It took a while and an extra pair of eyes to find what the problem was (is) with the Honda TLS. It seemed no matter what I adjusted and how close the shoes ran to the hub, the brake was always like a wet sponge.
First off....the chamfer on the brake cam has too much radius. Weld it up and make the chamfer more square edged. You end up with much better lift (more pressure) on the shoe.
Secondly, even after doing that, the brake still had no real power. Then I discovered that the edge of the shoes were contacting the very inside edge of the liner where it starts to round to the hub. I made up a spacer to move the backing plate out a bit from the hub. The brake was much better but still not working %100.
Then while I was testing the feel my mate came over for a look at what I had done. He looked at the pivots while I operated the brake and noticed that there was float on the pivots. Wheel out again and sure enough, the brake pivots had way too much tolerance allowing the brake cam to move off axis. We made up some brass bushes and pressed them into the backing plate. And what do you know, I now have a Honda TLS that works as it was designed to. Just as powerful as the Yamaha set up, maybe even a bit better.