Good morning,

I took my cobalt out for a drive the other day and noticed that after I returned the parking brake to the off position, the lamp stayed indicated.

The car drives fine and with the lamp on the DIC does not warn me that my parking brake is still on, unless I turn it up one notch, so I believe the switch for the park brake is working fine,

What else would set that light ON?

My ABS/TCS fuse is pulled because of a bad wheel speed sensor, however that has been like that for over a year now, never set that light on.

I haven't had a chance to see if it affects my cruise control yet.

 

Low fluid causes the light to stay on.

 

Fluid is fine. I'm wondering if the level sensor has gone bad.

light was coming on and off today while driving. No real pattern as to why.

 

I don't get what exninja is talking about as far as fluid but this happened to me once and I just popped out the centre console panel and adjusted the ebrake sensor wire and it was fine.

 

Not that complicated. The dash light illuminates if the brake fluid is low. Just trying to rule it out.

 

What exninja was talking about in a nutshell:
When you press your brake, the piston in the caliper moved out to press the brake pad against the rotor. That requires a certain amount of brake fluid and pressure to have this happen correctly. If your brakes were soft, there isn't enough pressure, and the sensor detects you're low on brake fluid (leak somewhere).

If it's completely dry in the brakes and lines (no leaks) the piston is coming out too far to push the pads into the rotor, so either your rotors are shot or your pads are shot (or both).

 

Aren't we talking about the parking brake that uses cables and a mechanism?

 

Same light though

 

Oh, gotcha

 

My brakes were all new last year, I hardly ever drive the car so I am sure that the issue is not worn brakes or low fluid, especially since the reservoir is full, worn brakes the resevoir would be low as the piston does not compress back fully when the pedal is released, just enough to disengage the rotor. Besides, when my brakes were worn right down the light didnt illuminate then, and they were metal on metal.

It is not the emergency brake adjustment as the DIC does not indicate the parking brake is on, and to confirm that if I put the lever up 1 click when moving it dings and the DIC indicates the parking brake is engaged.

I am thinking a faulty level sensor, just havent had time to diagnose it. If that is the case I will likely just try to find a way to bypass it.