help with ABS and Traction Control
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help with ABS and Traction Control
My friend has a Ford Focus and it has Traction Control and ABS. Today she turned it on and both of the warning lights were on meaning that they were not working. We did a few tests and it appears that the niether are actaully working. Nothing else is wrong with the car that i can see. Do you guys have any ideas as to what might be going on? I was thinking i would disconnect the battery because i think that resets the ecu. What do you guys think?
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Rep Power: 0 You can try resetting the ECU, but if there is a problem the lights will come back on.
Traction control is based on the ABS system and on FWD cars usually reads a hall effect style sensor with a toothed ring on the outer CV on each wheel to determine wheelspeed. Sometimes gunk from roadgrime, grease and brakedust cover the magnet on the sensor or fill in the gaps between the teeth resulting in inaccurate or no reading for the ABS computer to monitor. Once it sees a funny or no signal it will light up the dummy light.
Try cleaning the ring and sensor head with some brakeclean. If that doesn't change anything, it is possible a sensor could be knocked out of adjustment, or in the worst case scenario, something is genuinely broken.
Traction control is based on the ABS system and on FWD cars usually reads a hall effect style sensor with a toothed ring on the outer CV on each wheel to determine wheelspeed. Sometimes gunk from roadgrime, grease and brakedust cover the magnet on the sensor or fill in the gaps between the teeth resulting in inaccurate or no reading for the ABS computer to monitor. Once it sees a funny or no signal it will light up the dummy light.
Try cleaning the ring and sensor head with some brakeclean. If that doesn't change anything, it is possible a sensor could be knocked out of adjustment, or in the worst case scenario, something is genuinely broken.
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Originally Posted by SatinSilver2k1
My friend has a Ford Focus and it has Traction Control and ABS. Today she turned it on and both of the warning lights were on meaning that they were not working. We did a few tests and it appears that the niether are actaully working. Nothing else is wrong with the car that i can see. Do you guys have any ideas as to what might be going on? I was thinking i would disconnect the battery because i think that resets the ecu. What do you guys think?
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From: Boise, Idaho
Rep Power: 327 check the easy things first ..brake fluid level, brake lights, fuses..... If all looks good next best step is to scan the computer to see what the code is then go from there
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Rep Power: 0 Thanks for the input guys. Yesterday she was driving and suddenly the lights turned off again. This lead me to believe that Pb4uGo is right about crap in the sensor. The conditions here in Canada right now are less than ideal. It could have been some salt and grime that got washed off as she was driving. If it happens again I'll see about cleaning the sensors and or take it to ford for the diagnostics.
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