2N brake won't come out of drum

Trying to do a brake and seal job on my 2N for the first time. I got the drum and axle assembly off, I've loosened the brake adjuster asnfar as I can, but the backing plate won't come out of the drum. It'll move a small amount and then hangs up on something.

The answer's probably here somewhere, but I'm working in the field with spotty signal so search doesn't help much. Thanks in advance for your help.

I'm assuming you took the nuts off of the plate
studs...then you can pry on both sides of the
plate...it's a tight fit and you have to lift evenly
on both sides. It's possible that the shoes wore
into the drum creating a ridge in the drum. If
that's the case, you will have to be careful to pry
straight up otherwise the shoes may get hung up on
the drum. Is it possible you turned the adjuster the
wrong way?

Hopefully it won't require judicious (sp) application of a BFH, or a MFH. I'd start with a SMH and go up - gently.

I've done a couple - always take a big hammer to get the axle out on my tractors. After you have removed the six nuts.

Thanks, all!

After I looked at it for a while, and looked at my reference materials, I remembered that despite the fact that studs were moving in unison with the backing plate, they're not actually attached to the backing plate. This led to the conclusion that the backing plate and hub had become, well, romantically involved, as it were. Dedicated to one another. Extremely attached.

The only think I could come up with to break them apart was to use a hammer on the ends of the studs. I started with a rubber mallet, which did nothing. I then moved up to a small hand sledge, and that did the trick, and surprisingly didn't damage the ends of the studs. What I found is that the previous mechanic didn't use any gaskets, as far as I can tell. It looks like he used some RTV gasket maker which squeezed entirely out from between all the mating surfaces.

So now I've got another question. Is it normal for the hub/outer bearing race to have a fair amount of movement along the axle (maybe 1/2"), or did I damage something with my hammering? This movement made it rather difficult to put the brake/axle/hub assembly back on the trumpet, because the studs would "retract" a bit and then would be too short to reach through the flange on the trumpet. I finally teased them through enough to get a couple of nuts started and then pulled it through and finished the job. So, is this normal?

One more: should I have used some sort of adhesive for the felt seal around the rim of the backing plate? The old, oil-soaked one pulled out easily, which led me to believe none was required.