Front drum adjuster for drivers side?

69 GTX, 11” manual adjust drums

My drivers side front won’t adjust to where the wheel has drag, let alone locks. The shoes don’t seem worn enough to cause that. The pass side does better. I pulled them apart and after getting them next to each other they are the same. The FSM says the drivers side should be plated and have an L stamped in it.

is this just an issue of turning it the other way to make it work? It’s been years since I’ve adjusted these and I thought I tried both ways and found the one that made it the tightest.

I see no problem with turning it the opposite direction.

Auto adjusters are side specific, manual shouldn't matter.

Ok I freed up the drivers side one, called around and have a correct one coming just in case. Wheel cylinder on drivers felt a little funny on one end. Think I freed it up some. Did what I could today. Going to finish adjusting and bleed it out. Drum already has more drag just with how I set it with the drum off.

thanks guys.

I can never remember which way is tightening and which way loosening them
The self adjusting ones have a lot more smaller teeth on them than the earlier ones that were manual adjusting only, I like them better

Thought that one side adjuster is a left hand thread and the other a right hand thread and they tighten and loosen the same direction? Sort of if you turn the adjuster wheel from bottom to top on each side they do the same thing, I think bottom to top adjustment expands to shoes and tightens them????

If you remove the short cap from the adjuster, there should be a L or R stamped on the end you just uncovered.

At least that's the way it was back in the dark ages.

This is correct. Same direction for either side. I believe though from top to bottom tightens. And for loosening you have to push the ratchet arm back then move the wheel in the opposite direction. Either way, you can't loosen it by accident since you have to push the arm in.

Thank you,

Finished up today and I think I got to the bottom of this. The brakes have always had funny action since I got the car. Last year I adjusted them and I started in the right side. It adjusted like I could best remember. The drivers having the wrong one caused a weird contact on a high spot in the drum. I think I bottomed it out going the wrong way and the high spot fooled me into thinking the shoes were done.

Also the cylinder felt funny and will have to be swapped if having it adjusted right doesn’t allow it to move like it should. Seemed to free up after I worked it some. Bled the whole deal out. Pedal feels like I would expect now.