D40 brake failure warning light

Hi guys, Dave here again,
I was just wandering if anyone has experienced Any issues with there brake warning light and alarm sounding constantly? It is the same as the hand brake light but with a different chime, the manual says check brake fluid level it was a little low but not under min so I topped it up but the warning is still active, I am 4 hrs from anywhere and concerned to drive back to civilization as the manual also says to have the vehicle towed please help I am supposed to drive home tomorrow.... Aaaaaaaggghhhh!!!!!
Any suggestions? Oh yeah the chime also stops when I am stationary yet the light stays on ...

My service manual doesn't mention a thing about it, but from an experience point of view:

If your brake fluid levels are okay and they don't appear to be draining out quickly as you use the brake, AND there are no signs of fluid leaking around the disc calipers or from the bottom of the drum units on the rear wheels, AND the ABS unit on the passenger side of the engine bay (with the small metal tubes coming out the top) shows no sign of leaking, THEN

I would drive it allowing plenty of room to stop, use the brakes sparingly, and every time you stop for a break or fuel, pop the bonnet and check the fluid level. If you aren't using a lot of fluid, what's probably happened is a sensor has gone bad - possibly one of the ABS wheel sensors. If you've lifted your vehicle and done some flexing without extending the ABS wires, you may have damaged these and be getting an erroneous signal.

I would drive carefully on a loose surface if the ABS is malfunctioning (with or without the ABS light).

Hi Dave.
My Navs 2005 so it doesn't have ABS but the Volvo truck i drive does and the computer is always saying there is a brake fault. The fault shows up because of the ABS not picking up a signal from one wheel. This is probably the likely fault if your not losing fluid and there's no noticable problem with the brakes. Computers are only as smart as the person who programs them.

Could also indicate that one or more pad is worn too low (uneven wear)

If the obvious mechanical issues, like the brake fluid you have checked, and the brake pads seem OK, then like tony says, to drive it carefully and check it frequently.

Then dump the car on the driveway of your local nissan dealer when you get back home - ask them pilotly to turn the infernal beeping sound off.

Oh, and while your driving, crank the MUSIC up real loud to block out the beep beep beep beep beep beep beep

Dont worry, its just like the scene from Speed.

"There's a bomb in th Nav"

Just keep it above 100km/h.

I am with Rumpig, probably a ABS fault.

Haha the bomb is the nav hahaha!!!!
I spoke to Nissan today it was a small country dealership and I managed to speak to a young very helpful mechanic -westy your a legend mate - although the problem is not solved he spent the time to troubleshoot with me twice and has offered to plug in the diagnostic tool to clear any faults. Not something u would get in the city dealerships without an invoice!!!!

What we have come up with is that it's not an abs wheel sensor as it is still engaging in 4wd but, we started talking electrical,
I have a pioneer head unit with nav , DVD and reverse camera, last week we installed a switch on the dash to send power to the camera ( on the reverse circuit ) I installed a resistor to stop the lights coming on but I do recall reading something in the installation manual of the headunit ( 2yrs ago) about it having 3d gyro sensors and something to do with the reverse cable hooking into a circuit that has something to do with the motion sensors .,, sorry this is babble I just finished a 19 hr shift just wandering if this might shed some light on the situation

Plan for the morning -
- Disconnect head-unit fuse
- Disconnect car battery earth
Apparently leaving this off for
approx ten minutes might clear the codes
- Reconnect battery try driving and hope like hell the noise has stopped, I don't think I could handle the drive the whole way home otherwise. The trip was already put off once because of it haha

- if the warning is off I will reconnect the fuse and see if that triggers it ( although with the switch in the off position the circuit is more or less untouched ?????

Thanks again everyone much appreciated

Save yourself some time: disconnect the battery and instead of waiting, just press your foot on the brake, which will consume the energy you'd normally wait to dissipate for 10 minutes.

I can't think why the reversing lights would trigger a brake system alarm unless there's a faulty earth on the head unit causing power to run awkwardly through the instrument cluster (which is earth at the same point).

Try this: attach a lead from the chassis of the head unit to the vehicle body BEFORE you make any other changes. If that fixes it, then your entire problem has been a ghost and caused by not getting the head unit earthed to the chassis correctly. It's happened before, causing symptoms ranging from no instrument lights, erratic stereo operation, flying bouncing speedo/tacho needles to complete failure.

Nothing would surprise me on these modern cars.
When I turn on my reverse camera manually, (separate power source/ wired parallel with the reverse lights) the transmission kicks down a gear and wont change up at all. I guess the TCU freaks out and gets confused as the reverse lights are coming on while the car is in drive and moving forward.

Actually you have hit the nail on the head. The conditions for the TCM to maintain the auto's TCC (Torque Converter Clutch) in "locked" mode - which would be similar to keeping it in overdrive (with differences relating to speed, engine load etc) are that the vehicle is in 'D', the Overdrive switch is in the ON position (light on dash is OFF) ... it probably senses the vehicle being in reverse by looking at the output of the reverse switch in the gearbox, and if you've inadvertently fed power to it (essenstially feeding power in the wrong way) there's no wonder you have a confused gearbox.

Why not install a decent-sized diode on the switch line so that the power can't feed back to the gearbox, but only on to the camera?

Old.Tony said:

Why not install a decent-sized diode on the switch line so that the power can't feed back to the gearbox, but only on to the camera?

Click to expand...

Yes, I can do that or just disconnect it, so far all it has been good for is checking out the rego of all the A-Holes in their purple and black Commodores that tailgate me down the freeway.

It's a good idea for checking loads in trailers but it's easier to use the trailer plug as the switch in that circumstance because then the thing is only on when the trailer is plugged in. Still needs to be switched though because if you have a trailer on at night the brightness of the screen is too much in a dark car.....well I think it is.

Hi guys, so we started the drive home
- cautiously -
And after only 30 mins I was going NUTS with the beep beep beep so we pulled over and I grabbed the screwdriver set. So as my apprentice drove I pulled the head unit out only to have the problem basically jump out and hit me in the face due to the size of the head unit and all the accessories being external modules (gps, bluetooth and iPod control )
The unit had managed to rub through the tape covering the solder to the handbrake sensor cable creating the short on the earth circuit pretty funny really haha

As far as the fella with the camera hooked up and the lights coming on dude do urself a favor and buy a resistor they are an inexpensive part ( generally under $2) and totally worth it being done right, when you install the resistor make sure it is behind the camera circuit but before the reverse light otherwise you will find the headunit acknowledges the camera is on but the actual camera unit won't receive the power.. I put mine inline with the loom and taped the whole thing to the tray rail ( one of the advantages to getting rid of the useless tub ;-)..... )

Thanks to everyone for your help I'm really appreciative to have stumbled across the forum it's a friendly helpful place to come for your info I will post some pics soon of the 6 wheel conversion we are starting next month cheers Dave

Is that a factory head unit or after market?

It's aftermarket - pioneer avic hd3 pretty happy with it too just for the record

I was looking at one similar at one stage, however the fact that you have an after market one is a relief, I remember having my factory unit out and there was no chance or it rubbing wires of any sort and I was wondering what changes might have been made to new models.

Yeah the actual unit fits nice and snug. ( just like the original ) But as I said for some reason all the add ons are big bulky modules and to top it off you are supplied with these massive long leads that you "void the warranty" if they are cut so u gotta hide them somewhere.

Glad you kept us up to date there Dave. Important to know that.

Thanks jjohn, I'm glad my updates kept you happy!

What I meant to say is thank you. It could have been caused by so many things. Your updates provided a valuable reference for all of us. It seems the potential for others to experience the same problem is there. Mystery solved, bet your relieved.

I got ya mate, and yeah the potential is definitely there, as far as keeping y'all updated I couldn't help but notice there are a few people on here that are extremely helpful and that there help is useful due to the depth of the info they have posted so while to some my babble might seem frustrating hopefully someone somewhere can learn from my misfortune afterall that's what this forum is all about isn't it? Sharing info? Anyway good on ya jjohn take it easy buddy ... Dave