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The good news is: other than the chin splitter and some minor plastic bits, my car is undamaged.
The bad news: I had a catastrophic loss of brake function in my '13 Boss 302S today at Laguna Seca entering the Corkscrew. The brakes had been working normally until that point, and braking moderately at my usual spot (the white line on the left shortly before the crest) had worked unremarkably on the previous two laps. The third lap, I pressed the brake and... almost nothing. The pedal was firm, but the car wasn't slowing appreciably. I came over the crest and pressed the brake harder as the car settled, and still ... nothing. My speed was still very high at this point, and I made a split-second decision and turned right into the escape road / gravel trap. The car came off the track and went 3/4 of the way through the gravel trap before coming to a stop (!). It all happened quickly, but it is sobering in retrospect.
Back in the pits, we verified that there was nothing mechanically wrong with the brakes. I contacted my Ford racing connection, and was informed that in some cases with that car's ABS system, if an ABS wheel sensor fails or the wires to the ABS sensor short, the ABS system will go into 'ICE mode' and you lose almost all braking ability. Not good.
So, not sure what to do yet, other than start by using a diagnostic tool to verify the cause of brake failure was indeed a bad ABS sensor. We'll fix the brake issue, but... this incident was unnerving. I'm curious if anyone else has run into this problem with their Mustang (or other vehicle) and if so, what you did to address it?
The bad news: I had a catastrophic loss of brake function in my '13 Boss 302S today at Laguna Seca entering the Corkscrew. The brakes had been working normally until that point, and braking moderately at my usual spot (the white line on the left shortly before the crest) had worked unremarkably on the previous two laps. The third lap, I pressed the brake and... almost nothing. The pedal was firm, but the car wasn't slowing appreciably. I came over the crest and pressed the brake harder as the car settled, and still ... nothing. My speed was still very high at this point, and I made a split-second decision and turned right into the escape road / gravel trap. The car came off the track and went 3/4 of the way through the gravel trap before coming to a stop (!). It all happened quickly, but it is sobering in retrospect.
Back in the pits, we verified that there was nothing mechanically wrong with the brakes. I contacted my Ford racing connection, and was informed that in some cases with that car's ABS system, if an ABS wheel sensor fails or the wires to the ABS sensor short, the ABS system will go into 'ICE mode' and you lose almost all braking ability. Not good.
So, not sure what to do yet, other than start by using a diagnostic tool to verify the cause of brake failure was indeed a bad ABS sensor. We'll fix the brake issue, but... this incident was unnerving. I'm curious if anyone else has run into this problem with their Mustang (or other vehicle) and if so, what you did to address it?