vendredi 27 février 2015

Sad tale about non working ABS

Lifted this from a technical buletin

Electronic Brake Force Distribution

Four words that can make a big difference how a car handles in an emergency.

This vehicle is not one that was presented to me for repair but a vehicle that was involved in an accident, after the event I was discussing the incident and the possible causes. It did make me very aware of the possible consequences of giving inaccurate advice to a customer.



(vehicle shown was a Clio mk 2 facelift model)

The vehicle in question is similar to the one above.



The vehicle in question was presented to a garage for repair to the clutch, the clutch was replaced all straight forward and after a road test the technician noticed the ABS came on during a road test, after going out during start up.

A phone call to the driver who was very honest and informed the technician that he had recently purchased the car with the ABS light on had intended to have it fixed then the clutch failed so he could not afford both repairs as he had only recently started driving.

The garage agreed to have a "quick look"at the ABS fault. The fault was very simple a loose ring on one of the drive shafts.

The loose ABS ring was removed as a temporary fix to help the customer with limited funds, new drive shaft to be fitted the following month.



WHAT WOULD YOU ADVISE IN THIS SITUATION ????



Would this car drive and handle in the same way as a car that was never fitted with ABS ???



The car in question was fitted with

Electronic Brake Force Distribution (part of the advanced ABS system).

This means that the distribution of braking effort to each wheel was controlled electronically. however this system was now inoperative and the braking force is supplied at a default value of 60%/40% front to rear split.



Under normal use this would be acceptable, the vehicle was unfortunately involved in a high speed emergency braking, as the weight shift was excessive towards the front of the vehicle 40% default braking to the rear of the car was excessive.

The rear brakes locked up the car rolled over at speed and one of the young occupants was killed.



This is an extreme and very sad example of how important it is to be able to work on modern systems with a full understanding and be able to advise the drivers of when a fault makes a car unsafe to drive.



DCM Technical Services runs regular courses at

ABS and Vehicle Dynamics

next scheduled course



I guess kids just can't take it easy even when there's a known fault with the car.




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