WH Handbrake adjustment cog...should i need a hammer to move it even slightly?

Hi all!!

I went through 14 pages of searching for "handbrake" and wasn't able to find an answer to this specific question so thought i'd start a new thread.

The handbrake on my WH is loose as a goose. If i reef is all the way up the car will still slowly roll in either direction and even after adjusting it at the handbrake to the point it only makes it to 5 clicks it still does nothing (to be expected). So i took the wheels off and tried adjusting the brake shoes through the hole with the grommet but could not make the cog budge without smacking the screwdriver with a hammer.

Even when taking the hub off completely i had to apply a bit of force with the hammer to get it to move a few clicks, so my question is, are the cogs meant to be easily adjusted using nothing but a flathead screwdriver or are they usually this tight? Because i couldn't adjust the handbrake with the hub off otherwise i couldn't get the hub back on. If i try to do it through the grommet hole i have to continually search (and hope) i have made contact with the cog and smack away with the hammer

Thanks for your help

EDIT: Should note that the shoes are perfectly fine/meaty as well.

 

Phew, i was hoping it shouldn't be that tight!

As much of a pain in the arse it is to fish for the cog through that tiny hole, it'd be MUCH easier if i could just lever it up/down to adjust it. Rather than having to find it, grab the hammer, hope the flathead doesn't move and bang it each time. I tried it that way and after 45mins i spat the dummy and just said "stuff it"

Just to be clear though, should i be able to adjust it with nothing more than the flathead? Just smack it with the palm of my hand or something like that? Just to get an idea of how "free" it should be moving.

Thanks again

 

Thanks mate that's exactly what i needed to hear

I can rebuild a 13b and replace my own headgaskets but managed to get stumped with a simple adjuster, haha

Thanks again!