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High Pitched Tone, ABS, E-Brake, and (!) Lights all Come On

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Care, Maintenance and Troubleshooting' started by Brent1120, Jul 18, 2019.

  1. Brent1120

    Brent1120 New Member

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    Greetings all! I have been lurking on here for a while and finally decided to post. This is a great site and I am glad to be a member now!

    I did a search and found a lot of close threads related to my problem. However, one thing stands out with my issue.

    So, I get all three of the lights listed in the title (e-brake, abs, and (!) as well as a high pitched tone. I also have about a 70% reduction in braking feel...and of course, the ABS doesn't work. Now, here is the peculiar thing. When I plug my scan reader into the OBDII port, it comes up clean...even when the lights are all on the dash! I perform a reset anyway with the scanner and it does nothing. The only way to solve the problem is turning the car off, waiting about 10-15 seconds. It clears up but then comes back on in 15-45 minutes.

    Is there a special way to scan codes in the Prius that I am not aware of? My research on here leads me to believe that it is probably a front wheel speed sensor, or a new battery. However, it would be nice to narrow it down by pulling the codes instead of just throwing parts at it.

    Thanks in advance.
    -Brent
     
  2. Brent1120

    Brent1120 New Member

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    Oops. I forgot to add that, I have a 2005 Prius with almost 160,000 miles on it. Thanks again!
     
  3. Brent1120

    Brent1120 New Member

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    I was able to pull the codes with a different scanner.

    C1300 ABS ECU Malfunction
    C1241 Low or High Power Supply Voltage

    I'm thinking new battery to start? What say you PC?
     
  4. ChapmanF

    ChapmanF Senior Member

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    Those are two of the roughly one hundred possibilities that can turn on the lights you are seeing and the symptoms you're describing. That you also get the sonic alarm narrows things down a bit, because only about the half dozen most safety-critical problems are programmed to also sound the alarm. (Neither a wheel speed sensor nor the battery would be in that set.)

    You haven't said what code reader you're using. I'm sure you've seen in a lot of the threads you searched that Techstream on a laptop is the most dependable way to read Prius codes, and that many other readers will completely miss codes from some of the computers in the car, and that pretty much always that's what's happening when somebody says "I've got these warning lights and no codes" (because the warning lights don't come on unless there are codes).

    If you're kind of impatient about the time to order a J2534 dongle and have it delivered and set up a laptop with Techstream, you probably also saw numerous threads about just using a jumper wire to get the brake computer to blink out two-digit codes on the dash lights. That is less information than you'd get with Techstream, but often it's enough to get you going, and it's nice knowing you've got that way of reading the codes anywhere you are when warning lights come on, even if you might not have a better reading tool with you.
     
    Mr. K and Skibob like this.
  5. Patrick Wong

    Patrick Wong DIY Enthusiast

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    In case the OP was uncertain, the presence of the high pitched alarm means that the car should NOT be driven at all, until the root cause is resolved.
     
  6. Skibob

    Skibob Senior Member

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    I had that happen also. My 12v battery was older and I had other weird things happen like the windshield wipers ran very slowly. The problem went away when I cleaned the battery terminals but I replaced the 12v anyway for good measure.