Loss of braking on the 2009 Volkswagen Jetta
5 crashes 5 of the 11 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 2009 Volkswagen Jetta report loss of braking at a median of 130,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 115,000 miles and a quarter after 165,000 miles, from 8 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 78,000 miles. It is the 22nd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 50,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 165,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 111,429 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.
13% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 51,700 miles | 112,750 miles | 130,000 miles | 163,129 miles | 163,129 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, 5 a crash 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 $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 11 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2016, at a median of 400 miles, and latest on the 2009 at 130,000 miles.
By volume the 2001 carries the most reports, with 12; the 2009 has 11. 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.
Brakes squealed from the date of delivery in march 2009. Vehicle was taken to vw service department on several occasions to inspect brakes. I was told each time that that's common in the vw jetta and I had to get used to it. Brakes seemed to fail on several occasions and caused an accident. Vehicle was taken to vw service after accident several times to inspect brakes and each time I was told nothing is wrong until they finally replaced the booster and the sway bar links. After vehicle was delivered back to me, the brake fluid started to leak and the brake warning light keeps illuminating. Vw said that nothing is wrong with the car. The car has delayed braking and sometimes no brakes and is dangerous on the roads, especially the highway. *tr
Tl* the contact owns a 2009 volkswagen jetta. While driving 25 MPH, the brakes failed when the brake pedal was depressed. The vehicle began spun and crashed into a wall. The ABS warning indicator illuminated intermittently. The contact took the vehicle to the dealer where it was diagnosed that the communication to the ABS module failed. The ABS module and pump needed to be replaced. The vehicle was repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure and informed the contact that the vehicle was not included in the recall despite having the same failure. The failure mileage was 61,000.*bf *cn
Tl* the contact owned a 2009 volkswagen jetta. While driving 30 MPH, the ABS warning indicator illuminated as the brake pedal was depressed. The contact's vehicle did not stop and crashed into another vehicle. The air bags failed to deploy. There were no injuries and a police report was filed. The manufacturer was notified and informed the contact to call her insurance company. The manufacturer opened case number: 180215369. The vehicle was towed and deemed a total loss. The dealer was not contacted. The contact received notification of NHTSA campaign number: 16v913000 (service brakes, hydraulic, electronic stability control) after the crash, which could have contributed to the brake failure. The failure mileage was 163,129. *tt engine was placed with a remanufactured engine in november 2014 due to original engine failure. The mileage for original replacement engine was approximately 38,000 miles. *tt
Also reported on the 2009 Volkswagen Jetta
Fuel pump failure
ABS module or sensor failure
Other powertrain problem
Other engine problem
Other fuel system problem
Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 11 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 2009 Volkswagen Jetta?
Across 8 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 130,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 115,000 miles and a quarter after 165,000 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 2009 Volkswagen Jetta?
11 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.1 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