sesykes71

I have been having trouble with the parking brake on my Silverado Sportside with the manual transmission and 6 cyl engine. It currently has 151000 miles on it and it is my daily driver. I have had the parking brake recall done by the Chevy dealer. I have replaced the cables 3 times as well. I use the parking brake every time I drive the vehicle so I wouldn't think it would rust up from dis-use. Now it is time for inspection and they are not working again. When I checked this morning I found that one cable, the longer one on the right side is broken again. Both cable attachment yokes are frozen to the brake actuator, I suspected that this might occur as when I replaced the cables the last time I had to file the yoke because the Delco cable yokes wouldn't fit the actuator. One side was ok but the other side wasn't. I remember a similar problem other times when changing the cables.

GM now has a parking brake kit, P/N 19178787 which costs $140 for each side. It includes all the parts including the shoes and new backing plate. To install the kit it looks like I will need to open the differential so that the axle shafts can be pulled out. It will still need cables.

My question is that since this is a kit, is it a re-designed assembly that will allow the parking brake to operate like it should for a long time, or will I have to keep replacing cables every year even though I use it all the time?

There are many vehicles with 4 wheel disc brakes that don't have the problems these trucks have with the parking brake, so I hope GM has made an improvement.


Thanks for any help with this issue.

Steve Sykes
2001 Silverado
2003 Malibu
Lifelong GM customer!