i have noticed and others who drive the car say the brakes are hard when you press them. so how can i go about making my brakes soft as if the car was new. the miles on car is 126,000. front brakes are in good shape and the rear was changed 9 months ago. is my hard brake petal normal maybe on cavaliers i got the car used with 84k miles on it so i don’t know. so what can i do to change this i mean when i press them i feel i am getting a leg exercise here, i want them soft and easy like on my other car.


~1996 Cavalier LS 2.4L (auto)

check for vacuum leaks

check that your brake booster is working properly.

no vac leaks. and how do i test is the brake booster is working?


~1996 Cavalier LS 2.4L (auto)

how do you know there aren't any vacuum leaks? did you look?

check the hose in particular for the booster. turn the car on, let it run for a minute or two, shut it off and pull the little black elbow out of the booster and see if it makes any noise. if it doesn't, it isn't getting vacuum which is why your pedal is so hard.

no vacuum = no boost = super hard brake pedal.

best way is to just swap it out with one out of a junkyard or something and see if it helps.

ok i will do the brake booster testing to see. the vac lak, im good at keeping an eye on my hoses, and i have a vacuum gauge hooked up which shows no signs of a vac leak. but i will double check on it.


~1996 Cavalier LS 2.4L (auto)

vac gauge will only show leaks if the leak is post tb


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Cavi2Sunfire wrote:vac gauge will only show leaks if the leak is post tb

um, all the vacuum connections are post throttle body fyi