Chevrolet: 2000 malibu, the parking brake chime and dash light are flashing and sounding the warning all the time

On Jan 13, 10:15*am, com wrote: 

Try to get the parking switch to operate. Stomp on the parking brake
and set and unset it several times. That may get
the detect switch to operate. If that doesn't work, see if you can
find the switch and either replace it or try to make it
work.

My son's 2000 malibu with only 60k miles on it, the dash is like a
lit up christmas tree. He put tapes over some of the blinking
lights. He got used to the chime going all the time for the last 2
years. It drives his wife nuts though, and bad publicity for their
friends re GM product.



On Fri, 21 Jan 2011 18:37:18 -0800 (PST), russg
<net> wrote:
 

Finally had a few hours and removed the switch, no more problem. This
switch is ill designed, obviously it was replaced before, as I found
the broken parts off two switches under the carpet.



On Thu, 13 Jan 2011 07:15:32 -0800, com wrote:
 

 

I did the oil change, checked the coolant and noticed scum on inside
of coolant fill cap, stuck my finger inside and the finger was covered
in oil!

The drained used oil was black and normal looking.

HELP.



My friend found this somewhere. I can't believe the problems with
this car. The intake manifold gasket was changed at 30000miles, now
the HEADGASKET????


Head gasket failure 3.1 / 3.4 / 3.8 GM engines.

--Scum on inside of coolant cap, and oil in the coolant tank

-- at first the leak is during the combustion stroke, oil with
some combustion gases enter the coolant system. (this must be the
state you are at).

Later, as the head gasket continues to fail and the passage opens up
, then
coolant will enter the piston, and cause steamy exhaust, excessive
gasses in the coolant can damage rad hoses and radiator.


-- can be checked at the dealer with a device the detects combustion
gases in the coolant.


-- if test is positive then both heads are removed, and tested and
shaved for flat, then reassembled with new head gaskets, and new
manifold gaskets.



This is an expensive repair, running in the ??/ well over a thousand
dollars I'm sure. The car is probably scrap, even so it looks like
new.

Its a do-able repair at home, but will take 3 days with a wait time
for the heads to come back from the shop. Probably a week at least.

On Wed, 23 Mar 2011 10:13:30 -0700, com wrote:
 

Finally convinced him to fix it. So we took out the computer to get
to the parking brake switch under the dash, and removed the switch.
The switch has a long brass activator arm which has a sharp bend that
becomes a stress point and breaks off. so we figured, no point
putting another one in, as it would also break off, since the design
is so poor.



This fixed the parking brake chime and warning light., It is no
more.


On Tue, 08 Mar 2011 16:58:41 -0800, com wrote: