(Solved) Emergency brake light, VSC, ABS, and (!) On after Brake Replacements

Hello, I am new to the forum and made a new account to seek advice but currently I have a Toyota Prius 2005 with 140,000 miles and all is working well so far except for the fact that I just had my brakes (Front brake pads and back shoes) replaced considering about 1mm was left on the front pads (Back shoes had 3mm so still good but replaced with new anyways for the book keeping). After doing so, plugging back and screwing in the ground wire in the back and powering up the car left me with these nice lights on the dash constantly on and solid. At first, I was worried but I was able to test drive the brakes around the block and they are working beautifully fine. Only thing is I assume without the computer brake assisting since the lights being on. I have driven nearly 60 miles so far and can confirm my gas mileage is practically good with 44MPG with semi city traffic and solid new braking but still feel uncomfortable with lights on.

I have tried to reset the lights using the usual pin jumping 4 and 13 method and nothing changed and I also tried spending a few days on forums day and night when possible to learn how to fix the issue but nothing seems to work. I ultimately purchased the techstream mini VCI cable from Amazon and should get it in a few days. Some help on walking through the process would help. I want to avoid the dealers as they rip people off left and right.

Things to mention:

• Replacing the brakes and shoes was done slowly and carefully to match how it was before and after. When getting to the front brake pads, I had to push in the piston to take off the caliper. I feel this may have triggered the computer problem.
• When dealing with the back shoes, I used brake cleaner to make things a little cleaner but was careful when spraying. I wondered if a sensor was potentially the cause but I did not mess with anything except strictly the brakes and shoes.
• Yes, the battery is new and fully functional. Replaced two weeks ago and stronger than any battery I had before. I can assure this is not the problem.
• Battery was disconnected from ground or (Minus) terminal from back to leave the car in a no power state before brake replacement.
• I did NOT remove the 2 blue relay fuses as some people in forums mentioned (Kinda regret it now) because I assumed battery disconnection was good enough.
• Doors were opened a few times while replacing brakes to grab some tools
• KeyFob was in pocket the entire time (Once again, battery was unplugged so assumed noting bad would occur)

I can't understand my problem as so many forum posts similar to this issue have users with semi bad braking, locking up brakes, not feeling the computer assist, and many other issues but everything on my end works fine from driving, speeding, braking, except the damn lights are on.

At this point, any helpful advice would be great. Once I get the techstream, I can begin seeing how to test my car even more. Thanks guys and sorry for the essay explanation.

 

I figured I best wait until I can read the DTC. Any good tutorials on what I should do once I get the cable and software running? What to do specifically? Also I uploaded the picture of how my dashboard looks when started up.

 

Alright, will do and thanks for the fast response guys! Is clearing the codes using tech stream equal to using the pin 4 and 13 method or does the software clear more than the pin method? Just asking out of curiosity. Would make sense tech-stream clears more but not sure.

I wonder if it could be a sensor (as I heard they are sensitive for the prius) but still must be something from the computer's false reading or alert I would say.

 

Well yes, the 12 volt battery was disconnected before anything was done with the brakes until the brake replacements were finished. I did pump the brake 5-7 times once the left brake pad was installed and then another 5-7 times after the right brake pad was installed. This was just to be sure they were seated properly before putting the tires back on. I didn't do this for the shoes though.

What I am constantly wondering is, even though the battery was disconnected, since the 2 blue relay fuses were left installed, a signal was still able to be sent to the ECU the moment I pushed in the pistons to have enough access to remove the calipers. Thus this left a false alarm in the ECU and must be cleared. But... If this was the case, the pin jumping method should have cleared the lights which it didn't so now to see what error I get once I get the cable for techstream.

 

Alright guys! Sorry for the delay in posting but I finally received the cable and ran the health check instantly using Tech-stream! The software is incredible and is truly powerful for a diagnostic tool.

After running the check, I cleared the board just to make sure nothing out of the ordinary still existed in the system and after 40 seconds, the "Emergency brake light, VSC, ABS, and (!)" returned again. I ran the health check and one error DTC code has appeared. This code is "C1343 Hydraulic System (RR)". Now this oddly enough makes much more sense as when I was working on the right rear brake shoes, I happened to use brake cleaner to get ride of a lot of gunk build up and grease. This however, made the removal job much more annoying because the parts were slippery and partially wet from the cleaner and both of the gaskets for the wheel cylinders slipped off partially in the process of grabbing springs, shoes, etc. I did mange to slip them back in place after messing around with it for nearly 7 minutes because it was just such a tedious process with the slippery feeling of the rubber gasket being readjusted on the cylinder. Anyhow, in this process, a small yet fair amount of brake fluid came out. I didn't think this would affect anything but I am rethinking that now after seeing this error and doing some googling around to see others suggest bleeding the brakes to remedy this error.

Anyone willing to guide me now in this situation? Am I thinking in the right direction? The car can run fine if I ignore this error but as long as the lights stay on, the Prius won't do any brake regeneration and this causes my mpg to drop about 5 units. 48 mpg becomes 43-44. Big deal for the long run and why not fix if it can be done I appreciate any help guys!

 

Thanks for the help Patrick! Finally got around bleeding the rear right brakes considering I was just constantly occupied with life but all worked out! Loosening the nut was quite difficult with just a 8mm wrench so I opted to use a socket key to have more torque and after, I used the wrench when the bleeder nut was loosened enough to break the tight fit. After bleeding about 3 times, I cleared codes and system did not show lights anymore. Drove for about 30 miles and still no sign of lights returning and boy does it feel good to have regen braking back after driving for 250 miles exactly without it. Everything seems functional and my learning from this experience expanded greatly! Thanks again for all that helped!