4 low electrical issues

I was driving home tonight and all of a sudden my dash lit up.. 4low light flashing, VSC light, traction control, and check engine light lit up.

4low won't engage, tried to engage it to get the light to stop flashing. the idle is up and down and my dome lights are flickering.. not sure what to think here, anyone ever have a similar issue?

 

Need to scan the engine see what trouble code is in memory I had a car with a failed bank 1 Air/Fuel ratio sensor and it disabled the vcs and wen that happens it inhibits 4wd from coming on

 

Hey 5ive7even. I have an 07 Tundra is displaying the same issue. 4LO, VSC, Traction Control, and check engine light are on. My truck still drives but doesn’t shift out of gear as easily as it should.

Autozone told me it has a P0705 Code. It has to do with the neutral safety switch. They quoted me over $300 for the part. I bought it from a Toyota parts dealer online for about $130. Pepboys installed it in about an hour.

Sadly the new part did absolutely nothing. It shifts a little better but the lights are still on my dash. I did notice that the gear selector on my dash is blank. It won’t show me what gear I’m in.

If anyone has figured this issue out, I’d love to hear about it.

I forgot to mention I had previously tried disconnecting the battery and having the codes reset. It didn’t work for more than a few minutes driving.

 

I had these same lights come up when I put a lift kit on my truck. Come to find out the wore to the abs sensor was pinched. Causing a short. So it threw everything off. I would check that as a thought. Idk for sure but it seems like those are all what was on when that happened . And it's just one little wire we just spiced it back together until I bought another one.

 

I’ll have to check that ABS wire. I didn’t mention that I had just replaced all four rotors and pads a week prior to my dash turning into a Christmas tree. I was hauling a 24” camper about 250 miles when the lights came on.

 

Yea I would check it. They are easy to pull to hard on. And that's all it takes for the wire to get stretched.

 

Another thing to consider is the brake stroke sensor. Mine is malfunctioning intermittently. When it does, the 4hi or 4lo beeps and won't disengage, ebrake light comes on, and traction control light comes on. My friend is a GM certified mechanic and he's replaced a number of these on Tundras. The common theme is the 4hi flashing and beeping when you start the truck. If I put it in neutral, then engage and quickly disengage the 4hi and 4lo knob, then put it back in park, it stops. It could certainly be something else, just wanted to add my 2 cents.

 

here’s a test for your code if you haven’t found the problem

1. Unplug the park/neutral position switch and verify key on battery voltage at terminal 2 Green wire from the 10 amp BK/UP LP fuse. Repair as necessary.

2. Jump the key on battery voltage from terminal 2 Green wire to terminal 1 Blue/Red wire at the park/neutral position switch connector. If the reverse lights come on, replace the park/neutral position switch.

 

@07TundraCNY My friend is coming up this morning with a code reader so I can figure out what the issue is so if I get the same code as you and we figure it out I'll let you know what it is for sure

but something tells me my issue is different than yours because I tried to start it up last night a few hours after i got it home and it was dead in the driveway. died twice on me so I'm hoping it's the alternator.. if it's not charging the battery correctly then the computer might be getting the wrong voltages and messing everything else up

 

I shouldn't say it's dead. the battery has juice. it will start but it won't run for more than a second.. this kind of has me worried tbh

 

That stinks. I hope you get it figured out. I’m going to attempt to check the speed sensors on my wheels along with the wiring. Never done it before so this should be fun.

 

It’s pretty obvious which wire you need to be inspecting and the sensors are easily accessible.

 

Start with making sure that battery is good first before you dive into the alternator. See if you can jumpstart the truck and check for voltage from the alternator.

 

okay good idea. what voltage should I be looking for from the alternator?

 

Man I can’t remember the specific but I want to say somewhere around 13.6-ish

 

1 volt over a fully charged standing battery which is at least 12.4v so about 13.4 with no load 14.1 just about with load

 

I just put a multimeter on the battery, it's showing 11.9v with the truck off, 14.1 when the truck is running (which it did this time for a few minutes)

when we first plugged the OBD meter in it showed 18 codes, it settled at 8 which seemed to be 4 sets of duplicate codes, all related to the ignition coils

P0351
P0353
P0355
P0357

when you clear the codes, they come right back.. anyone have any thoughts on this?

 

11.9 volts, you're battery is NFG. 14.1 is too low also, but that could be because of the battery. I don't know if the battery is the cause or a result of your problem, but you should get a new one.

 

This is on my Brand new truck with 3k miles just for reference you do with that info what you want I don’t want to start an internet war.
Your Voltage numbers are not bad at all.
Now the real situation is to diagnose this problem that you have which can be serious almost sounds like your truck jump timing with all those codes but before we go into that I have several questions
1-Did you drive thru water?
2-have you done anything to your truck prior to this issue?
3- Fuel how low or did you fill up recently?
Reason I ask those are all misfire codes
Could be bad ignition coil, Spark plug, injector or even critters chewing on your coil wires
Worst scenario is broken valve spring or jump tooth on timing you need a timing light to check timing while engine running

 

All those codes are for Bank 1 which is on the driver side of the engine check coil wires on that side the problem is on that side Bank 1

 

to answer your questions

no I haven't driven through water recently, that crossed my mind as well.

the only thing I've done to the truck since I bought it (2 weeks ago) is put led low beam headlights in it and I took the hvac motor out of it bc it was spinning off balance and found 2 acorns in it. not a good sign

I did fill up on Thursday, the truck has 7/8's of a tank in it right now

I found more broken acorns under the hood near the fuse box and battery... I'm fucked

 

Please inspect all those wires critters love to chew and chill on top of a warm engine at night cause it’s warm and safe and wiring sheathing is made with peanut oil it’s sounds crazy but it is so inspect everything. I had a Honda Pilot with chewed wiring and challenger with injector harness completely destroyed

 

Let’s hope for chewed wires cause that’s easy to repair your fucked if you jump timing

 

No internet war intended, but a good battery should be 12.4 to 12.6 V resting. I will say, I had my son in law put his boss's $12K Snap On test tool on my 6 year old original battery and it tested "good". Resting voltage is 12.3.

 

This. Sounds like squirrels, throws a monkey wrench into the mix. Good luck.

 

Your absolutely correct I have been an ASE certified technician now for 30 years for the last 20 years I was a diagnostician that’s even harder than doing repairs I finally left that business now I’m a Heavy Equipment Engineer I love it and great money and get to work on some big machines. But yes 12.4 is what we are always looking problem is these newer vehicles now with the DRL’s and all different modules that turn on wen you turn the key on take voltage from the battery yea theirs a possibility that he’s battery is a little tired but that is not causing his issue but you are definitely correct

 

I gave it a good look, I couldn't find any chewed wires but they're almost completely covered by plastic sheathing so I may have to remove all of that and give it a twice over. the idle is rough enough to warrant a bad ignition coil as well so I'm not sure if there's a way to check if any of them have failed or not? on my way home the other night the throttle response didn't feel like it was there so it's definitely misfiring.

My issue is, I drove this truck for 2 weeks and it ran perfectly. if it had chewed wires, it should have run like shit since I bought it. it ran fine all the way to the grocery store and almost all the way home before all of this happened, so my question is.. and maybe its a stupid one but could faulty wiring or a bad coil for any reason be bringing up all of the dash lights associated with improperly engaging 4lo?

 

Critters don’t open the wire cover to chew the wires them basturds chew threw it all wat u can do is and this is crazy but worth a shot is swap all Bank 2 coils with Bank 1 then clear codes start engine and see if same codes come back or new codes are now set for Bank 2

 

that's actually genius.