Brake Pad replacement - Wear Sensors Problem

[duncan89]

Hi there - great forum - hope that someone can help me with a problem I had with my recently aquired passat - more annoying than urgent!

The dashboard recently told me to "Check Brakepads" - so thought that I would change them to be on the safe side (front pads). Seeing as the Autopart garage was closed, I had little choice but to get the new pads from Halfords (sorry) . Of course, when I managed to get the pads off (less than 2mm left on them), I noticed that the wear sensor cable on the new pads had a different connector to the vehicle (round) than the old pads (square) - thanks a million halfords!

Obviously I could not put the old pads back on, so I just cut the wear indicator cable away from the pads, and insulated and tied the car-side cable away.

Problem is of course that the brake pad wear dash warning keeps coming on every time I use the car. I was wondering if there is any way of disabling this - as the new pads have at least 30k mileage in them, and I would rather not have to fork out again for a new set of front pads with the correct wear sensor connectors - afterall, my other cars had no such warning system and all I did was to check the pad thickness at each service.

The rear pads are fine - as they were changed by the retailer before I aquired the car and I can see these are fine.

Help/advice appreciated (apart from "don't go to halfords" - I know this )

Cheers!

Duncan.

[stuart]

Hi,

I belive that you can "fool" the system by linking the 2 pins together in the wiring plug.

If I am correct, the sensor is a loop of wire, which breaks when the pads wear down, making the warning come on.

Whilst the ideal thing would be to replace the pads with the correct items, I can see your point, so the above may be a solution until next time

Stuart

[hurley]

hi there i had a similar problem with mine what you need is a pair of abs sensor looms which comes as a kit consists of abs sensor with loom which splits off from sensor to brake pad plug i got mine from german & swedish price £75 for pair problem solved.

[Sam]

I'll second Stuart's idea, go back to Halfords, buy a length of cable (they have lots that Halford's main customer base use for their stereo equipment ) and wire the two pins together.

You'll obviously be without the warning and you'll need to manually inspect the pads, but the light will go out and you wont be faced with that annoying chime every time you start the car.

[martinj]

Hi Duncan,

I would agree with the try a loop of wire in the car side of the sensor, and it that does work, it would be easy enough to chop the connector from the old plug onto the new pads. At worst, if that splice ever failed it would bring on the warning light earlier, rather than not atall. If you have binned your old pads I might be able to help as I am about to change my pads.

Let me know if you want the connectors from my old pads. Could also let you have a few lengths of heat shrink to cover the splices if you don't have any.

Martin

[duncan89]

Thanks to all

Weather here is rubbish at the mo, so I shall put up with the annoying chime until I can implement the loopback idea.

Thanks again!

Duncan.