I had my car in the shop Monday to get the lower control arm bushings replaced, and while in there they discovered the drivers side tie rod assembly was shot, so it was replaced (it failed inspection because of it). Afterwards, my DSC light is now stuck on. My TPMS light came on, but I have steel wheels with snow tires without TPMS sensors so that isn't a concern of mine. The DSC light is solid, not flashing or anything, and is always on. I've had an issue where it stays on and then goes away after restarting the car, but this doesn't seem to be the case. I have an alignment appointment in a few hours but I'm not sure if that will fix it? The steering wheels is about 30º off to the right since the alignment is a little out of whack. It drives/tracks ok other than the wheel being off.

 

After your alignment, if the steering wheel is not pointing the same direction as before, you will need to have the steering wheel angle recalibrated. With the wheel off center, the DSC and TPMS cannot function correctly, thus the warning light.
DSC uses the steering wheel angle plus the direction the car is going to determine if it needs to "do something", i.e. apply brakes, slow down the engine. So it thinks you are turning your steering wheel 30 degrees but still going straight. Normally, this would indicate a skid, but based on the other data it has, it assumes the steering angle is wrong and throws a fault code of implausible steering angle and turns itself off.

 

Thanks for the info - that definitely sounds like the issue. I got it aligned yesterday and the light(s) stayed on for a while. I made a few stops but after the 3rd or 4th restart of the car, both the DSC and TPMS lights are off. I am assuming it found there was no more fault and reset itself.

 

You have an '05 MINI, there are no TPMS sensors in the wheels. The TPMS works off from the abs sensors that detect wheel speed. These sensors can go bad.

 

Ah, gotcha. Good to know. I think the sensors are okay - the symptoms sounded just like what Greg_Dr mentioned about the steering wheel being off-center. They re-centered it during the alignment and all seems well, no issues so far coming into work today.

 

Greg was correct.

But the steering angle sensor will not relearn where it is. If the steering angle was off and the sensor needs calibrated you'll have to have the dealer or someone with the MINI software recalibrate it.