Free-wheel Hub Light Blinking.

[oldblue]

Prado or Landcruiser, Any one had this problem, Intermitant, Not related to going to fast and trying to engage the hubs, but when going at any speed.

[BIGK]

i know the green light you mean..
is it a 1kzte? checked fault codes? still got the electric hubs connected or have manual ones?

[xorph]

this is exactly what happened to me in the 2 weeks before my front hub disintegrated on the motorway!
I assume (with mine) the bearing preload slackened off and caused the brushes to also begin to fail, before the bearing exploded.
I may be speaking out my arse here, but when i was taking it to peices I was trying to figure out how the hell it worked, more specifically, how the 4wd computer got feedback on whether the hub was engaged or disengaged or faulty, because it only has 2 wires going to it. Only conclusion I could come up with is the computer measured the current draw of the hub motor through the circuit and possibly the resistance. It then uses logic to work out if it has locked (a timed period of meduim current draw followed by maximum draw denoting it has reached locked pos) or faulty (resistance in circuit goes infinate)

when i took the hub apart, i could see the little motor that drives the hub gear and decided to press the hub lock button.
the motor spun for a few secs, stopped and then spun again, and did this 3 times before giving up and then flashing the hub light.

I replaced both hubs with old Aisin free wheels now and it flashes all the time.

Id quite like to discover the truth behind this gizmo!
In the mean time you might just want to check your hub preload

[oldblue]

There is no connection between the hub motors and the hub light. The hub motors can be disconected [ as in fitting manual hubs ] and also the hub switch can be off and the light is still blinking all of the time.
Light will go off if you press the hub switch on and off couple of times.
Hope this makes sence

[xorph]

Ill try pressing it on and off a couple times actually, the flashing starts to get annoying.
the point i was trying to make is that somehow the 4wd computer knows if you unplug the clip. there is only the neccesary 2 wires going into the hub for a reversable dc motor, and no other sensors at all, but it has some smarts and somehow it knows if it has failed to engage. Its the same with the difflocks, they flash for ages until they go 'clack!' except they must use limit switches cos they have more wires.

The flashing must indicate one or both hubs have failed to engage.
I forgot to mention that on the morning of the day my hub fell apart I noticed that the left front hub was not engaging. I knew it was this hub because with front diff lock the right front would spin, but not the left and I just assumed that finally my brushes had packed it in and I was going to contact you and ask about converting it to manual

[oldblue]

In the past 3 years I have converted 46 sets of electric hubs and only heard of this problem 2 times, It is a problem that is not connected to changeing from electric to manual, and with the electric hubs removed the hub light still works as normal.

[Highway]

Funny you mention this... I have the "oldblue" electric to manual converted hubs and have had this happpen once... sometime ago.

I manually engaged the hubs and was driving on the road when I remembered I'd not pressed the hub switch (to turn the light on) so I pressed it. Hub light flashed. I turned it off. Stopped. Pressed the button again and the hub light came on as it should, not flashing.

I just thought it was becasue I was doing 70km at the time.

It's never done it again.

[oldblue]

Yes, this a how it should be, the ECU for the hubs receives a signal from the speedo that you are doing more than approx 10Kph and won't let the electric hubs enguage. just think of the damage if they did enguage at 70Kph