Parking brake will not disengage on 2005 jaguar s type

Hi mike i had the very same problem with my 55 plate s type this morning 4 feb 2009 had driven a journey of 20+ miles at 9am with 4" of snow on the ground and at this point no problems and i would assume the discs and pads would have been toastie hot and the assoc parts ,
but after a quick stop for ten minutes i restarted the car and drove away up a slight incline in snow /slush the rear wheels lost traction and the dsc sybol illuminated on the dash after getting no traction in this mode switched dsc off and managed to get some traction by hook or crook on reaching the major grit treated road and gaining full trction the dsc was re selected
as per normal start up but then i noticed that i had the amber oval warning light on the dash and park brake fault promt on the info lcd .
On stopping the car i tried to switch off the engine and re start to see if this would reset or clear the display
resulting in the car still showing same fault msg and this time unable to select a gear and the gear selector stuck in park

on calling jaguar assist an engineer arrived within a reasonable time with laptop and conections to do a diognostic scan
finding that his pc would not cummnicate with my car following several attemps the engineer went on to get the park brake disengaged by these next two steps and i can only say that this worked sufficently to get the vehicle off the road to a more suitable investigating area
in my case my drive way less than 1/4 mile away

step 1. inside the boot lift the floor to expose spare wheel and battery compartment
then on drivers side, the interior that covers the rear light cluster should be teesed back there are two black fixings that secure this in place one being 1/4 turn the other a full thread plastic nut
once this liner is pulled back (easier with two people )there is a white (PARK BRAKE ) module sat there with a multi plug going in .
this multiplug contains severa wires going into it.
from what the engineer said the two your intrested are clearly fatter than the rest and control the motors that engage parking brake force to the calipers .
now heres the clever bit take 2 peices of wire at least 2 feet long making sure the ignition is off and key out
(this is also where a friend comes in handy )
where the battery is, remove the cover from atop of the live + terminal and place place /hold /secure one wire to each batery terminal this done then carefully touch the exposed other ends of each wire into the little gaps where the individual fat wires go into the multiplug trial and error will do one of two things
1/ nothing and the brake motors will just remain powered to keep brake force applied so by swapping them round should give the desired result in powering the motors to RELEASE breaking force and thus disengage

REAL IMPORTANT NOTE MAKE SURE THE VEHICLE CAN NOT ROLL ,OVER YOU ,OR AWAY ,CHOCK A WHEEL OR TWO WITH SOME THING BLOCK OF WOOD BRICK MOTHER IN LAW YA GET MY DRIFT

so stage one complete but error msg and drive selector still not moving

step 2.
go to
center console where ashtray is ,lift cover to expose cigar lighter
the trim panel that is sheild shaped and surrounds the gear selector should be grasped firmly by placing your four fingertips along the flat top area where it meets the ashtray and prise upwards toward the roof this removes the trim plate without any damage and exposes the Jgate selector linkage and the plastic dust shroud that rotates when various positions are selected .
now on the pasenger side look into the gap that has become visable and a small aprox 1/2" to 3/4 " protrusion with a flat straight lump similar to a slotted screw but in reverse if you get my drift sits on the side of the selector by rotating this button/protrusion with your finger tip or screw driver tip and trying to move the gear selector from its park position this should allow the selector to move down the gate,while the engineer did this in my case i was sat in the drivers seat and had the car held on the foot brake so that the normal protocols of selecting were observed also the engine was running on moving the selector neutral was selected and at no time was park re selected til the vehicle was recovered to my drive way
however whilst driving the car the parkbrake fault warnings were still present and the asssoc beeps were audible .

strangly once we were on my drive the car was re plugged in to diagnostic laptop after the engineer had tried it on the land rover disco he had attended in and this done just to elliminate that his laptop and cables were funcioning correctly which they were ,
my car began to communicate with his machine and a reset was done
the get you out the S**T CHEATS were put back to normal
the PARK BRAKE FAULT warning was cleared and so far so good

its been very intresting to note that all the posts i have read on the web seem to refer to 2005 models and that adverse wheather conditions seem to play there part i was relieved to have this fixed and very grateful to the engineer who was so very helpful and happy to share his wealth of knowledge without which i could not have passed this on

2005 Jaguar S Type Brake Motor Problem

The voltage applied to the electronic Park Brake module is applied at the same time you start the engine,consequently on a very cold day the battery will be far less efficient and due to the extra power required to start a very cold 6 cylinder engine the voltage will fall.
Although this reduced voltage will quite happily start the car it will trip out the Park Brake module,and this can only be reset by specific software.
To help avoid this problem happening again switch the ignition to position 2(position just prior to starting) and press the chrome handbreak tab down while having your foot on the brake.The brakes will be released,the park brake light on the dash will go out and you can now start the car.
On the new XF module the electronic handbrake is not activated by the gear shift as in the later S models so you can start the car and then release the brake when the engine is running..
The earlier S models did not have an electronic hand brake but the standard cable one.

Hi all,
S Type Juguar 05 Reg.
18/01/2010
After the first down pour of the white stuff, and knowing how well our S Types handle in the snow I decided to park mine up until the snow went away.
After a week into the big freeze I went out to just start the car, and let it run awhile to warm the engine up. While doing this I noticed the message on the dash 'Park Brake Fault' and after referring to the Owners Manual I tried to move the car but the park brake wouldn't release.
After speaking to the local Jaguar Dealer who was no help at all, all they could suggest was I call someone out to get the park brake released then get it booked in with them for further inspection (at Jaguar Rates of cause). So I called on the services of my local mobile mechanic and after looking on your web page 'Parking brake will not disengage on 2005 Jaguar' we decided our first cause of action would be to cut off the power supply to the EPB Module by disconnecting the battery and see if that would release the park brake.
After gain access to the battery, and EPB Module I suggested rather than disconnect the battery and possibly interrupt other electrics ie radio codes we should try just pulling the two multi plugs on the EPB module, this I said should have the same affect as disconnecting the battery's. Leave them off for few minutes then reconnect them.
Well it worked!!!!! The park brake disengaged and the fault message has gone. That was four days ago, and fingers crossed the fault hasn't come back. AND THE COST JUST £20, yes £20 for about 30 minuets work.
So if anyone else has the misfortune to have this problem, give it a try.

I had the same problem on my XJ8 L (X350) 2004

I tried the reset procedure, disconnecting the battery, EPB fuses, connecting the battery leads together (away from the battery) and connecting a booster when switching on the ignition, after having made sure already the battery was good and fully charged.

All to no avail, so I:

a) disconnected the car battery and removed fuse 32 from the fuse box next to the battery
b) took out the right hand carpetting in the boot (trunk for any US people) and took the connector off the bottom of the black plastic EPB module (it has 4 thick wires and with brown +ve and black -ve although power supplied through fuse 32)
c) placed a 30amp blade fuse in the slot with the red/white cable wedged with a small crimped copper wire (otherwise it is a loose fit). Spare fuses are in the compartment on the panel at the rear of the boot to the left of centre
d) connected a cable (I stripped a bit of 2.5mm twin&earth) with a normal spade crimp connector to the green/white
e) I used a battery booster to provide 12V and connected -ve to the other side of the 30A fuse and the +ve to the green/white connected cable for a second or two.
You should hear the electric motor run and hopefully the lovely sound of your brakes disengaging!

Although a temporary workaround, disconnecting the battery and/or control module to release the park does not resolve why it became locked-on in the first place. The problem with many many S-types has been a failure of the park brake motor. This starts as an intermittent problem, during which time you'll read countless forum threads suggesting everything from change the battery, change the pads, disconnect the battery, disconnect the ECU and you'll try every one of them. Disconnecting the battery again and again is just as likely to blow a fuse or other ECU, especially on older cars. Then one day after lots of mucking about and false hope it'll fail completely and you'll be cursing. To determine the real problem you'll need the diagnostic codes from the car's in-built system. Jag dealers will charge a fortune for doing this but any garage with an up to date Bosch system will be able to read off the codes for you, eg C1782. You can then diagnose the failing part and get it replaced before you find yourself stranded somewhere.

Hi, I had this problem of frozen park brake yesterday, I removed the right hand internal boot trim (side carpet), located the EPB module which is fixed to the right hand inner wing (either back or white ), disconnect the two multi plugs for a few minutes, plugged them back in again & it worked fine & it cleared the fault message on the dash, hope this helps, Bryan

Do this start the car then you see break light is on dont worry about it just put your feet on the brake pedal & by two finger push up the hand brake up & release it, then change your shift to drive it shout work & you free to go