New to Rover and I am working on a friends. He bought it with the 3 brake lights on so ABS is not the problem I am trying to solve yet. His new problem is intermittantly he has a hard pedal. When the brakes do work you get hissing at the pedal. When they do not work they are hard and the traction control light will come on. I am assuming its a bad booster since I can duplicate the tracion control light by pumping the pedal with engine off to let the pressure out.

I see about the only place to get a replacement booster is on Ebay.

My question is since this is not a cheap part new is there a rebuild kit for these. Can't seem to find one. Is a used one my only option. And does this sound like the problem.

 

With the expensive booster

 

You mean the ABS brake pump? See this link: ABS Pump

 

try paul grant he may have one i think he is parting a p-38 now

 

Yesterday I called a place and was directed toward an accumulator possibility.

So many posts point to the brake booster as the issue but a British repair shop says the accumulator.

Question can a accumulator give intermittant issues if the pump is working. We did the discharge and key on test yesterday. It took about 10 to 15 seconds on 3 different test. I read where the system should take up to 45 seconds if the accumulator has a full charge if nitrogen. Say you start the car, brake works fine. Drive for 5 minutes and then apply the brake and have a hard pedal but it recovers and works fine again. I know this could sound like a ABS pump intermittantly not turning on. But I also read if you apply the brake and its hard and the brake light flickers it could be an accumulater. The accumulator is just low. But also the traction control message appears as tho the system is discharged.

So if the brakes were working fine and your driving and the pedal gets hard on the the next push and no leaks can be found, can an accumulator still be at fault.

Thanks for that link on the pump. The link doesnt address intermittant pump failures so its still a guess game at this point.