Other brake problem on the 2006 Toyota Corolla
6 crashes 1 fire 3 injuries 10 of the 23 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 other brake problem gets reported
Owners of the 2006 Toyota Corolla report other brake problem at a median of 25,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 1,000 miles and a quarter after 80,000 miles, from 17 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 9th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 200 miles at the tenth percentile to 120,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 119,600 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.
53% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 200 miles | 1,000 miles | 24,000 miles | 81,680 miles | 119,800 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, 6 a crash, 1 a fire 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 $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 24 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 1998, at a median of 15 miles, and latest on the 2003 at 80,000 miles.
By volume the 2010 carries the most reports, with 119; the 2006 has 23. 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.
Dt*: the contact stated while driving various speeds and releasing the accelerator pedal the vehicle only slowed to 30 MPH. Also, when depressing the brake pedal there was a extended stopping distance. Furthermore, the odometer had become inoperable. The vehicle was driven to the dealer where the cause of the problems could not be determined. Updated 11/30/2006 - *nm
Tl*- the contact stated that while driving her 2006 toyota corolla (200 failure mileage) at 25 MPH she came to red light. The contact applied the brakes which slowed the vehicle down, but did not come to a complete stop. The contact also stated that on another occasion she had to swerve to keep from hitting another vehicle in the rear, because of the same failure. The dealer informed her that there was nothing wrong with the brakes. *jb
Daughter driving, smelled and saw smoke, right front tire area. Two days later, same problem, right side brake drag. Towed to dealer. Told me not covered under warranty because some one put motor oil in the brake fluid. Went there. Tech put finger in reservoir, motor is in it, system is contaminated. The cost is 1,300 or more to replace everything. It doesn't look contaminated to me. I got samples, top, bottom of reservoir, front right bleeder, left rear bleeder. Other than the top sample from reservoir which was taken using a dirty battery tester, all other samples look good. Took sample from another car in service area with batter tester which had black specks coming out probably because brake fluid ate at rubber. After taking 3 or 4 tube full and throwing them away the black specks went away and got the sample. This sample was taken by the operation manager. Samples of front/right, rear/left, bottom of m/c where done by tech as I held bottle. All done in front of the manager. Said it was the m/c that was causing the brake to hold pressure. I ask how can it be only on one side? If the pressure is at m/c why aren't both wheels…
Also reported on the 2006 Toyota Corolla
Airbag inflator rupture
Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure
Other speed control problem
Other engine problem
Other electrical problem
Airbag warning light or occupant sensor fault
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 23 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 2006 Toyota Corolla?
Across 17 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 25,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 1,000 miles and a quarter after 80,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other brake problem on the 2006 Toyota Corolla?
23 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