Hi people,

I'm new here, and I have received a 1995 4door Chevrolet Blazer LT, from my old man, he wants me to restore the vehicle, it has some problems, well maybe a lot, but it could be driven without much issues. I love this car and plan to solve all its other issues eventually.

Now, I wanted to start making the vehicle able to brake good enough, because its quite powerful, but its ABS block has been disabled many years ago, so it brakes are terrible.

It keeps blocking the rear tires even under light braking, and I can clearly feel its rear right tire to be the first one to block and then the left one, and front brakes feel almost nonexistent. The same symptoms have still happening after I bought all brake pads and rear bands, bought one of the rear brake pistons and housing that was leaking (right side), and bleed all the lines entirely to be sure and I even bought a pair of rear tires because the old ones were almost slick and toasted.

So I decided to take some desperate actions for sake of driving safer, and decided to block the rear lines, I'd have a slow braking truck rather than one that wants to do a 180° each time I brake. So I used a hole puncher and made a hole in a soda can, to get a small aluminium circle, this one is to be placed on the intake line for the rear tires in the leak safety aluminium block, this is to prevent the block to shut off the rear brake lines (don't want to fight with that block again).

So it worked, the truck can brake in a noticeably shorter distance but now I now had a new problem.

The engine shuts off under mild braking, just like if I was out of fuel.

I'm thinking that it could be the master cylinder, but my dad keeps saying that he changed it recently (I bet is about 10 years old already).

What do you think about this?

 

I think fix the brakes the way they should be rather than trying to find a run around to make things workable. Brakes are one thing you never want to take a short cut on.

 

Before you disabled the rear brakes, did the ABS lite illuminate when the brakes were applied?

Did the BRAKE lite come on at any time?

I agree with AJBert above regarding fixing the brakes the way they should be. The '95's rear brakes are drums and were not the best even when they are at 100%. I had a '95 and my '02 is with rear disc brakes is alot better.

As far as the engine shutting off under mild braking: I do not see how the master cylinder could do this. Could be a loose electrical connection or the fuel pump pickup in the tank is loose/broken such that there is no fuel getting to the engine under braking.

If you raise the back end up, does the engine shut down or no longer have fuel pressure at the test port, rear of intake?

Curious...what color is the Blazer? My '95 was purple....we called it the Great Grape.

 

Thanks for the replies,

I don't have the money to fix the rear brakes right now, and seems that the cause of the rear blocking is that my rear-right drum is cracked.

The ABS block died more than a decade ago, so its disabled, and the brake light never lits up, and as you have said, seems to be a fuel problem, because yesterday I replaced the fuel pressure regulator that was leaking (CMFI), and that helped a little, but the problem is still there, but this time I can brake a little harder and keep the car running. In the bad side, if I push it too much it will still shut off, but this time its much more difficult to turn back on, since now there is no fuel on the lines or even poured on the intake.

I'm going to take a look in the fuel tank, that seems to be the best option.

My Blazer is Black, and my father calls it "The Black Beast", mostly because the loud exhaust (due to a hole in it and its Dynomax muffler).

Funny fact: after the fuel pressure regulator change the vehicle doesn't feel as powerful as before, maybe it loved all that excess fuel pouring in the intake.