Traction Control light on
Thread Starter
Melting Slicks
Joined: Aug 2005
Posts: 2,821
Likes: 204
From: Lincoln CA
Traction Control light on
My '09 base coupe puked out another battery a couple of days ago and, when the people who supplied the last two Duracell batteries (one purchased and one on warranty) gave me another new one, the Traction Control light came on on the dash and the DIC was telling me to get the traction control system checked. I am beginning to get somewhat annoyed with this car. It's had three batteries in three years. I admit that I failed to hook up my trickle charger and allowed it to sit for more than a week without driving it, and, for reasons that totally escape me, the rear hatch was popped while in the garage. Maybe I pocketed the remote. I don't know. But I've never had such a prima donna of a car before. My old school Mustang doesn't get driven any more frequently than the Vette, but you can hop right in and start the car every time. Anyone have any suggestions as to why the damn traction control light is on? Ain't technology great?
Race Director
Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 11,351
Likes: 2,445
From: Eastern
My '09 base coupe puked out another battery a couple of days ago and, when the people who supplied the last two Duracell batteries (one purchased and one on warranty) gave me another new one, the Traction Control light came on on the dash and the DIC was telling me to get the traction control system checked. I am beginning to get somewhat annoyed with this car. It's had three batteries in three years. I admit that I failed to hook up my trickle charger and allowed it to sit for more than a week without driving it, and, for reasons that totally escape me, the rear hatch was popped while in the garage. Maybe I pocketed the remote. I don't know. But I've never had such a prima donna of a car before. My old school Mustang doesn't get driven any more frequently than the Vette, but you can hop right in and start the car every time. Anyone have any suggestions as to why the damn traction control light is on? Ain't technology great?
Typically, the normal draw from the electronics on a C6 will be between 0.01-0.02 amps after everything normally shuts down.
The biggest culprit is the Onstar that stays connected with the car off. Pull the fuse on this will cure that issue, that is if you don't use Onstar.
You can set up a multimeter to see what your drain is on thesystem. I have added a PDF to show how to do that, and some things to check and deduce what system may be causing the extra drw on the system
As far as the Traction light, there are a few things that can trigger this alarm.
1) A wheel speed sensor that either has a bad connector, or has failed. (Check the connector on all 4 wheels, and for any wires that may be broken or any corrosion inside the connector)
2) The fuse panel in the passenger compartment under the floor board. If a passenger was braking hard and pushing against the floor board to do so, it can dislofge the big blue connector slightly, thus causing all knids of weird things to happen, with traction alarm as one of those. You can check the blue connectors, remove, and check the pins, reconnect and use a spacer to prevent contact between the floor board and the fuse panel connectors. (see attached PDF file)
3) You can check the connector to the ECBM, which gets the signal from all the wheel speed sensors.
Try the easy stuff first, and hopefully the issue goes away.
Good Luck
