ok, the two abs lights in the center of the instrument cluster stay on all the time. where would be a good place to start looking for the problem?

i haven't driven the car at any speeds yet or any distance, so i don't have any other symptoms to go by yet.

 

if both lights, red and orange, are on it is quite aserious problem.

things like sensors will only bring on the orange light once moving. red light as well is possibly a power failure to the ecu or something (possible missing/broken fuse or relay

on the other hand, a low fluid level, or disconnected fluid level switch, can do the same and is a simple fix

 

could be loads of things.....but check the pump runs,it may be low pressure in the accumulator

 

i'll check these things this weekend and let you all know if i find anything or need more suggestions.

thanks.

 

red light won't go out if the handbrake is on.

 

ok, the red light next to the battery light does not stay on. only the two small yellow lights just below the fuel and temp gauge

 

2 small yellow lights?

 

hmm, i guess i have to take a picture and post it.

 

3 doors have an engine management light as well iirc

the other light could be a brake pad warning light that is no redundant if you've fitted cossie running gear to a xr4i

abs fault is probably down to a dodgy connection if it comes on as soon as u start the car.

 

these are the two lights i'm talking about. they come on whne the car is started and they stay on all the time. no other lights come on when i hit the brakes.

 

normally there is just one light there - looks like it's been converted to LED's as the standard bulb is a ford only part

for those to come on immediately and not go off after 10 seconds indicates a permanent fault, rather than something intermittent like a sensor/ring gear.

check that all sensors are plugged in and check the resistance across each sensor by removing the multiplug from the ecu and opening it up

what does the pedal feel like during driving? if normal, then it indicates that the pump is fine and getting up to pressure. presumably you hear the pump come on when you go to key position 1 for about 10 seconds, switiching off when it achieves pressure?

 

yes, i can hear the pump come on and then goes off after about 10 seconds.

the pedal feels nice and firm and the brakes feel real good.

 

then i suspect that you have a broken sensor or wire which should be relatively easy to rectify

when you open up the 'hair brush' multiplug, the sensor cables are easy to pick out as they are shielded

 

3 doors have 2 small LED's only saphs have 1 single bulb light

check all ABS sensors and try remove them from the hubs and make sure they aren't worn & damaged

 

didn't know that

 

ok, the sensors are probably a very good place to start , since the car was hauled up on a flat bed with no wheels on it.

 

I had the same problem on my sapph cos, and drove 5 miles to MOT with the light on, had to go as was expecting a fail on other things anyway.
The brakes/pump worked 100% fine, after it had been turned on/off a few times lights started behaving, and have been fine since.
Not much use I know, but a wiggle might be worth a try ?
tabetha

 

Mine came on at the weekend - took her carefully down our road and they went out almost right away so guessing its an earth connection corroding?

btw all early saffs have the twin light system as well lads

 

found my problem. i have a bad front n/s sensor. it is reading infinite ohms when doing a resistance check and it reads only 90mV when spinning the wheel and checking the voltage. the other three sensors all read 1k ohms and about 1v when spinning the wheels.

will go to the junkyard soona nd get several sensors form scorpios to test and install.

 

the early abs system is a little different ot the later systems in terms of how it works and is set up

but the granada sensors do work in the sierra loom, if oyu get the scorpio ones they have different plugs on the end and it's not possible to convert them over

 

hmm, different connectors eh? changing connectors on a piece of coax cable isn't particularly too difficult. just a matter of finding the right connector.

i'll let you all know how it goes.

 

what's the easiest way to chesk the resistance on them?
pull the sensor from the hub?

cheers

 

unplug the sensor and spin the wheel and see what the muultimeter tells you

you need to be seeing around the 1100 (ohms) mark

 

that's close but slightly off.


pull the plug and check resistance from the center conductor to the shield. that should be 800 to 1400 ohms.

then switch your multimeter to volts AC and check the same places while spinnning the wheel. it should read 2VAC according to my scorpio abs troubleshooting manual (which is all i have to go by). i was actually reading 1VAC at each sensor, except the bad one, i was reading about 80 to 90mVAC.

i think that as long as the shield conductor isn't aluminum, that i can probably cut and splice and rebuild a scorpio sensor with a cossie connector. i don't think the frequency is high enough for the impedance mismatch to be to horribly relevant. besides i think it's shielded to keep out out emi noise rather than to keep rf losses down.