so my roomate took my truck over to a buddys house and he called me on the way back and said that the brake light and abs light came on. what would cause these lights to come on? but there is no fluid dripping anywhere, but i have noticed that the brake pedal is kind of soft. I checked the pads and they are still good, is there a way that air could have gotten in the system and would that cause the light? Fluid looks good but i just checked it in the parking lot and it is dark here right now so i will have to check it again tomarrow morning.any input is greatly apreciated have never had to work on the brake systems on these trucks before so not really sure where to start?\

Thanks
Matt

 

No matter what you're goin to do w/ it(if you'll do the work,or not),you shouldget a code reader,that way at the very least you have an idea whats goin on and i'll give you a direction to start with...

 

check for codes, you do not need a code reader can you tell if it is front or back? I would start the the ruber hoses to the calapers.

 

when my roomate brought it back he told me what happened and i went out tand started the truck again and the lights didn't come on. My CEL was on before this happened because of my cat, but i checked and it did not throw anymore codes. If those lights come on again will it put out another code? i was going to start with those hoses because i had the brakes apart last weekend checking the pads and maybe something happened but im gonna try topping off the fluid and bleeding the brakes and see where that gets me.

 

i took it out for a drive today to see if i could get it to happen again, and whatever i tried i could not get it to mess up. So now im thinking that it could have been something electrical because the pedal feels the same, the fluid is good, and its not leaking from anywhere, so i guess ill drive it til it messes up again

 

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All I'm sayin is if you're gettin any type of lights,a reader will let you erase one that you may deem "not urgent"...don't start replacing parts untill you know the problem,you say you had an eng. light on already...maybe thats what your freind saw...you're gonna need to get used to MIL lights comming on...it's a dodge...^^^he is right though,you can get a Haynes manual that will tell you how to check for codes and give descriptions...

 

Hi, I am new to the Dakota world but not new to working on cars, the problem you are talking about sounds like an ABS computer on it's way out. I had a caravan that I worked on had this same problem, the lights will come on when you start the car but not all the time, all she does to get it to go of is shut the car of and turn it back on. I hope this helps.

 

yeah lamchop you could be right, i'm gonna look further into it when i start to do some work on the truck this afternoon, i still have yet to get it to do the same thing for me that it did for my roomate. I took it out yesterday to some back roads around here and slammed the brakes and they locked up but the abs did not come on so that could very well be the problem.

 

well i was looking into another forum and it says that somethines this problem is caused by a wheel speed sensorproblem. So i have replaced that and in the process i found out that i have a rear brake leak on the passanger side brake line, so now i have to fix that too.

 

I think you are doing the right thing by fixing and changing the smaller things first before spending alot of money on the bigger stuff. good luck on finding your problem.