I have a 2004 Dodge Ram 1500 ST. I notice when I'm using cruise control for a long time, when I press on the brake it has much more resistance than if I didn't have cruise control running.

I normally press on the brake pedal to get out of cruise control, and it comes as a bit of a shock that I have to press it much harder to than I normally do.

It's almost as if the brakes were pumping or the pedal is locking while in cruise control. If I do not use cruise control, I don't run into this issue at all, the brake pedal feels as it normally does.

Let me know of any thoughts/suggestions that would help troubleshoot this issue.

 

I'm a little confused as to what you are saying is the issue here.

Are you saying that the Pedal is simply stiffer than usual? Or are you saying that you have to press it hard to get the cruise control to turn off?

Any modifications to the truck?

 

You did not mention which engine you have. I was looking through the Service manual for this issue, and depending on the engine, vehicles will or will not have certain parts that other engines do. If you do not have the SM, look up weedaho user name, he has links to download in his sig.

2nd, it looks like it is vacuum controlled via the PCM. Have you tried doing a reset? Pull neg battery cable then turn on headlight to bleed residual power. About 5 mins should be good. Then reattach neg cable and test.

 

My 1500 has the 4.7. Essentially, in order to even make the truck feel like it is slowing down, I have to press on the brake pretty hard which then disengages the cruise control. I'll see if resetting the PCM works. It's due for a service so I'll have to have my mechanic take a look into it as well. Thanks.

 

that is very odd, i would definitely have the dealer check that out... brakes are kind of important....

 

You should only have to tap the brake pedal to get the cruise to disengage. If you are have to do more than this, I would look for possibly a vacuum leak in cruise control system.

Also, my truck had under 50k miles when I had to have brake pads changed. From the standard brake inspection everything looked normal. Had them look closer, the inside pads on the front were just about gone, but outside pads we ok. Rear was ok. But I just had them change out pads on all 4 wheels just to keep them all the same.