Another day another problem. ABS light

[Currency]

As the title says, another day and another problem. ABS related this time.

As I have stated before, I have a bad upper ball joint on my front right side and my alignment is off, and the right radius arm and bracket need replaced.

Now whenever I am turning right really slow under 5MPH my abs starts kicking in, mind you every time I was on black top when this happened. When I back up and touch the brakes, the abs kicks on but at any time mentioned above the ABS light stays out.

Now if I take a hard right turn braking or not, the ABS light will come on.

Hey guess what? I think it has something to do with the front right ABS sensor or something else related to the ABS on the front right.

Yeah, now I know I have to fix the above mentioned things. Little time, no money. I do have the ball joints but not enough money to rent the tool to press them in.

So, tell me what you all think. I think I may know and have mentioned what I believe is wrong but again, not sure. Very odd abs issue in my opinion. :

 

[something9000]

yeah it sounds like that sensor is out..if it is a driveabilty problem until you get the funds and or time you can pull the relay for the abs system which will disable it (just dont hail mary the brakes)

 

[Roadrunner777]

^^^ Agree, pull the fuses related to ABS in the under-hood distribution box. I find the ABS overrated anyway.

 

[Currency]

Yeah I will agree with you guys. I think my ABS has other issues. One time it was pouring down rain, I was on the highway 60MPH. Red light and you hear the famous oooeeee oeeeee oeeee of the ABS kicking in. I stopped in the intersection though. I do not think it pumps enough, I heard its millions of times a second but for me it feels and sounds like may be ten times a second or less.


Trying to find some front end schmatics, I think TBars has a link in his sig for the pic with the front end torn apart. I noticed another issue today. Front driver side tire is wearing extremely bad on the in side. Appears to have been for some time since the passenger rear which was once the front driver tire is worn the same. My tire shop never mentioned it and as many times as I pull the rear tires off I never even noticed it until today.

It you ask me, if they continue wearing like they are/have been, they will need replaced winter 2011 or spring 2012. Purchased brand new September 2009.

So I guess a set of 31's will be purchased in spring or sooner. It's sad though. I've not even put 25,000 on the wranglers.

I will look further into this tomorrow, this is why I want to know what everything is and where it is located at. I believe that if I push the top of the front tire in it will move. Not sure yet and replaced the bearing in November, repacked again in June. Those little locking keys are a PITA.

 

[Currency]

Guess I should say I should have my 99 cavalier fixed next month. Perfect timing too. Will park the ex in my new garage until I get the front end fixed along with everything listed in my registry.

 

[Currency]

Well I had spun a bearing, replaced and packed a new one and three other bearings today. Also noticed where my rotor was rubbing the ABS sensor on the drivers side. Oddly enough, the ABS sensor on the passenger side almost looked as if it was caved in, too much heat hit it or something.

Picture of the driver side ABS sensor.

I believe the passenger side did get too much heat on it at some point. I remember having one hell of a time changing the crackshaft position sensor on the cavaliers 2.2L. It had ballooned up because of the heat and took forever to get out.

You can see in the above image where the rotor rubbed it because of the spun outer bearing. Somehow it had 1/4 of an inch of play in the drivers side wheel. Oh well, it is fixed now, $20 for one bearing and two seals or pretty close to that anyways.

Thanks for the help fellows, Just really posting this message to let everyone know where she sits now.

 

[Currency]

Posting an update so everyone knows the issue is still present, sort of.

Replaced bearings as dated above, August 30th. Replaced bearings again, October 20th around there, inner bearing was gone. Still had issues, so I replaced them again a few days ago with Timken bearings and replaced the spindle. Rebuilt it from a junk yard one I pulled from a 94.

Now every time I stop, dry or wet pavement, and only at very slow speeds, below 5MPH, the front left tire locks because of the ABS. I am about to go pull the fuse. But, someone mentioned to me this can be caused by a rubber brake line which is collapsing. So does anyone know exactly which brake lines, rubber, are used when lifting?

I believe they are F150 four wheel drive with ABS lines, I just forgot the year. If I am going to replace them I would rather put longer lines on it because after I get everything wrong with it fixed it will be lifted. But I cannot do that until I have another daily driver. The rubber lines on it now are torn a bit around the caliper but its not leaking yet, either way they will need replaced.

The ABS light is not coming on at all when the tire locks up. So it is odd. It's doing it on dry pavement, gets worse on wet pavement, I slid further.

The inside ribs on the rotor had rubbed the ABS sensor on this side, the little metal cover thing was broken off when I got it as shown in the picture above.

 

[Roadrunner777]

Pull the fuse and try the exact same stop. I would like to know for sure if it is locking up because of the ABS or the ABS is triggering because it is locking up.

 

[Currency]

Pulled the fuse, ran into town, a few miles, to my mothers no lock up at all. On the way home, wet roads of course, I slammed on the brakes at 45, again, no lock up.

Therefore my problem must be the driver side ABS sensor behind the rotor. Now, finding one appears to be the problem. Checked Rock auto and Autozone, it appears they only carry the ones for the rear diff which of course has to be for rear ABS and not front ABS.

Kind of strange if you ask me Roadrunner. Never locked up when slowing for stop signs as it had been doing the past few days. Also, I remember back in July it was triggering the ABS every time I was in reverse and braking, now that is not even happening.

Any other suggestions? It appears to only be the driver side locking up, but at times it feels the entire front is sliding because of the lockup.

I installed new front brake pads in spring, the drivers side are about half gone, yet the passenger side are nearly gone. When I first got it, the passenger side caliper was busted so I installed one I picked up from the junk yard, cheap, with nearly new free brake pads for the front. Those lasted over a year, 15 months, while these brand new ones appear to be wearing a lot faster. At least on the passenger side.

Perhaps the caliper on the driver side is bad but its not locking up anymore so I don't know now.

 

[Currency]

Picked my girlfriend up from work and decided to test the brakes again.

With the fuse removed for the ABS still, the 10A from under the dash #15 FYI.

I was able to get the passenger side to lock up twice under extremely hard braking. Guess you would call it Hail mary braking as mentioned above.

So this leads me to believe that the driver side caliper is not braking as much as it should be. Also, the brake wear is pushing me to believe that as well since the passenger side is wearing faster than the drivers side pads.

 

[Currency]

So my plan is to grab another junkyard caliper should be under $20. Then at the same time I will install my new rear brake spring kit and purchase new adjusters.

Have a problem where if I hit a hard bump, the rear adjusters will fall out of place and result in rear brake loss. Sucks.

Still do not understand the entire ABS issue. Also still cannot locate a new sensor that goes by the wheel. Anyone have a link to a place that sales them?

Internets been out the past day or two.

 

[Roadrunner777]

Get all your brakes working right before thinking about ABS. I have learned brake problems can lead to ABS symptoms. Just my thoughts. I'd buy new caliper slides and brake grease for them. They like that.

And, you know this, so I am wasting your time with this sentance: Be sure the bleeder screw is not frozen in the JY caliper. Yeah, I know you know, I just get too complete sometimes.

 

[Maniak]

Dorman makes the front ABS sensor. p/n 970016 or 970-016

From amazon..
http://www.amazon.com/Dorman-970-01...L65E/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1322866624&sr=8-2

RockAuto also carries it..

~Mark

 

[Currency]

Thanks for the link Mark.

Also, Thank you Roadrunner. Personally I would most likely not have thought about that. My father is more of the worrying type. He is one of those that will only work on something that is in or in front of the garage, but he is 51 so I guess using air tools for everything is easier.

Either of you know the difference between the loaded and unloaded new calipers from Rockauto?

They are all pretty cheap, under $50, if you ask me.

 

[Maniak]

Loaded Calipers usually means Pads and mounting h/w included too.

~Mark

 

[cogs]

i have an automatic, but did anyone think that the abs sensor in the pic is a little far forward? like, what's the clearance between it and the rotor?

 

[Roadrunner777]

Mine are like that. I put on new rotors and bearings last fall, and I could hear the tone ring just brushing the top of it but it was just so faint, and just during part of a rotation. I took the rotor back off and saw a rub pattern on 4 or 5 fingers of the tone ring. I biffed it a little bit with a soft hammer and then decided to leave well enough alone. The noise disappeared pretty quick, probably took another 2 thousandths off the sensor. Still works!

 

[Currency]

My rotor rubs the sensor on the drivers side a lot. Not much recently though. Passenger side doesn't make much noise until I hit rough pavement and the bad RA bracket starts smacking around.

I really need to fix that, I know another subject altogether. But you can see where its been hitting the frame in two places. Not good but I guess it could be worse.