p38oncoils
24th November 2012, 10:20 PM
Hi guys. Just thought I'd tell you about my experience last weekend. After playing on some difficult tracks at Levuka my traction control stopped working and so did the brake assist / ABS. I thought that I might have boiled the brake fluid with excessive use of the traction control so I drove slowly back to the camping ground and allowed the vehicle to stand and cool down. As you all know things get a bit hot under the bonnet and it was a bit difficult to determine whether the brake fluid had boiled - but some brake fluid had spilled out through the cap of the brake fluid reservoir.
Anyway - after having let the car cool down I tried the brakes again - but still the same thing - no traction control, no power assist and no ABS function and all the brake warning lights on the dash were lit. I could hear the pump making a weird sound as if it was cavitating. Not in a good position to start ripping the brake system apart where we were we drove back to Brisbane using a lot of gearbox to slow the car down and then pull up when we had to stop with what little braking power we had left in the un-power assisted brake system.
Come Monday I spoke to a couple of Land Rover mechanics and they agreed that the problem would either be the brake accumulator or the pump switch and or the ABS relay that had failed and that I should get ready to take out the credit card and be prepared to spend a fair bit of money to get the system working again.
Well, being a tight-ass with money I got stuck into checking the system to find out how much damage my wallet was up for. I had a look at whether the accumulator was still pressurised and that checked out OK. As I said before the pump was running but sounded like cavitating so I checked whether the pump was getting any brake fluid - lo and behold - there was no fluid coming from the brake fluid reservoir to the ABS pump. I blew through the supply hose back into the reservoir and brake fluid started running freely through the supply hose. I connected the hose up to the pump, bled air from the port to the accumulator as well as from the brake fluid pressure pipe from the pump at the ABS modulator.
Next I started the system up, it built up pressure as it had always done normally in a few seconds and then took it for a test drive. Well I can tell you that the brakes had never worked this well before - a firm pedal that responds to the slightest touch. I was happy, my wallet was happy and my wife was happy as she was now able to spend all the money that I was planning to spend on the car on shoes and handbags :(
Anyway - after having let the car cool down I tried the brakes again - but still the same thing - no traction control, no power assist and no ABS function and all the brake warning lights on the dash were lit. I could hear the pump making a weird sound as if it was cavitating. Not in a good position to start ripping the brake system apart where we were we drove back to Brisbane using a lot of gearbox to slow the car down and then pull up when we had to stop with what little braking power we had left in the un-power assisted brake system.
Come Monday I spoke to a couple of Land Rover mechanics and they agreed that the problem would either be the brake accumulator or the pump switch and or the ABS relay that had failed and that I should get ready to take out the credit card and be prepared to spend a fair bit of money to get the system working again.
Well, being a tight-ass with money I got stuck into checking the system to find out how much damage my wallet was up for. I had a look at whether the accumulator was still pressurised and that checked out OK. As I said before the pump was running but sounded like cavitating so I checked whether the pump was getting any brake fluid - lo and behold - there was no fluid coming from the brake fluid reservoir to the ABS pump. I blew through the supply hose back into the reservoir and brake fluid started running freely through the supply hose. I connected the hose up to the pump, bled air from the port to the accumulator as well as from the brake fluid pressure pipe from the pump at the ABS modulator.
Next I started the system up, it built up pressure as it had always done normally in a few seconds and then took it for a test drive. Well I can tell you that the brakes had never worked this well before - a firm pedal that responds to the slightest touch. I was happy, my wallet was happy and my wife was happy as she was now able to spend all the money that I was planning to spend on the car on shoes and handbags :(