brake shoes

About what?

 

that will not hurt anything

 

Not sure how that shoe got chipped but it is nothing to worry about. You have plenty of shoe covering the drum. Glad you can ask questions though. Very wise!

 

How do they get like that?

 

The only worry I would have about that is meeting the wrong DOT person. I have seen that many times over the years and never had a problem.
Some points: In picture 2 the flange with two bolt holes in it which is welded to the axle is the spider. The shinny spot in the drum about an inch in is from the previous shoes being worn down to the rivets. The rivet made that groove. The shoe is not straight in the drum caused by one or a combination of the following. 1: Drum is barrel shaped and pushing shoe out. 2: Anchor pins and or bushings are worn out. 3:Bent spider. 4: New linings on worn out shoes. 5: Missing parts? Fix now!
We are pretty local yocal here and I would correct it the next brake job. If I were running 48 I would get it corrected now. It is not worth the risk being shut down in the asphalt wilderness losing loads etc.

 

Couldn't say. That would be a good question for a service manager at a dealership

 

They did it on my 16 kw. I even had a set Crack and break on me with 35k miles, granted the previous operator trashed this truck.

 

this is just for your info, not saying you should not have looked into but... when,if d.o.t. does inspection & you apply only tractor brakes, he most likely will not see the shoe, cause it will not hang out like that when brakes are released.