I have only had my cobalt for a few months now. with the ebrake activated my car rolled down a hill into the back of my friends hitch on his truck. so i have a nice dimple. i covered it by putting the license plate there. its right in the center where the plate mount should be. anyway when getting my stage to put in my ebrake went completely out. like doesnt catch at all. so should the dealership have to repair my bumper. i feel they should since the car has 5 thousand miles on it and the damage is from a faulty ebrake!!!

 

ya you should of took it to them before putting the license plate on...

 

its not faulty it needs adjusted.

 

talk to em right and they should. i agree with an above poster tho, u should have not mounted ur license plate there but...

 

should i take the plate off or what. what should i say to them as to "talk to them right"?

 

tell them what happened and how u think it should be handled... but keep your cool about..

 

yeah the ebrakes blow. Rear discs FTL, when it somes to parking breaks..... tip of adivece, put it in first.

 

My rear brakes are calipers, would my e-brake hold better?

 

now I don't know if it's true with cobalts or not, but my impala's emergency brake .. well..

I have disc brakes, but the centers of the rotors in the back is bigger, and the emergency brake is on both sides like a drum brake at the center of the rotor on the inside.

 

I had the same problem last week with 5k mile on it too when i was getting gas...
I went to the dealer rite away and the ordered a brand new assembly kit for it and installed it for me...
All under warranty...
I got lucky i guess...

 

Not on these cars, the cobalt rear discs have a mechanical integrated e-brake in the caliper, thats why they don't hold. GM is getting away from the setup you have, they call it the "drum in hat" setup, as it is harder to seal out dirt and contamination.

 

was your car in gear? if the car was in gear, like it's supposed to be, it wouldn't have rolled. i'm guessing it was in neutral.

that really sucks dude, but let it be a lesson. don't ever park the car in neutral with just he e-brake. alway, always leave the car in gear. this way if the ebrake fails, the car doesn't roll.

 

after a bunch of horror stories on here, I've learned to leave my car in first, this is exactly why
good luck with the dealership

 

use the reverse gear. it is the strongest gear.

 

i had my car in first gear. and it was heading down hill. i had the ebrake activated too. kinda blew my mind

 

When the front of the car is pointing down hill, your car should be in the reverse gear. If your front is pointing up hill, you should have it in first. Both times with the ebrake on obviously.

 

i have been told to always use the reverse gear when parked on slopes. reason it is the biggest gear.

 

I thought it's the smallest gear? o.0

 

Reverse gear generally has the largest gear ratio in the transmission it uses several gears instead of just one

 

reverse typically has a gear ratio between that of 1st gear and 2nd gear....it is definitely not the largest gear. think about it, if it was the largest gear, it would be larger than 5th...and if that were the case, it wouldnt really be usable. try moving your car starting in 5th gear.... reverse should be something like a 2.5:1 ratio

 

First gear ratio is 3.38 while second is 3.17. Therefore first should be used in ALL cases: Uphill, downhill, diagonal whatever

 

what i meant to say was it uses multiple gears which is stronger and larger than a single gear. but you are right if you are measuring the diameter of the gear. 1st gear is bigger than the reverse gear in that sence. either way 1st or reverse and ebrake is better then just the ebrake