Dear fellow Fiat drivers.

I have a Fiat Bravo 1.4 from 1997.

Everything is working fine on the car, but recently it has developed a braking issue, which is NOT constant!

When I drive along, and everything is fine with the brakes, then suddenly a metallic tin sound can be heard, it sounds like it is coming from behind the firewall down by my left foot. The sound is like a small tin fan hitting another piece of metal, and when I try to brake, the pedal shudders, like you would expect when pressing the braking pedal all the way down and the ABS system will kick in. But I am not able to fully compress the pedal, when I hear that noise. Then as sudden as the weird tin sound startet, it stops, and I am then able to brake perfectly normal again.

I do not get any warnings (ABS or tracking control) on my dashboard.

Has anyone experienced something similar/same? And are the any obvious faults?

Best regards
Viking1

You just need to strip down the front disc / caliper assembly, and inspect and clean everything. I'm sure it just needs a good check and service.

The light metallic noise you hear could be something loose rubbing against the brake backing plate, this is thin metal and on an older car it is almost certain to have rusted quite a lot. If it is rusty you can remove as much old metal and rust as possible, then treat and paint it. Alternatively you can get new backing plates fitted, but paint them first because the factory finish is not very durable.

The backing plates on my old Tipo rusted away to nothing, but as long as I removed the evidence of rusty metal there was no problem passing the annual MOT inspection.

If you do a proper service on your front brakes check the flexible hoses carefully, they may have cracks. If you get everything working well you should have very good brakes - it's a nice feeling!

Bluejohn125, thank you for your reply. I will try to strip down the front disc assembly and have a look. I called a Fiat garage yesterday, and they said it most likely is the ABS ring located on the drive shaft, that has failed. It will cost between 100-400 pounds to get fixed.

If it is the ABS, clean them first.
Magnetic stuff will collect small metal particles over the time.

And the ring is on the hub, not drivesaft, follow the ABS wires.
Still kinda strange to hear about 1.4 with ABS as the engine was the "cheap" option.

Maybe throw in new brakefluid/flush if it has not been changed in quite a while.