Location: Shropshire

The Austin brake shoes don't self align. This makes it difficult to shape them when not fitted to the pivot and cam.
Bedding them in on the car isn't difficult and the soft linings will bed in quickly anyway.

This is a tool I have to help with this (from another thread):

Ruairidh Dunford

Charles P

The single best improvement that I've made is to make sure that the shoe area is fully contacting the drum.

This tool helps to attain this, I have shared it before, Beck design and Goodfellow construction:

Similar to the tool needed to set up the back brakes of the Citroen 2CV. Another car designed in the same spirit as the Seven.

Thank you all. Ruairidh, I searched for dimensions/design of this tool on the site to no avail. Where can I get the tool or the design dimensions?

Erich

Location: Sunny Seattle

It is made from an old brake drum Erich, the slide/guide and locking pin could be made from anything you want.

If you don't have a an old/spare drum, use one you have on the car as a guide to make one from plate.