Chappers' 200 20vt sedan - Pearl

[loxxrider]

I won't be awake until after 3 today due to work schedule, but I don't know a whole lot about replacing the bomb anyway... I can help with vacuum assist conversions though!

[chappers]

So the old brake accumulator is off, I've sat it next to David Kase supplied one.

You can see it looks a lot cleaner and has the pressure tap for Nitrogen.
He supplied 2 new O rings for the banjo fitting which is nice. I also have a copper washer on the banjo bolt, so will get a new one of those from the local hydraulic hose place.



My old bomb also has a threaded blanked off port where the new one doesn't, bit unsure why the difference?

I'm also replacing 3 hoses that run from the resevoir to the pump, the bomb and the PS rack. So I removed the resevoir and gave it a good clean, took out the inner sleeve with the mesh and sprayed everything with carburetor cleaner. I found one the tails has a bit of a crack starting, it looks like a hose clamp has been tightened too tight, it has a inner sleeve that the fluid flows through so might not leak, but I might look at reinforcing it with gorilla glue or something.

[chappers]

Got the hoses remade by a local hydraulic place

Bargain at $15 and took him couple hours, I gave him $20 and told him to have beer on me.

Fitting the steering rack banjo bolt back on again was tight and contorted and actually hurt my hand!

Anyway all went back really nice and no leaks!!
I can't tell if it made any difference to the brake or pedal feel :-/

Another annoyance was I drove it today and I still got the damn beep sound and 'brake light' on the dash!
The level had dropped below minimum level, so I topped it up to midway between min and max.

Then drove this evening and I got the sodding beep again! Grrr I thought the new bomb and fixing the leaks would prevent the warning.
Any advice??

[yodasfro]

Which brake light is coming on with the beep? Only one that would do that is the autocheck pad warning or bulb out warning. The red brake light is for the brake/hydraulic fluid levels pressure switch on the booster and e-brake. If it's the pressure switch you can just unplug it to make the light go out.

[chappers]

Ha thanks Austin, that's interesting, I didn't realize, maybe my old bomb was OK!
My red light goes off instantly, it's the LCD display that says brake light with a beep.
The E brake works and I thought there was plenty of material left on the pads.

The warning only happens when it's hot weather, like today :-(
I wonder if it's a wiring or circuit board problem in the instrument cluster? I did resolder it a while ago and it fixed my intermittent speedometer. Since then the LCD display sometimes goes funky and shows a sideways smiley face instead of a (O) symbol, anyone else get that?

[themagellan]

Nice car man, hope you resolve the issue - It does sound cluster related, mine does all sorts of wacky looking things. If it's a 'sometimes' it most likely means it's just a bad connection.

[loxxrider]

Which symbol is it exactly? If it's the (O) one then that's definitely not bomb related.

If you want to have your cluster professionally resoldered, I can ask my buddy if he wants to do a few because there are a few other people who might want to do it too. He can reflow the entire thing.

[chappers]

Nice car man, hope you resolve the issue - It does sound cluster related, mine does all sorts of wacky looking things. If it's a 'sometimes' it most likely means it's just a bad connection.

Thanks, each time I take the cluster out I find out more about it and spot more broken things.
Have you had success fixing your wacky LCD?

Which symbol is it exactly? If it's the (O) one then that's definitely not bomb related.

If you want to have your cluster professionally resoldered, I can ask my buddy if he wants to do a few because there are a few other people who might want to do it too. He can reflow the entire thing.

Yes Chris it's that symbol, I've always had it. Not sure what that symbol particularly means?
Can you find out how much he would charge and the lead-time?

Cheers
Chris

[loxxrider]

Nice car man, hope you resolve the issue - It does sound cluster related, mine does all sorts of wacky looking things. If it's a 'sometimes' it most likely means it's just a bad connection.

Thanks, each time I take the cluster out I find out more about it and spot more broken things.
Have you had success fixing your wacky LCD?

Which symbol is it exactly? If it's the (O) one then that's definitely not bomb related.

If you want to have your cluster professionally resoldered, I can ask my buddy if he wants to do a few because there are a few other people who might want to do it too. He can reflow the entire thing.

Yes Chris it's that symbol, I've always had it. Not sure what that symbol particularly means?
Can you find out how much he would charge and the lead-time?

Cheers
Chris

I'm fairly certain that one is just for brake pads... I'm not 100% sure on that though.

Yeah, I'll send him an e-mail now and see if he wants to try it. I'll have him do mine first and then see if he would want to do more and how much he'd charge. Lead time would probably be on the order of weeks (he has a day job which doesn't involve this). However, I can look into getting us a cluster to ship around for the ones who can't have the car down that long.

[loxxrider]

Also, I am getting that one randomly coming up too. I chalked it up to cluster issues hence why I was thinking about sending my cluster to my buddy to have it reflowed.

[yodasfro]

The brake pad warning is a common thing on these cars best thing to do is bypass it right at the cluster. What happens is the wires break somewhere along the harness making impossible to disable at the pad connectors. It is not a problem with the cluster needing to be soldered. The scrambled autocheck is the LCD screen itself, it's connected to the board with zebra stripes overtime and with heat they can lose contact.
How too disable thee pad warning at the cluster. http://s55.photobucket.com/user/yodasfr ... e.jpg.html

[loxxrider]

Thanks Austin, that's very good info. In my case, the temp gauge is also doing wacky stuff, so I'm thinking it's a good idea to reflow the board anyway.

[chappers]

The brake pad warning is a common thing on these cars best thing to do is bypass it right at the cluster. What happens is the wires break somewhere along the harness making impossible to disable at the pad connectors. It is not a problem with the cluster needing to be soldered. The scrambled autocheck is the LCD screen itself, it's connected to the board with zebra stripes overtime and with heat they can lose contact.
How too disable thee pad warning at the cluster. http://s55.photobucket.com/user/yodasfr ... e.jpg.html

Cool, thanks Austin! So just connect the light brown and brown/black wires together?
I'm doing that this weekend!

[yodasfro]

Thanks Austin, that's very good info. In my case, the temp gauge is also doing wacky stuff, so I'm thinking it's a good idea to reflow the board anyway.

That's probably the MFTS coolant temp sensor.

Cool, thanks Austin! So just connect the light brown and brown/black wires together?
I'm doing that this weekend!

Yes you need to cut the br/blk wire and connect it to the br ground wire.

[chappers]

Thanks Austin, that's very good info. In my case, the temp gauge is also doing wacky stuff, so I'm thinking it's a good idea to reflow the board anyway.

That's probably the MFTS coolant temp sensor.

Cool, thanks Austin! So just connect the light brown and brown/black wires together?
I'm doing that this weekend!

Yes you need to cut the br/blk wire and connect it to the br ground wire.

Ok I can't tell from the photo, I need to cut the br/blk at the instrument side of the blue scotch block? Or cut at the loom side?
Loom side makes sense to me.

[yodasfro]

As far where to cut just give yourself a little slack don't cut too close to the plug. I can't remember which side you ground I think it's the side coming from the plug after cutting the wire.

[chappers]

Thanks for the help Austin. I bridged the two wires this morning and it works a treat!
I read on SJM that it's a series circuit, the br/blk wire at the cluster goes to the left front brake pad, then onto the right front, then back up to the cluster via the br wire. So a break in any point will cause the brake warning, so just bridging the two wires, like you say, just behind the cluster completes the circuit. I didn't have to cut anything.

Never seen this symbol, ever!!

Thanks again. With my new found electrickery confidence I might even tackle the power windows next!

[yodasfro]

What's wrong with the windows? Probably an easy fix.

[chappers]

The left rear is non operational from any switch. The front passenger works, but doesn't go down from drivers side switch.

[yodasfro]

Ok the left rear might just be the motor being stuck you just need to pull the door panel and window frame then you can get to the motor. Remove the cover off the motor two + screws and check for corrosion a shot of wd-40 and you should be able to get it going again. Could also be a broken wire in the door jam test as follows. The left front not working is likely a broken wire in bellows of the drivers door jam. Removing the arm rest will gain access to the switches and connectors. Check all the wires for power(any one that isn't brown/ground) with a test light also operate the switches while doing so and check the corresponding wires for up & down.

[loxxrider]

So glad to have you here Austin. A true t44 veteran

[chappers]

Well, it did work for a few days at least. I got the brake light warning and the beep back, almost every 2-3 seconds. Its very distracting while driving.

So I pulled the cluster out and checked the connection I'd made, I decided to redo it just to be sure. I used 2 spade connectors to joint the br/br blk together. LCD said 'OK' for 15 minutes.....then brake warning light and beep again!

I agree with Chris its probably something with the circuit board and not the wiring. oh well. Chris any news from your buddy who re-solders these?

[loxxrider]

Yeah actually... he said he isn't going to have the time to do it :(

It might be worthwhile to trace that circuit and just reflow yourself if it isn't too complicated...

[yodasfro]

This outlines what to solder for autocheck issues http://www.sjmautotechnik.com/trouble_s ... .html#dash

[chappers]

This outlines what to solder for autocheck issues http://www.sjmautotechnik.com/trouble_s ... .html#dash

Thanks Austin I followed this guide a while back to fix the intermittent speedometer. (It needed resoldering). I stripped all the cluster down at the weekend, checked every solder joint and found 1 which was a little suspect, as shown on SJM guide. I resoldered it and it seemed to fix it.
But....the last few days were cooler days.
Today, well it was ~80F and the dashboard got hot to the touch and guess what, the brake warning came back with a vengeance!! Beeping every freaking second.

I did an experiment where I put a reflective windshield cover up for the afternoon and it cooled the dashboard enough that the warning went away, until ~15 mins into a drive and the dash was really hot again and the warning came back.

So...I can't find the break in the circuit that seems to be caused by high temp on the dash, and short circuiting the wiring didn't fix it. I'm thinking some way to keep the dash cool, the obvious is fix the AC system but that's expensive right now. I'm really thinking of buying some insulation material and just laying on the top of the dash!