheresRick
I will remind everybody of YOUR experiment
You were absolutely convinced that drum brakes were great, and were given an unfairly bad reputation
You set out to prove us wrong
You reported back, telling us that your truck with drums all around experienced massive brake fade, and you weren’t able to stop in time. You overshot the stop sign, or red light . . . whatever . . . . and you wound up smack in the middle of the intersection
You grudgingly “conceded” and that was the end of it . . . or so we thought
Why have you now decided to revive this discussion . . . ?!
We all like you, but I for one don’t understand why you want to go through this all again
A lot of school buses use drum brakes front and rear; subject to a lot of stop and go.
Drum brakes in an air brake system have another advantage for vehicles like a school bus; they can be designed such that loss of air pressure engages the brakes… an invaluable safety feature. If the vehicle loses pressure, the engine shuts down, or the system springs a massive leak, the brakes automatically engage. I know that the parking brakes on big-rigs are designed this way. If the truck loses air pressure, the brakes automatically engage. I’m guessing school buses have the same feature.
I like my 4 wheel power disc brakes although I drove at least a couple decades with 4 wheel non power drum brakes. No problems. I tend to be pretty easy on brakes and clutches.
Rick, you must have a real sense of humor posting an Ernest P. Worrell type video about brakes.
“You will never find a disc brake car on the planet earth manufactured with manual disc brakes”.
There were millions of cars manufactured with manual disc brakes in the 1970’s and '80’s. I wonder if Wayne has ever been out of the holler.
He (tried to) state that if front disc brakes were installed on a car without power assist the stopping distance will increase by 1/3.
I replaced the front drum brakes with disc on my 1970 Plymouth Fury (full size car), the car does not have a power brake booster. The stopping distance decreased, stopped straight and was smoother. The pedal effort is greater but still less than the effort required to stop with hot drum brakes.
LOL, thanks for the Ernest P. Worrell analogy. I loved it. Truer words have never been written.
WheresRick I had a co “non” worker who should have been known as “where’s Joe”. One day I walked into the hanger where he supposedly worked and he was turning wrenches on a helicopter! In the few seconds it took for me to reach a phone with the intention of alerting the media he had disappeared!
Nevada_545 You are absolutely correct I owned 1960 and 1962 MGAs a 1966 MGB with manual front disc brakes plus a 1981 Fiat X1/9 with 4 wheel manual disc brakes.
My 2015 truck still has drum brakes on the rear and the braking test results for this vehicle were the best in class. This is because weight and size were not as big a factor and the manufacutrer is still using old designs as the new model for 2016 will have discs. Braking performance. should not g et much better then “being the best” to begin with. So, it isn’t ’ actual braking performance, especially on an axle that gets such a low percent of braking
Disc brakes require greater power then drums to apply unless the mechanical advantage is so great for them it still weighs weighs too much and takes up too much room to install without. Power assist eliminates any advantage drums then have here. No, it’s ride due to decressed unsprung weight, room (discs are more compact) and performance under varied conditions, including cooling off quicker and being easier to repair in most cases.
Discs are more efficient when all a car’s conditons are considered. That includes weight, size, performance and ease of repair
Drum brakes can be made to perfom very well, when many of these other factors are not considered. But then, that usually happens in different vehicles then cars and for different reasons. . Drums require less power to actuate. That’s why many parking brakes that are not power assist, are still little drums in the rear where weight and size is not as big a factor. Air braking probably lends itself to drums too. Air is less efficien and takes up more room then hydraulics but coupling and decoupling done regularly on semis is more problematic with hydraulics, making drums the overall choice on bigger trucks that must operate that way. On tractors that don’t have be decoupled regularly…discs are used as hydraulics are the actuator of choice,
I had a 1970 Chevelle with drum brakes all around. I miss the car but not the brakes. One hard stop and the brakes would noticeably fade. Two and you’d have practically no brakes. This was the 2nd car I owned and the first had disc brakes. I drove through a bit of water and had no brakes until I rode the brakes enough to dry them out. It was… enlightening. I would not want to go back to drum brakes any more than I’d want a carburetor on my next car.
hey rick!!! good to see your voice again!!!
I knew it was you when I saw the title of the thread.
These are the best brakes you can get…
I used to hear these arguments with the “unspoken truths” ignored when the old brake guys and the young brake guys at the GM division I worked for.
The unspoken truths:
Disk brakes are cheaper to produce than drums as long as there is no parking brake, i.e. fronts. Adding a parking brake makes drums cheaper than disks.
Disk brakes have linear gain characteristics so minor brake torque errors side to side don’t cause the car to pull. Self energizing drum brakes have non-linear gain and are very hard to adjust so that side-to-side pulls don’t occur. The side pull maximum heading change is a regulation in the EU and the US.
Drums cannot take repeated stops because they will not cool as effectively as disk brakes and they fade at a much greater rate than drums as they heat.
Zero drag disk brakes exist and are used extensively.
Manual disk brake cars have been produced for decades and are currently for sale.
Drum brakes produce more brake torque with a lower pressure than disk brakes. So what? Increase the disk brake piston diameter and decrease the master bore diameter and voila, more torque. In the spirit of transparency, it will take a longer brake pedal travel when you do this, but that is why disk brakes are usually power assisted.
The industry long ago decided the best solution; 4 wheel disks when warranted and front disk/rear drum when the rear brakes don’t do much work.
Most drivers today use the brakes excessively
In addition to what others have already said, I don’t know what this means. I brake when I need to brake, which is often, because I’ve been told I’m not supposed to run red lights. I’d like to see the statistics that show people today are braking more per mile than they were when drums were common.