Has anyone tried repairing instead of replacing the ABS brake actuator?

The hybrid pit briefly said they are "repairing" them. Then it faded away....
Likely because of the liability risk.
I do it correctly and safely, you likely need special tools, and the correct replacement parts.

Whomever builds them for Toyota, would be the ones to repair them.

 

Just take one and start taking it apart and and you'll quickly see the problem and why it's not being rebuilt I guess there are a few of them like this BMW had this problem years ago now all the newer cars this thing is mounted on the fender well and a rebuilt was $149 or similar

 

The main flaw happens most likely from the degradation in the walls in the cylinder wall of the aluminum casting.

This might be on amount of the contact surface flaw made when the liquid aluminum flows into the mold.

When xrayed, the casting be perfect but can degraded with use.

Unless bored and sleeved with iron, there would be no way to reuse the original casting.

It would require a high tech holding and machining fixture, even if the casting has enough residual material to allow sleeving.

Apparently, a new replacement is economically less expensive.

 

Do you feel it's necessary to replace both the actuator and the accumulator? I don't know the Toyota terms for those 2 items, but when Toyota does a warranty replacement, they replace both. I'm still not sure if the part that hasn't failed, why they need to replace both parts. Just replacing the failed part is reasonably affordable, under $800 for parts

 

Because the problem manifests as loss of fluid pressure and the two parts are connected together by pipes, it's not always easy to be sure which one is the failed part. My money is usually on the actuator because there are more valves in it and more to go wrong, but I won't be right every time. The dealer doesn't want you to have to come back.

Also, consider the number of people (even just posters on PriusChat!) who keep driving as long as they can with the pump runs only seconds apart. Given that it normally runs maybe a few times an hour (more when you actually use the brakes), people who have driven a long time that way have added the equivalent of years of normal wear on the pump and accumulator. Even if they weren't originally the failed part, they could be on their last legs now.

 

It's a matter that the failure of one part results in detritus being distributed and deposited to contaminate the other which might cause early eventual failure again.

Additionally, due to the cost of labor involved, once and done us probably the most prudent course of action.

 

If lowest cost is the only factor, regardless of safety or the odds of success, some have installed used parts. Even then there is concern about getting the correct part which varies by tire size, model and year. So you really need the donor vehicle's vin to look up the part number of its brake booster/actuator and compare to yours.

 

yes that is correct. I found out the Gen 3 cars vs a Prius v or CT200h, even though they are very similar, uses different parts

 

I would think the Lexus part would probably be the one you want on any of the higher-end Prius as it has the large Wheels and all of the stuff probably that would be on the highest and Prius would be my guess course that is the Lexus Mark I would think it would get the better of the breaking parts that they make for the series but you never know.

 

It's not a question of quality between models. Each brake booster/actuator has a Skid Control ECU integrated into it with unique "calibration ids" (software). Get the wrong part and all the work to install it and set it up is wasted.

 

This will make navigating for used parts difficult. As older part numbers are often superseded by new numbers. If you're looking for a used part, it would make it really difficult. I don't think I've heard to compatibility issues yet, has anyone posted 3rd gen used parts that didn't work properly after installation, due to possibly the wrong part number?

I remember when I order my new one, I was tempted to buy the lower cost one for my friend CT200h, I'd get the part number from Lexus and checked if Toyota had the part for possibly less money. Strange enough, the part through Lexus was less expensive.

 

The thing that can make you frown is getting a C1203 code. The skid ECU in your replacement brake actuator introduces itself to your car's power management control ECU, and main body ECU, and yaw rate and acceleration sensor, and gets unhappy if any of those three should turn out to be not what it was programmed at the factory to expect.



... which means, of course, that this can also happen to you if one of those other three ECUs ever got replaced with the wrong thing.



The fix is to go replace whichever things need replacing until they are all the right things. Which might not be very fun.

On the other hand, there is also this hint buried on the second page of troubleshooting:



So this C1203 code is a strange animal. It either means you're hosed and have the wrong things and you're having a terrible day, or it means there's a simple calibration routine you should run.

So the takeaway is you should never go immediately to feeling terrible if a C1203 shows up. First just try to do the linear solenoid calibration. If that works, you're not hosed.