Brake Light & Gear Change Problems

I caused a very bad problem in my Prius while attempting a DIY repair on my third brake light.

First I'm going to write the symptoms, then what I tried to do to repair the problem, and finally what I did to cause this.


So the symptoms:

1. None of the brake lights come on when you hit the brakes
2. The car won't enter ready mode. Pressing the break and the power button at the same time is basically ignored by the car and it's as if you press the power button without pressing the brake. You still have to press the power button twice every time just to get things kicking.
3. Pressing the brake and trying to change gears does nothing. The car won't even go into neutral.
4. I still hear the break actuator activate every time I hit the brakes.
5. A new light came onto my dash to join the others — one that looks like the car swerving left and right. My ABS light has been on for a while as well as the (!) to the left of the ABS light. And the brake light. These have always been on for the last few months.
6. I've noticed that pressing the brake doesn't cause any relay to make a sound. However, connecting 12 volts of power to any of the brake lights turns all of them on and causes a relay to make a noise.
7. I can't check the check engine light right now because I lent out my diagnostic tool

What have I tried to do to repair this problem?

1. I immediately thought that perhaps I had touched the wrong wires for too long and had broken a fuse. But the fuse is perfectly fine. I replaced it anyway but it didn't change anything.
2. That's when I noticed the brake not being able to put my car into drive. Then I thought maybe my car didn't see me pressing the brake pad at all and perhaps I had shorted the brake switch somehow. I got a brake switch from a junked Prius and installing it has made no difference at all.
3. I replaced any relays having to do with the ABS system and nothing has changed.

Does anyone have any idea what's happening here?


What I did (in story form):

I failed my last inspection because they noticed that my third LED brake light located on the hatchback wasn't working. They said a new one from the factory is $400 plus installation.

I quickly found out that disconnecting the light and adding my own 12 volt power source made it light up. So, the car wasn't providing power to this light when pressing the brakes. I figured it was much easier to reroute power from one of the other brake lights to this one since they all are on the same fuse anyway.

So I found the connector that powered the passenger side rear brake light (and all other passenger rear lights). I found out that a blue wire on the corner was the only one that had power when my car was off and I was pressing the brakes. I cut the wire and spliced it using a "wire splicing connector" so I needed to do no soldering.

I ran a set of wires from there up to the hatch and right where it needed to be to connect to the third brake light. I connected the wires with two "wire splicing connectors" ajd got the hot and neutral wrong but when I switched them it was okay and all three brake lights lit up when hitting the brakes...but the wires were too long so I had to cut them shorter.

That's where I made a stupid mistake for no reason at all. I decided to use those connectors to connect the original power source wires as well as the new wires. I don't know what came over me. To make matters worse, I didn't remember which of either pairs of wires was positive or negative.

I had forgotten which one was positive or negative many times ... putting them in the wrong order simply did nothing and I would switch them and it would be fine. Not this time.
I was nearly done. I connected them one way and I connected them the other and this time none of the three brake lights would turn on.

Does anyone know what I could have done to my car?



Video of problem:

(The brake lights to absolutely nothing throughout the whole video but I don't have a camera camera pointing at the back of the car)