My wife has a 1994 Grand Cherokee Limited that is in excellent condition. Only 130k orig miles and has been extremely well maintained throughout it's life. Last Halloween some idiot decided to jump a 2 foot ditch in my front yard, clip the back left corner of her WJ. He impaled his F150 on my XJ'x Smittybuilt rear bumper which only ended up with a few scratches, but destroyed his truck We just got her car back from the body shop, and the display panel below the radio is still showing "Rear Lamp Failure." I unhooked the battery and waited about 15min, hooked it back up, and it still shows as soon as you hit the brake pedal. The lights are working fine, and I checked the connections and all is good. Can anyone please tell me how to get rid of this warning so we aren't looking at flashing red warning lights every time we drive?

 

Whenever I reset the PCM (and VIC) on my mom's 94 GC limited, I unhook the battery and leave it unhooked for several hours, works everytime (although many have told me it's unnecessary to leave it unhooked that long.)
I suspect that there is something unhooked in your rear lamp area though, the VIC can be VERY picky over the simplest things.

 

If you have the trailer lighting package, try disconnecting it and plug the two harnesses together, thus bypassing it. It may have been damaged in the accident.

 

Check your third brake light bulbs one could have been knocked loose or burned out

 

WAIT A MINUTE! You've got me confused. Your wife 94 is a ZJ, not a WJ.

The WJ was produced between '99 and '04.

 

Same problem as a lot (most?) GC VICs. I've had two, both had "rear lamp failure" when it wasn't actually a problem. My current GC has the holy trinity, "REAR LAMP FAILURE," "COOLANT SENSOR BAD," and "SERVICE 4WD SWITCH"

So as far as fixing it... there are several helpful threads on here and jeepforum.com that talk about fixing the problem--which is bad solders on the circuit board for the VIC. Seems to be pretty easy for people with the tools to do it.

I don't have the right tools, so I've learned just to ignore it.