traction control

[Liberato]

Have a 95 Aurora and just recently the traction control light will come on and then it will go to traction off. And when that goes off my anti-lock brakes light comes on also. And today I had the key on but hadnt even started it yet and the tracton control came on for a second. You know how it sounds when your on ice or something slick. Any ideas?

[davisb2]

I'm pretty certain that the traction control uses the brakes to stop from slipping. Check to see if you need brake fluid. Same thing happened to me once and when I added fluid, brake light went away.

[JTrujillo86]

Actually, the traction control upshifts the transmission in order to slow the wheels when it senses slippage.

Jeremy

[ghutchin]

Most likly one of your wheel speed sensors is failing. The computer detects that one of the wheels is moving at a different speed and thinks that there is loss of traction, it then detects that there is a problem with one of the speed senors and shuts the whole system down which is why the ABS and Trac Off lights are on. Get it scanned.

[steck]

funny, everytime I put my olds in 'Drive', and pull away I notice either the traction control or ABS will come on real briefly. I can hear it and feel it on the brakes etc...

this happens since day one, and I've just accepted it...perhaps its suppose to do this (as a test or sumpthin)???

[ugsrich]

The ABS system does check/pressurize and you might hear/feel it as the vehicle starts to move forward and gets to about 5mph. Additionally, the Traction Control system uses a combination of engine speed and independent front braking to help you control front-wheel spin.

Gee wilikers how did "we" ever live without all these advanced systems that seem to fail even when never, seldom, or even used. I think my Traction Control has engaged a total a three times in the life of the vehicle ('95 original owner here and I've put 128K miles on it). Two of the three were me fooling around in some snow to get an idea of how it works. The third time was my failure to recognize and account for the fact that I was on wet/slick asphalt and I simply attempted to accelerate too aggressively (that's called driver error).

Similar to your situation, my TC light now comes on and stays on after I reach about 5mph of forward motion. My father's '95 did the same thing, as did a buddy of mine at the office. Seems like a systemic problem to me (along with the master-cylinder). Fortunately, whatever my specific problem, the ABS is still operational (it's only been engaged once in a panic-stop, the other several times it has been engaged was for me to "see" how it works - playing around).