2011 Jeep Wrangler (JK) Reverse Lamp Sensor Replacement

For months the reverse lights on my Jeep had been flickering. It was one of those problems that you know you have to fix, but somehow just can’t find the motivation to tackle. Spring and summer came and went with essentially no progress towards my goal. Frankly, it was starting to get embarrassing (and potentially unsafe) to be seen driving down the highway at night with my reverse lights randomly turning on and off, flickering, staying on for sometimes many miles, and making strange flash patterns as I drove over bumps in the road.

Fall, and finally winter arrive. What better time to work on the Jeep? I think to myself. See, Joseph and I have this problem of always working on the Jeep over winter break. I suppose it’s because that’s typically when neither of us are preoccupied with classes and we just get too much time on our hands. At some point during the first week of January I decided it was time we fix this issue once and for all. Just as we were finishing up with the installation of the restored rock rails, I ask Joseph to help me with just one more thing. I wanted to remove the trailer wiring harness, because I was under the impression that was causing a ground fault somewhere and thus triggering the reverse lights to flicker. We remove the wiring harness, and are quickly faced with a new problem. The wiring harness was not the issue. In fact, we now think it’s got something to do with whatever actually senses that the Jeep is in reverse.

Joseph decides to try moving the shifter into and out of reverse, and while that seemed to have an effect on the lights, we determined it was when the shifter moved into or out of any gear and not just reverse. After a lot of Googling we were able to identify the location of the “reverse lamp sensor”. Not only was the sensor easily accessible from under the car, it was only secured in place with a single bolt. We quickly removed the bolt and disconnected the wiring running to the sensor. We had thought the sensor would be removed effortlessly, but alas, as with so many Jeep related projects that would just be too easy. Long story short, we snapped the sensor clean off the transmission housing. And the internal spring and ball of the sensor went flying. Now we were faced with a new problem. There was now a clear opening from the outside directly into my transmission, making the Jeep undriveable (or so we thought).