brake light failure

[m3f_shp1124]

had my brake light failure check come up and i thought it was just a bolb or something so i just went in my garage to get a replacement. i couldnt tell if it fixed it or not so i had my mom hold down the brake while i looked behind the car. turns out both sides arent turning on for some reason and i just had the bulbs replaced. so should i get the plastic thigns that ohld the bulb replaced? the left one looks like one of the metal things melted some plastic onto the metal not sure why the right one istn work though very odd help needed!

[m3f_Realhotguy77]

does it say brake lgiht sensor failure or just brake lights?

[m3f_DMan]

I too had a brake light fail message but when I checked, the brake lights were still ok and I haven't gotten the message since (that was about three days ago).

[m3f_Dan I Am]

It sounds like your contacts got dirty and burned through the plate on the housing. This is fairly common. The bad part is, the only fix I've heard is to replace to entire housing.



You can try to clean it up a bit, which is what I did, but I fear that this is only a temporary fix.

[m3f_Kerplunk]

Thats exacutly what happened to my car just now. Only i think it may of been rust. I took it to my mechanic who instead of replacing the housing just fabricated a new contact point.

[m3f_Sirius]

Theres this product we use at work called ... uhhh.... Contact Clean or something..



Its designed to remove crossion on electrical connections. You could try something like that. Even some light sand paper on the contacts may work.

[m3f_96GSR]

Do you have a wing? I have one and one of the lights is loose so whenever I hit a hard bump I get the code. As soon as I turn the car off and on again the message goes out.

[m3f_DMan]

I found a corroded (perhaps rusted?) contact point in my left brake light. It's actually the part that's bolted into the housing. Well actually it's one of those contact points since I believe the light and the holder contact the housing at 2 places.



My question is what is the best way to clean this contact point given how corroded/rusted it is? I tried some fine sandpaper (taken from the back of a matchbook actually) but no way that's going to get that corrosion off. What if I use something like a Dremel? I just don't want to grind it down so much that I lose contact entirely though.



I forgot to take a pic, but I can do that if it will assist in the visualization.

[m3f_Dan I Am]

you could try a little heavier grit sandpaper, but like you said, be careful. See if you can find some of that Contact Clean Sirius was talking about.



You may need to replace the whole housing if it is too corroded.