Other brake problem on the 2002 Pontiac Aztek
1 injury 1 of the 10 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.
Only 5 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When other brake problem gets reported
There are 10 reports of other brake problem on the 2002 Pontiac Aztek, 5 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 4th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 45,000 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, 1 an injury is 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 $300–$1,800 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.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 3 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2002, at a median of 45,000 miles, and latest on the 2003 at 90,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
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.
My 2002 aztek has only 45,000 miles, mostly highway. The rear brakes are making a grinding noise right before coming to a complete stop. I was told by plaza tire that the brakes are not bad, that pontiac has a problem with its braking system and is aware of it the gentleman to whom I spoke stated that the only way he knew to fix the problem was to replace the rotors, calipers and pads, and that he could not guarantee the problem wouldn't reoccur. He stated I should take it to my pontiac dealer and that they should fix the problem, but he did not know if they would since it is no longer under warranty. If pontiac is aware of this problem, they should fix it.*ak
Front brakes have been replace 4 times in 41,000 miles back brakes have less less than normal wear. Vehicle brakes poorly on wet and icy roads due to front brakes taking most of the braking. *ak
I have a 2002 pontiac aztek and all four of the wheel bearings went bad with only 45,000 miles on the car. The anti lock brakes come on when you touch the brakes and we've almost been in quite a few wrecks. I've researched some reviews and there are alot of people that are having the same problems that I'm having. Thank you for your time. *tr
Also reported on the 2002 Pontiac Aztek
Wheel bearing or hub failure
Fuel tank, filler or EVAP failure
Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure
Other body or interior problem
Other electrical problem
Overheating
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 10 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 10 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 other brake problem happen on the 2002 Pontiac Aztek?
Across 5 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 45,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other brake problem on the 2002 Pontiac Aztek?
10 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