Brake pedal shakes

[Barry Phillips]

When I hit about 70 mph or higher my brake pedal shakes making an annoying noise? Can’t figure out why this is happening. Anyone experience this!?

 

[GTyankee]

Do you mean that at 70, you apply the brakes & get a shake ?
Or it shakes at 70 without touching the brakes ?

 

[Barry Phillips]

Shakes without touching.

 

[Burla]

Last brake job? I would first lift each tire and spin see if there is any caliper dragging. I would make sure caliper housing isnt loose on 4 corners while I was at it. All bolts tight as well. Yeah, kinda puzzling for sure.

Just as something to toss out there, wheel bearings and/or ball joints, something that could have a symptom at higher speeds and could possibly lead to brake pedal shake. If it was drive shaft it would be in steering wheel, it has to be something in or around the wheel or how the wheel attaches to suspension.

 

[Rlaf75]

Can you feel the entire truck shaking or just the brake pedal? A bad universal joint, out of balance tires, loose front end parts can all cause the truck to shake. In my almost 30 years of being a mechanic I have never heard of just a brake pedal shake without it being something I mentioned

 

[Barry Phillips]

i thought tires too maybe but it’s not riding rough or anything Just when I’m going 70 mph or higher the brake pedal shakes and when I put my left foot behind it and barely lift up it obviously stops. Truck does not shake and I’ve had a bad ball joint before and doesn’t feel anything like that.

 

[NJMOPAR]

Check the pivot & mounting points of the pedal assembly itself.
If you can stop it by lifting up on it I doubt it's something mechanical under the truck.

 

[Burla]

Since you mentioned two things people try and make their theory fit that box, both shakey brake pedal and "annoying noise". If you can without radio on and recording device close to brake, record the noise for us. Shakey brake pedal without annoying noise can be a different thing. When I hear the term annoying noise, my brains says = rotational. So what could cause this and be rotational, but if the noise isn't rotational could look at other things.

 

[Rlaf75]

There has to be some sort of vibrational harmonics coming from somewhere. I've owned $50. Junk yard vehicles that were as smooth as a babies @ss Either there is something wrong or loose with the brake pedal or there's a vibration coming from somewhere else causing the pedal to shake. You're saying it starts at roughly 70ish mph which I'm assume it goes away when you drive slower than that which leads me to believe there is some sort of other vibration somewhere else causing it

 

[gbark80]

I had some ****** primewell tires on my ram that I got balanced 3 or 4 time that would shake all sorts of things in the truck from 72-75 and up. Replaced with BFGs and all shake went away. Every time I have had a shake or death wobble has been tire related.

 

[Barry Phillips]

I am going to get new tires soon bc mine aren’t the best anyways but someone just told me maybe one of wheel weights fell off. Idk

 

[Rlaf75]

I am going to get new tires soon bc mine aren’t the best anyways but someone just told me maybe one of wheel weights fell off. Idk

That would make total sense or at least get your current tires re-balanced and see it one is off

 

[16Ram4x4]

Since you mentioned that you are soon to replace your worn out tires, you might want to be check that you don't have a belt slip in one of the tires

 

[Thomas Obieglo]

I have the same issue with my brake pedal, and it's not related to tires or brakes in this case. The pedal actually wobbles from side to side, probably no more than 3/8-1/2". But it is annoying, especially when on a gravel road. It sounds like the wheel well liners are loose and flopping around. When on a gravel road I'll lean my left foot against the side of the pedal to stop it from wobbling. I've not seen an easy fix for this yet... have read there are some new nylon bushings that can be put in where the pedal links to the mount.

 

[Jeepwalker]

There could be a number of reasons (as others have described) -- balance/out-of-round tire/warped rotors/tire chord broken/worn bearings/suspension part worn/failed shock (wheel hop)/bent wheel/driveshaft worn or weight fell off, etc.

If you don't feel comfortable looking things over yourself, take it to a decent alignment shop or dealer. Make sure to stay on them and ensure they check *everything*. The risk is, a lot of dealers might be tempted to put their least busy (i.e. worst) mechanic on a job like this and they stop looking after checking (or overlooking) a couple obvious items. It depends how good and thorough the mechanic doing your inspection really is. Hopefully you'll get a good one. Some mechanics are genius' and can spot problems from across the shop. Maybe an alignment shop is the better way to go (??), and ask who their best mechanic is. IDK, it's hard to say which is better.