Brakes not responding caused accident

[timeoutdan]

I think I might totaled my 2015 red Z/28 last night as I was getting to my mom's house. She lives on a dead end street. As I started approaching her house I started braking and the car would not slow down!!! I remember the pedal just felt very hard and no pedal travel at all. I slammed into the guard rail at the end of the street!!! I could not believe what had just happened!!! Thank God I was not hurt too bad. All air bags were deployed I thought the car was catching on fire from the smell and smoke inside the car.

Has anybody heard of anything similar to this happening? I want to get another Z/28 but I'm concerned about the same thing happening again. I already found a new red one at a dealer. I was thinking of going with a new ZL1 but I love the exclusivity of the limited production Z/28. My other option would be to wait for the 6th Gen Z/28 coming out.

Your input and thought would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advanced.



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[69L48Z27]

WOW! First I've heard of a brake failure.

I would get in contact with GM to investigate why you had no pedal. Pretty scary stuff, good to hear you were okay.

[shawn18]

Wow , I really hate to see that but glad you are ok..that's the most important thing. I have not heard of a brake failure on the Z/28 or any 5th gen for that matter. Especially under normal circumstances. It could be a little more understandable on a racetrack or in an emergency situation but not this. I really hope you get another Z if that's what you want. Hope they figure out what caused the brakes to fail like that.

[frankwjr]

I had more to thought than I drink? Seriously the only time my brakes were ever hard to press like you describe,,the motor was off....check the vacuum line to the booster...had any work done l8tly?

Good thing our air bags weren't from Takata!!!!!!

BTW - e-brake stopped workin too?

[Nick S]

Sounds to me like you are describing exactly what happens when the abs module goes into "ice" mode. The pedal gets very hard and no travel and feels like your brakes are not biting at all. It's happened to me a few times when autocrossing. This "ice" mode is triggered when the abs detects that all four wheels are locking up or decelerating too quickly at the same time. Were you easing onto the brakes or were you driving spiritedly and then stabbed the brake pedal really fast? The only thing you can do when it happens is to release the brake pedal and then reapply the brakes again. Releasing the pedal will force the abs module to exit "ice" mode and give you normal braking again.

I personally think this "ice" mode should just be removed from the abs calibrations because in all the instances wheere it has activated on people it causes more problems that it does any good.

I would get Chevy involved. They should be able to pull data from the computer to prove what did or didn't happen and if the brakes were not being applied aggressively it went into ice mode like that then I would think Chevy should be stepping up and helping you out.

Really sorry to hear this happened to you. I hope you get some help from Chevy on this.
Good luck with your resolution.

[bowtieman_racin]

Definately keep us informed on this. My wife and kids ride in this car all the time I hope that this is a one time only thing. Glad you're ok!

[karve]

Glad to hear you're ok! Definitely keep us posted please. Best of luck with finding another Z.

[frenchsquared]

Never heard of a brake failure. From my experience the pedal get softer not harder in most brake issue. First heat cycle my pedal would go all the way to the floor. I was not concerned I knew it was just hot new pads.

If you did try the ebrake and it did not work then Im thinking you were on cold tires on a cold damp road. Many people forget about the ebrake in a panic situation.

As for holding out on the next Z28.... might be holding a long time. Im with the group that thinks there wont be one.

[D2M]

Originally Posted by frankwjr

I had more to thought than I drink? Seriously the only time my brakes were ever hard to press like you describe,,the motor was off....check the vacuum line to the booster...had any work done l8tly?

Good thing our air bags weren't from Takata!!!!!!

BTW - e-brake stopped workin too?

+1 on the brake booster failure or hose or the little plastic one way check valve in the booster. This car is impossible to stop without the vacuum assist. I tried..

Depending how much your insurance company pays, you may be able to buy a nice low mile used Z and still have cash left over.

[SSEssence]

That's pretty scary! Glad you are okay and it didn't happen at higher speeds. How many miles and are you going to have Chevy look at it for you to figure out what happened?

[Stephen12ZL1]

sounds like possible ice mode as stated above...had the brakes been properly burnished? I know my brakes were terrible until they were burnished. After burnishing they certainly work very well.

[Mark_Z28]

My first thought was it being wet. I've had some pretty scary experiences from driving in the rain on the ceramics. There was pedal travel then though.

Is there a fix to keep it from going into ICE mode

[ksupkt87]

Originally Posted by Mark_Z28

My first thought was it being wet. I've had some pretty scary experiences from driving in the rain on the ceramics. There was pedal travel then though.

Is there a fix to keep it from going into ICE mode

That's what I thought as well. I have come out of the car wash with the ceramic brakes wet and it is definitely an interesting experience.

[ICTsccaCamaro]

Sounds like ICE mode to me also, my 1LE goes into ice mode atleast 1 time every event, and yeah you have no brakes when it happens and you normally go way wide on that corner. But it only happens when I am going from full throttle to hard brake in a split second.