drum brake front hubs

any recommendations? all opinions welcome,

I have a sturmey one, wouldn't recommend it.

I've had the Sturmey Archer XL-FDD 90mm drum/dynamo for a few years now. Generally I really like them, for a commuting bike. Very little maintenance and good stopping power, I have had the occasional problem with them sticking but I've documented it on my blog. Also I managed to bend my forks not designed for drum brakes when I fitted compressionless cable outers
http://smutpedaller.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/braking-bad.html

damn, they work then! got any spare fronts?

I bought mine new. They come up on eBay quite often. The 70mm version is reasonably strong, and the 90mm is great. Although I would recommend getting largeish levers to get the most power out of them.

I have had the occasional sticking problem, although after several unsuccessful tries I managed to fix this by giving the cam a bit of a chamfer. Mind you this is after riding on them every day for 2 1/2 years, probably have about 8000km on them now, plenty of life left in the shoes still

This is the sticking problem
http://smutpedaller.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/sturmey-archer-xl-fdd-service-part-ii.html

Dredging this thread as despite my comment up there ^^^^ I'm thinking about giving a front drum a go again.

I have a Gazelle hub that I got as part of a hub gear/brake lot I bought of a guy and it is the sweetest spinning thing on earth. I'm hoping that the high quality of the bearings is equaled in the brake.

It looks like this,

The only problem with it is that it's just a hub, its not built into a wheel so I have no idea if it will actually be a decent brake or not. I've also not got a buckshee rim at the mo but I have a couple wheels I can dismantle.

Anyone want to regale me with tales of superbly functioning drum brakes and convince me to get on with this?