Originally Posted by wanttolive (Post 256658)

Thanks for your quick reply, JetMech.

They didn't say what the exact name of the modulator is, just that there is one for $700 they would try first and if that didn't fix it, we would have to replace a second modulator for another $1800, for a total of $2500.

Here's a recap of our incidents. After we had the yukon for about 2 weeks, we had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting a car in front of us. It was an extremely hard braking situation. We drove the rest of the way home fine and the next morning, it was fine on my first trip of the day. The second time I drove that day, I was going very slow, leaving a parking lot. When I pushed on the brake, nothing happened. I had to put the pedal to the floor to slowly stop, and I was hardly moving in the first place. The red brake light came on with all of the dash warnings to service brakes immediately, check stability, service traction, etc. I crawled to my destination. I was parked for about an hour and when I got in to drive home, the lights were all back to normal and the brakes worked fine. I took the back roads home very slowly since I no longer trust my Yukon.

We called the GM dealership we bought it from only two weeks ago and they said since it had no warranty, they would charge us to read the codes. We got the idea they knew it had a problem when we bought it, so we decided to take it to a different GM dealership. They read the codes and said it was because we had such a hard braking incident. They said turning the key on and off would reset it, but it may need a new modulator (one for $700 and possibly a second for $1800). We asked if that means every time we have to slam on the brakes we have to replace a $2500 part. They said, "Oh no. There's a 12,000 mile/1 year warranty." Oh, that makes me feel better. We only have to replace it once a year! Really? They then suggested we try and recreate it, and if we couldn't, it was "probably ok." "Probably ok" doesn't sit well with us when we are planning on towing a very heavy boat with our entire family in the Yukon. We went to a parking lot and slammed on the brakes a few times, but nothing happened. We figured it might be a day or two later before they failed, but still nothing.

Two weeks later, a car cut us off and we had to slam on the brakes hard again. We tried turning the car on and off several times to reset it, which seemed to work....until we got up in the mountains and they failed again. I pushed on the brake with little response, pushed the pedal to the floor, and then very slowly came to a stop with lights flashing and some annoying beeping that only adds to the panic and frustration of no brakes. Luckily, we were pulling into a parking lot so we were going pretty slow when it happened, but we were not all that excited about the drive down the canyon. We let it sit for an hour, turned it on and off several times to reset it, and then headed down the canyon praying it wouldn't happen again. We did make it out of the canyon, but it failed again that evening. We were again going fairly slow and the exact same thing happened. I can't imagine where we'd be if we were going fast at the time of the failures or headed down the canyon.

We encouraged the dealership to report it. They said they can't. I have looked online of where the best place to file a complaint is, but the GM site didn't seem to have a place to report it---hmmmmm, I get the feeling they don't really want to know. Where did you file your complaint with the government and I will do the same?

Also, can you tell me the exact name of the modulator you replaced that fixed your problem? Did you have to replace two of them? Thank you. Your posts have been so helpful.

Originally Posted by gwdaniels1984

I'm actually waiting right now to get my hybrid looked at by GM because we've lost our brakes twice while driving with the kids in the truck. I called GMC and they're working with the dealer to try to buy it back. In the end I'm sure they'll probably force me to buy a brand new truck and give me trade in value for my truck. This is a safety issue though so we're done with that truck.

Originally Posted by evois (Post 257121)

Did you buy it new? How many miles? What MY? I had a 2009 escalade hybrid with no problems at 195k miles until I traded it for the 2015 escalade platinum and still miss the hybrid for the mileage.

Originally Posted by gwdaniels1984

No we bought it used with 18000 miles. The first time the brakes went out was at 30000. I'm cheap so I didn't buy the warranty so I forked over 2000 to fix it, they said it was the ABS control module. This time they went out at 54000 miles, it's at the dealership now without being worked on in case GM decides they want to send an engineer to look at it. I hate the situation, besides for the brakes randomly going out it's been a great truck.

Originally Posted by evois (Post 257123)

Sorry to hear about your brake problem. It's a PITA when the dealers cannot fix something commonly complained about. It's a problem with the 2008.

Originally Posted by gwdaniels1984

Yeah, they fixed it for 24000 miles. I believe it's either a defect with the ABS module or possibly multiple issues with the design of the braking system. I can't blame the dealer but since this doesn't sound like an isolated issue I think GM needs to make it right.