I finally got to slam on my brakes today when someone pulled out in front of me while i was doing 55 and my brakes completely locked up smoked me out and left huge dark marks for everyone to see when I go back to work monday. I thought anti lock brakes were sorta old and would be standard on most newer vehicles. Do 2005 Dodge Ram 1500s not have anti lock brakes? or is there something wrong with it?

 

ABS standard on rear only for most of 'em. Four-wheel ABS is an option.

 

well it was in 2 wheel drive. -.- maybe i should have it checked

 

Have what checked? Did the rears lock up? If only the fronts locked, you have rear-wheel ABS. Nothing to check.

 

EDIT ......

I just dug up my build sheet, im kinda blown away its only rear wheel ABS... Ive had troubles in winter time and on gravel with the rear kicking out alot. I was under the impression my truck was front ABS rear non abs.

Logic dictates that the front should be ABS to maintain steering control during hard braking ........ right? Even so with rear abs my back still kics out, most of the weight of the truck gets transfered to the inferior brakes in the front....

but your right about ABS being old tech, ABS showed up on air craft landing gear in the late 1920s then in motorcycles in the 70/80. 28 years later and its not standard all around on my 08 model. Im assuming the 2013 trucks all come standard with abs all around...

 

They're ALL rear ABS. Some are four-wheel. If the rears lock first, you're along for the ride, even more than with four-wheel ABS. It'll switch ends on you faster than you can blink.

 

My 2003 has 4 wheel ABS. Just look inboard of your front hubs and you will see a cable coming from the ABS sensor. what i have learned is wierd. I ordered my vehicle with the 5.7 L hemi and the dealer guy said that is automatically upgraded the 2 wheel to 4 wheel ABS (atleast for 2003) when hemi engine was selected. I just changed both of my hubs and didn't know whether i had 2 or 4 wheel ABS until learning of the sensor cable. But what is strange is i found out that 2006 and later in some cases only have one front hub with the sensor and the other is without. i have had a couple panic stops and DEFINATELY felt the pulsating in the brake pedal. My truck has 85,000 miles and just now had 3rd set of front pads put on (1=OEM + 2 that i've installed) so sets 1 and 2 each went ~ 40,000 miles. chysler must have gotten cheap to only do one front hub the right way. The only other thing i can imagine is the ABS computer can get the signal from one hub and apply modulated pressure to both front calipers. Just a guess though.

 

The Rams that only have one front sensor on the hub is for the cruise control.

 

I got 4 wheel abs and I know If I really slam on the brakes hard and fast, all 4 wheels lock up, the back end kicks out and it slides. I've also had cars without abs, when you lock down the tires, the rear are the ones that lock up first. I've had my rear drum brakes on a honda lock up before the front brakes. It causes a little worse condition than the front locking. The back end will kick out and pull you whatever direction it feels like going. Anyways, ABS or not, if you hit the brakes hard enough for all 4 tires to lock up, ABS won't help. It will see all 4 tires rotating at the same speed which is nothing. Therefore it has no speed differences to correct.