length GMC SIERRA 1994 Owners Manual

Defensive Driving
The best advice anyone can give about driving is: Drive defensively.
Please start with a very important safety device
in your Vehicle: Buckle up.
(See “Safety Belts” in the Index.)
Defensive driving really means “be ready for anything.” On city streets,
rural roads, or freeways,
it means “always expect the unexpected.’’
Assume that pedestrians or other drivers are going
to be careless and make
mistakes. Anticipate what they might do. Be ready for their mistakes.
Rear-end collisions are about the most preventable of accidents. Yet they
are common. Allow enough following distance. It’s the best defensive
driving maneuver, in both city and rural driving. You never know when the
vehicle in front of you is going to brake or turn suddenly.
Drunken Driving
Death and injury associated with drinking and driving is a national tragedy.
It’s the number one contributor to the highway death toll, claiming
thousands of victims every year. Alcohol takes away three things that
anyone needs
to drive a vehicle:
0 Judgment
Muscular Coordination
Vision
Police records show that almost half
of all motor vehicle-related deaths
involve alcohol
- a driver, a passenger or someone else, such as a
pedestrian, had been drinking. In most cases, these deaths are the result of
someone who was drinking and driving. About 20,000 motor
vehicle-related deaths occur each year because of alcohol, and thousands of
people are injured.
Just how
much alcohol is too much if a person plans to drive? Ideally, no
one should drink alcohol and then drive. But if one does, then what’s “too
much”? It can be a lot less than many might think. Although it depends on
each person and situation, here is some general information
on the problem.
The Blood Alcohol Content (BAC)
of someone who is drinking depends
upon four things:
0 How much alcohol is in the drink.
The drinker’s body weight.
0 The amount of food that is consumed before and during drinking.
0 The length of time it has taken the drinker to consume the alcohol.
4-2
ProCarManuals.com

Driving Across an Incline
Sooner or later, an off-road trail will probably go across the incline of a hill.
If this happens, you have to decide whether to try to drive across the incline.
Here are some things
to consider:
0
0
0
A hill that can be driven straighr: up or aown may be too steep to drive
across. When you go straight
up or down a hill, the length of the wheel
base (the distance from the front wheels to the rear wheels) reduces the
likelihood the vehicle will tumble end over end. But when you drive
across an incline, the much more narrow track width (the distance
between the
left and right wheels) may not prevent the vehicle from
tilting and rolling over. Also, driving across an incline puts more
weight on the downhill wheels. This could cause
a downhill slide or a
rollover.
Surface conditions can be
a problem when you drive across a hill.
Loose gravel, muddy spots, or even wet grass can cause your tires to
slip sideways, downhill. If the vehicle slips sideways,
it can hit
something that will trip it (a rock, a rut, etc.) and roll over.
Hidden obstacles can make the steepness of the incline even worse. If
you drive across a rock with the uphill wheels, or if the downhill
wheels drop into a rut or depression, your vehicle can tilt even more.
For reasons
like these, you need to decide carefully whether to try to drive
across an incline. Just because the trail goes across the incline doesn’t mean
you have
to drive it. The last vehicle to try it might have rolled over.
Q: What if I’m driving across an incline that’s not too steep, but I hit
A: If you feel your vehicle starting to slide sideways, turn downhill. This
should help straighten out the vehicle and prevent the side slipping.
However, a much better way
to prevent this is to get out and “walk the
course”
so you know what the surface is like before you drive it.
some loose gravel and start to slide downhill. What should I do?
4-21
ProCarManuals.com

Brake Adjustment
Every time you make a brake stop, your disc brakes adjust for wear.
If your brake pedal goes down farther than normal, your rear drum brakes
may need adjustment. Adjust them by backing up and firmly applying
the
brakes a few times.
Replacing Brake System Parts
The braking system on a modern vehicle is complex. Its many parts have to
be of top quality and work well together if the vehicle is to have really good
braking. Vehicles we design and test have top-quality
GM brake parts in
them, as your vehicle does when it is new. When you replace parts of your
braking system
- for example, when your brake linings wear down and
you have to have new ones put
in - be sure you get new genuine GM
replacement parts. If you don’t, your brakes may no longer work properly.
For example,
if someone puts in brake linings that are wrong for your
vehicle, the balance between your front and rear brakes can change, for
the
worse. The braking performance you’ve come to expect can change in many
other ways if someone puts in the wrong replacement brake parts.
Other Maintenance Hems
Front Suspension and Steering Linkage
Your maintenance schedule will tell you how often to lubricate the fittings.
See “Recommended Fluids and Lubricants”
in the Index for the proper
lubricant to use.
Front Wheel Bearings
Your vehicle has front wheel bearings that must be cleaned and repacked.
Your maintenance schedule
will tell you how often this must be done.
Front Shock Absorbers
The front shock absorbers of your vehicle do many things. They help the
vehicle ride smoothly and also control
the travel of the suspension system.
When the shock absorbers are serviced, any replacement shock absorbers
must be
the same as the original equipment shock absorbers in both
extended length and strength.
NOTICE:
If you use shock absorbers that are not the same as the original
shock absorbers, the shock absorbers
or suspension system
could be damaged.
6-49
ProCarManuals.com