Shift lever stuck in park and no brake lights.

[jza80king]

Hello everyone, as the title states my car is stuck in park and my brake lights are not working. it is a 92 auto, before I get smart a** responses no I'm not doing a 5 speed swap. I did search on here as well as other online resources and I checked the fuses underneath the steering wheel in the panel as well as the fuse box in the engine bay and the fuses and relays look fine. I thought my brake switch which engages and disengages when you press the brake pedal was bad so I replaced it with a new switch but I still have no brake lights and my car will not move out of park still. I removed the center console and looked closely at the shifter lever and noticed that something isn't engaging in the shifting mechanism so this prohibits the shifter to be moved. I am able to manually move the mechanism and at that point I can move the lever from park to reverse to neutral to drive as normal however only when I manually move the mechanism at the bottom of the shift lever. At this point I'm stumped, can anyone help me out?

[SoundEfx]

I'm not 100% sure, but it sounds as if your 'shift lock out' might have gone bad.
Meaning, in an auto, you have to step on the brake before you can shift out of park. So it seems that system is broken.

Check the fsm for your car and you should find what is exactly wrong.

[jza80king]

I actually have looked in the FSM in the AT section but I don't recall a shift lock out. I saw something called the inhibitor switch I think but that was about the time I posted here. Can you elaborate?

[jza80king]

Did a little more digging, I looked up what you said and I am thinking the Control ASSY Shift lock part # 28450 40F02 might be the issue. Will be updating as soon as I can. $93 part so I want to verify before I start buying anything.

[jza80king]

ok, so after more testing I think I have pin pointed the issue. A fuse was blown but it wasn't showing any physical signs. I swapped the bad 15a fuse for the tail lights and put a new one in and it worked. Thank god the shift lock control unit and shift solenoid were ok. Car is up and running like normal again so i will keep an eye on the fuses and hopefully I don't have anymore fuses go out. If that happens I will have to take the car in somewhere to have the tail light wiring checked, possibly grounding issues?

[jza80king]

god dammit, I seem to have some sort of short or grounding issue with the brake lights. I keep blowing the 15amp fuse but it is completely random. Drove just fine for about 1 week and then all of a sudden the fuse blew and I could not move outta park. I keep a set of spare fuses so I was able to swap it out and drive again but I am going to try to find the break in the wire or see where it's exposed and make sure the grounds are all good as well as check bulbs again. Every time I brake, my rear defrost button light comes on as well. f*** electrical gremlins

[jza80king]

Can I get some help here? Please read/see below..

so I removed the back panels to get to the tail lights. I went ahead and replaced all the bulbs with new 1157 or 1156 as it indicates. I added a little coat of di-electric grease to each bulb as well. I think I may have found the problem. The rear side marker on the passenger side looks like it has a good amount of corrosion and the wire seemed a little loose. I bought some electric cleaner spray specifically for connections and took a small brush and cleaned off the corrosion. I also cut the wire that seemed loose on the butt-connector and re-spliced it and then put a heat shrink cover on the wire to protect it better as well. Finished the job off with electric tape around the wires and put everything back together. The 15AMP fuse doesn't immediately blow, it happens randomly so I'll keep an eye on it and will provide updates.

Also guys I have a harness in the drivers side rear panel inside that compartment where you access the car stereo antenna that is not plugged into to anything. Can anyone help me in figuring out where this goes? I only have this female plug and no male plugs to connect to, I ended up taping it up with electric tape and it's tucked away. Please see my pics

What the hell are these and where do they plug into?


another of the dangling harness/plug. What is it for and where does it go?





Here are some pics of the side marker w/corrosion from BEFORE I cleaned everything up.



Female part of the plug with corrosion


Male part of plug with corrosion

[jza80king]

Anyone? I'm trying to find out what the plug/harness I found in the driver's side compartment where the side marker is (see 1st two pictures above). Can anyone check to see if that goes to the rear wiper? My 240sx is a base model so I do not have a rear wiper.

[SoundEfx]

Sorry man.
If I had a S13 I would have helped.

Hope you found your fix though.