Loss of braking on the 2015 Ford F-150
4 crashes 3 injuries 7 of the 102 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When loss of braking gets reported
Owners of the 2015 Ford F-150 report loss of braking at a median of 50,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 37,500 miles and a quarter after 70,000 miles, from 92 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 78,000 miles. It is the 6th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 15,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 100,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 84,600 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
24% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15,400 miles | 37,750 miles | 51,200 miles | 69,250 miles | 100,000 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 4 a crash and 3 an injury are mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $400–$3,000 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
This mode is classified as critical, which means a failure can leave the car unable to stop, steer, or stay out of the way of traffic. It is weighted accordingly in the risk score.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 26 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2021, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 2025 at 260,000 miles.
By volume the 2016 carries the most reports, with 106; the 2015 has 102. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
Total loss of power while driving. At 3022 miles the engine cut off while at 40-50mph. A smart data link was replaced. At 3619 miles the engine cut off again while accelerating at 40-50 MPH. Both incidents happened within 5 minutes of starting the engine. Several alerts pop up on the screen to include loss of braking, hill assist, and service engine. First repair was for 10 days. Current repair is 3 days and counting. Currently I am aware of another f150 with the ecoboost 2.7 engine having the same problems with several attempts to fix.
Total loss of power while driving. At 3022 miles the engine cut off while at 40-50mph. A smart data link was replaced. At 3619 miles the engine cut off again while accelerating at 40-50 MPH. Both incidents happened within 5 minutes of starting the engine. Several alerts pop up on the screen to include loss of braking, hill assist, and service engine. First repair was for 10 days. Current repair is 3 days and counting. Currently I am aware of another f150 with the ecoboost 2.7 engine having the same problems with several attempts to fix.
Saw recent news article about f150 brakes..I purchased my 2015 f150 last march 2015. With only 980 miles (yes 980) on it my brakes began to fade out. Ultimately they stopped working and the vehicle would not come to a stop as the brakes continually faded out. Brought it back to ford who ran several tests and could not find out why this happened. They confirmed that there was a problem but did not know why.they told me same. The western u.s. Ford representative even called me to apologize. Ultimately they replaced my rotors and pads, not certain what else they may have replaced. I asked where all the parts were going that they replaced and was told by the rep that they would be sent back to their engineers and I would most likely never hear why the brakes failed. I do not have documentation. The vehicle was purchased and serviced at towne ford in redwood city ca. I can prove this occurred by asking them for my work order which should be in their system if needed.
Also reported on the 2015 Ford F-150
Other engine problem
Other powertrain problem
Other body or interior problem
Other electrical problem
Cruise control failure
Other brake problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 102 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does loss of braking happen on the 2015 Ford F-150?
Across 92 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 50,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 37,500 miles and a quarter after 70,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is loss of braking on the 2015 Ford F-150?
102 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.2 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed