Well, dang. I was getting an "engine failsafe mode" warning when I would hit the brakes while using cruise control. So I reckoned I'd start with the easy** fix and replace the brake switch, since that seems to have worked for a lot of folks. Alas, no luck. Still getting the same problem.

I'm open to suggestions for what's next. I saw in some previous threads that a vacuum leak can cause the problem. Is there anywhere in particular that I should look that might be a likely culprit? Admittedly, I bought a used switch off eBay, but it looked in good condition, as did the switch that I pulled out ... no noticeable corrosion, bad connections, etc. Looked clean as a whistle, really.

I haven't yet pulled out my ODBII scanner, but I guess that's my next step. Any codes I should look for in particular?

Mind you, I'm still taking it for a road trip to Chicago tomorrow. I'll just keep my foot on the gas pedal like some sort of primitive from the mid 20th century. The horror. The horror.


**Easy, if you're smaller than me and fit into that footwell a bit better, I guess. But I eventually got there. BTW, if anybody is reading this in the future you want a 7 mm wrench for the back end of the bolt and an 8 mm wrench for the lock nut. It took me a while to figure that out. (And then, of course, I just saw that advice it in one of the threads on the brake switch that I read after completing the swap.)

 

All the "used" switches look fine. What fails is the 2 micro switches inside the switch.

 

Hmmn ... sounds like it might be the cheap man who pays the most in the end. I guess it wouldn’t hurt to buy a new one and try it out. If nothing else, contorting myself into that footwell is at least as good a stretch as any yoga class.

 

You can test the switch easily. The two outer pins are one circuit, inner pins the other. But sometimes the the connection is intermittent, and also be aware the switch can be physically out of place so that contact is intermittent.

The fact that you were able to use cruise control makes me think the micro switch was not faulty, but that it wasn't opening the circuit when you hit the brakes because the brake switch itself was out of position.