[DaveNP]

There's a few threads on handbrake issues on here, but in short, as Luxobarge said delamination of the shoes is fairly common, they do very little other than hold the car once it's stopped so a lot of cars will still be on their original 20+ year old shoes. And as dippydog says when adjusting, like the Saab, fully slacken the cable adjuster at the lever before setting the shoes with the adjuster inside the drum/disc, then set the height and travel of the lever using the cable adjustment. I replaced the calipers, discs, pads and shoes on mine a couple of years ago as the shoes had delaminated and one caliper was sticking leaving the back of the disc severely rusted, unless you carry a lot in the boot regularly the load sensing valve in the brake system means the rear discs/pads don't do much work either.