So got the p0500 ABS light and no speedo. Replaced VSS, rear output shaft sensor and checked wiring for breaks all the way up the the male termination point by the battery with positive continuity. Am I to assume at this point the only other thing it can be is the cluster???? Thanks for any help guys.

 

I did some rooting around for ya. There are many questions posted but not many answers! Seem to be relatively common just as you describe. There is a "tone ring" inside the chunk the sensor reads, apparently you can see it through the hole when the sensor is removed. Many replies say to check that it's not broken and all 4 teeth are still on it.
Here is one of the more odd resolutions.
PO500 CODE UPDATE
Well got truck back from the dealer last night. It took them 3 days, but it's fixed. For some reason Ford (according to the dealer) ran VSS signal thru the windshield wiper motor and then to the PCM. They said the printed circuit board on wiper motor shorted out, PCM not getting a signal. Sounds strange to me, but everything is working.

Has anyone heard of this before? Just want to say thanks for the info I got from the forum.

Ron
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'04 F-250 XLT FX4 ex cab 4x4 6.0L PSD Auto 75k miles

Here is some info that may help.

P0500-VSS fault fixed with help of AE
I thought I'd post this up on the chance it might help someone else at a later time...

So my OD light started flashing recently so I used AE to pull the codes and it said P0500-Vehicle Speed Sensor malfunction. The odd thing is that the speedometer was reading correctly and when I switched over to monitor the ABS system the rear speed signal was present.

I 'assumed' the PCM was calculating vehicle speed via some other method such as the front wheel sensors or maybe even the OSS sensor in the trans and was simply feeding that info to the ABS and dash cluster. Assuming things gets me into trouble more times than not because I was dead wrong in this case (but I'll get to that in a moment...).

So, I picked up a spare sensor for $30 and proceeded to change it out. When I crawled under the truck I found damaged wires at the VSS. Looks like the previous owner got happy with a cutting torch and burned the insulation off the wires. So, I fix the wires and did not change out the sensor since I figured it was the wires that caused the fault. I test drive and it worked for a mile or two but then the OD light began flashing again.

So, back under to change the sensor. Test drive and OD light STILL flashing.

Out comes AE again and I road test. In Enhanced Systems, I monitor Vehicle Speed and it sits at dead zero. Switch over to ABS Systems and rear speed sensor shows correctly. I pull over, unplug the connector at the VSS and check again and to my surprise ABS light comes on and rear speed value is zero. Hmmmm....???

So, obviously my assumption earlier was incorrect. I pull out the wiring diagrams and see that the VSS actually feeds the ABS module directly and then it branches off into 7 possible circuits such as the GEM, Overhead Console, PCM, instrument cluster and a few other places. So, ABS has speed, overhead console has speed, instrument has speed.....only item that doesn't have speed is the PCM (hence the P0500 code). The wire color from the ABS to the PCM that provides the speed is grey with black tracer. I might have a break in that wire.

This is when I learn my lesson to beware of modified vehicles. This particular truck has a Banks Brake installed. Step 36 of the installation instructions say to locate the Grey wire with black stripe and install a T-Tap splice for the Computerized Brake Controller module. Turns out that connection is faulty because I gave a tug on the wire and it pulled right out of the T-Tap. Wonderful. At this point I am giving up for the night but I am pretty confident that I found the problem.

 

Very true lots of posts but not many solutions other than what you have posted. I have read and read and searched and searched that's why I was posting hoping someone would have some updates. Thanks for the reply