Doesn't the pat have disc brakes in the rear? That means you just replacing the pads (why would you do rotors already?) isn't going to solve it. Pull the rotors off the rear and I'd expect you to find a tiny drum brake mechanism in there. Hopefully you just need new shoes on that and you'll be fine. If those look ok, then maybe the cable stretched. I've never done it but I'd think behind the drum brake mechanism there would be a place where you can adjust the parking brake cable.

EDIT: I just spotted the bit about you never having done a brake job before. Doing disc brakes is stupid easy, but fixing the parking brake gets more involved. Take apart one side, pull the caliper and then the disc. That should expose the drum brake for the parking brake. The only thing I remember about working on drum brakes is that they are annoying. If looks scary, at this point it's easy to put it back together and drive it to a place like brakes plus.

 

yeah, the parking brake assembly is a pain. If you aren't mechanically inclined, just have someone else do it. I did a parking brake setup on an old eclipse we used to own once....I must have put a spring in the wrong way, made it about 1 block and the driver's side rear tire locked up and I had to drag the vehicle into a parking spot. I took it back apart and the parts were mangled pretty badly. lol After that I completely removed them. Then we got a Jeep! happy ending!

 

Didnt she see the Park brake warning light flashing!!

 

I don't know how she didn't..... :doh:Thankfully its only a parking brake.

 

understand got confused... the Pat needed its brakes done anyway and for some reason in my head this was going to fix it. I'm going to take a look at my service manual tonight and maybe when I do the brakes I'll check and see if i can adjust the cable for the parking brake. I found another forum that shows the adjustment on the backside of the parking brake handle.

 

well I jsut got a call while i was at work that my wife drove the Pat with the parking brake on and now it no longer works...

Mine did the same thing! I have yet to get around to fixing it.