OT: Brakes seizing on electric cars? (2024 Update)

[RosemontCrest]

Please understand that you are feeding a village idiot who is simply trolling for attention.

[Dave Plowman (News]

Seems to be pretty common these days. But not on (very) high performance cars. They seem to stick with multiple pistons.

[NY]

I've never driven a car with one (I would avoid them like the plague) but I've heard that it takes a second or so to apply and release the handbrake. This makes it very difficult to hold the car on the handbrake briefly while "changing feet" to do a hill start on an uphill gradient. I am used to coordinating hand and feet movements: 1) apply handbrake, 2) move foot from footbrake to accelerator, 3) bring clutch up to bite point and apply power,

4) release handbrake, increase power and let clutch up. It sounds a right performance but it's one of those skills that you learn on the test, practice until you've got it right, and forever after can do in an instant without having to think about it. OK, so doing it on a 1:3 hill when the car in front has stalled takes a *little* more thinking about, but I can still do it without rolling back. (*)

But if I had to wait for the handbrake to apply and release, it would be painful. I know a lot of cars have "hill start assist" which prevents the car rolling back but still allows it to be driven forwards, but I've never had the courage to rely on in for real.

(*) Rosedale Chimney, 1:3 hill in North Yorkshire a few miles from Hutton-le-Hole. Car in front seemed to be dawdling a bit on the foothill, so I dropped back a bit in case he happened to run into difficulties. Sure enough he stalled on one of the hairpin bends. Even in first gear with no throttle, I realised I was going to catch up with him soon, before he'd got going. So I stopped short (to allow for him to roll back) and sure enough he did roll - three times. I flashed my reversing lights and the cars behind got the message and rolled back to give me even more room than I'd already left. Eventually I had to get out and offer to drive his car to the top - which he gratefully accepted. Luckily the people behind realised what had happened and waited patiently. The guy was a bit gobsmacked when I got into an unfamiliar (to me) car, did a quick "is it petrol or diesel?" check to see how much throttle I'd need, and set off smoothly without rolling back. I then had to run back down the hill to my car and we all set off. Earned a few brownie points that day!

[Jim Joyce]

I don't think I've used a handbrake more than once or twice in 40-50 years, so it wouldn't matter much to me. The last time that I remember was in 1980 when I was living in Germany. The road to my village ended with a 1.6km fairly steep downhill section so one winter day I decided to use the handbrake to lock the rear wheels and descend the hill in a mile-long skid. Fun, but pointless, and the damaged house at the bottom of the hill was testament to the risk involved. A delivery truck had embedded itself into the house, up to its windshield, the summer before.

Too many steps to that procedure, IMHO. As a kid, I learned to do it without the handbrake steps. Like you said, after a bit it becomes second nature and you do it without having the car roll back.

I've had quite a few similar experiences, but mine mostly involved snow or ice covered roads, with a few muddy roads, as well. People who didn't grow up under those conditions seem to think that spinning the wheels at ever higher speeds will somehow result in moving the car forward or backward, when just the opposite is true. When they declare "I'm stuck!", I offer to get in and drive their car out. I enjoy their looks of amazement as I hand the vehicle back to them.

[Michael Chare]

Well to stupid to realize that if the pads are stuck to the disks as often happens if the car is left after washing, the car does not want to move, whereas if piston is stuck in the caliper the car quite likely won't want to stop. If you take a car to a garage you usually get a bill which states what work was done.

[NY]

I've not driven *much* on snow and ice - I'm sure it was a lot more snowy when I was growing up - but I know enough to use the minimum road-wheel speed possible when setting off. In my diesel car, which will set off in first with no throttle pressure, if I think there's going to be a problem, I keep my foot off the throttle and let the clutch in very gently, feeling for wheelspin (easy to see because the speedo and rev counter needles suddenly increase).

I have still occasionally been stuck. I parked on a slightly icy road to go for a walk, and when I got back some of the slush had frozen to ice. Even with the wheels turning exceptionally slowly, they would not grip. One wheel had grip but the differential would not supply power to it because the other was spinning. I keep a couple of old pieces of carpet in the boot, so I slid one under the wheel that had no grip, stood on it to anchor it to the ground and got my wife to drive off - which worked a treat. When there is very thin ice, I suppose that spinning the wheels might generate enough heat to melt the ice until the wheel descends to tarmac, allow the car to *start* moving, even if it then encounters ice as it moves off the hot spot. But on anything else - eg thick snow - you'd be digging a grave for your car! I have fond memories of staying at my parents' holiday cottage in the dales. Both approaches to the village involve steep hills - either uphill or else downhill. I have memories of inching down the downhill gradient, hoping that I'd be able to negotiate the 90-degree bend at the bottom and wouldn't have to chicken out onto the straight-on farm track. Once the car started to slide - it took a lot of will power to *release* the brakes to let the wheels regain a grip and then *gently* apply the brakes again - that car was before the days of ABS which would have done the job for me.

Pointing the front wheels at an angle when setting off can sometimes help, as can repeatedly applying and releasing power (though I've never made the latter work for me).

My most embarrassing experience was when I parked on a muddy verge (no snow/ice) and when I came back, the front wheel slithered sideways towards a ditch, even with very slow wheel speed as soon as I detected spinning. It took several guys to help me push the car sideways away from the ditch as my wife set off very slowly, and the carpet mats came in useful there, though it was difficult to find anywhere to "anchor" them to the ground to stop them flying backwards.

The funniest was when I went to see a customer (on a side road near the bottom of Rosedale Chimney which I mentioned earlier) and he's had some building work done which had left a bit of soft ground that one wheel got stuck in. Luckily a neighbour saw and tried to tow me out with his 4x4, but his tow-rope broke. So the guy who I'd gone to see went to find a substitute - and came back with... a hosepipe! ;-) I'd visions of the plastic pipe stretching like an elastic band. How I and the towing guy kept our faces straight is a miracle. Luckily the towing chap had a strong chain back home, and that did the job. We agreed that I wouldn't apply any power, and I'd let his 4x4 do all the work, for fear of my wheels suddenly hitting solid ground and my car flying into his.

[Michael Chare]

When I change some pads I had to remove the caliper so that I could use a special tool to push the piston back. The bolts holding the caliper were very tight. I did notice someone on a youtube video using a very long breaker bar.

[Michael Chare]

I remember watching Greyhound bust drivers doing that 55 years ago, the did roll back a little. I keep my toe on the foot brake and use my heel to press the accelerator.

[NY]

I learned to drive on my mum's little Renault and that had such a small petrol engine that if you brought the clutch up to the bite point so the car didn't roll back, the engine would stall with no accelerator (ie until I'd moved my foot from the footbrake to the accelerator). So I got into the habit of always using the handbrake to hold the car during that time, as I was taught for the driving test, and I still do it even in modern diesel cars which have enough torque to allow the clutch to slip and hold the car stationary, with no throttle.

I soon dropped some of the other pedantic things that the driving test teaches you, like applying the handbrake after every forward and backward cycle of a three-point turn, and changing down through every gear when braking to a halt. When I took my advanced test about 10 years after the normal test, *not* changing down gear-by-gear was normal IAM practice - and that's what I do nowadays: brake almost to a halt in 6th gear and then go straight into whatever gear I need to accelerate out of the hazard once I see whether or not I need to stop completely at the give-way line. I gather that the normal test has now abandoned the change-down-through-every-gear advice. My nephews were saying that they were told not to change down at all when going down a steep hill, but to rely *only* on the brakes, without the assistance of engine braking. I'm talking about a long 1:3 hill, not every puny 1:100 slight slope.

One useful trick that my IAM "observer" (instructor) taught me was to get into the habit of always waggling the gear lever from side to side just before starting the engine or turning it off. If the car is in gear, the lever won't move and I'll know that I have to put it in neutral (or press the clutch) before starting, and I'll know I can't just let the clutch up blindly after stopping and as I'm about to turn off. Saves the embarrassing (and maybe costly) mistake of the car unexpectedly lurching forward.

[Rod Speed]

Fark, we never had anything like that and I have been driving for longer than you have.

Or that either.

Mine wont let you start the engine without the foot on the clutch.

[Ralph Mowery]

Around 1966 I almost backed the grocery store managers car throught the store door. I did not think it was a 3 speed on the colume. He had backed it near the door after the store closed for the night. He told me to load his groceries and then move his car to a parking space. I got behind the wheel and without even thinking or looking turned the swithch. The car jumped back about 3 feet before I could let go.

It was not as If I did not know how to drive a stick as that is what I took my drivers ed in. Dad had a truck with a 3 on the colume that I sometimes drove.

A few years later I bought a car with a 4 speed. drove it about 3 years and then got an automatic. Had it about 2 years and someone ran a stop sign and I ran into them. Was not going but about 30 mph but it hit the front of my car, then I went sideways and then the rear end hit. There was not that bad of a wreck however almost all the sheet metel was damaged so it was totaled by the insurance company.

I bought another 4 speed and had driven it for several days. Needed to fill it up for the first time. Tried to start it and it would not start. Service station man told me to push in the clutch. It started. Up to that time I guess that I had been doing it, but I always wiggled the 4 speeds to make sure they were in neutral. That 1972 was the first I ran into that had the safety switch on the clutch.

[Dave Liquorice]

Just have to relearn the relative timings of the actions.

Takes a bit of getting used to but works resonably well. The system on my car doesn't use the (electric) parking brake, it releases the foot brake pressure gradually.

Two niggles I have with the system on mine is that it's easier to stall because you have to guess the amount of "go" to give the engine rather than balance "go" and clutch slip as you release the parking brake. Also I haven't quite worked out under what conditions it is going to "assist" me. I think it has an angle sensor so any obvious slope it will but at shallow angles, but still enough to roll back, it sometimes doesn't. I think it's associated with clutch and gear, ie you need to brake to halt, hold the car on the foot brake, select neutral and let the clutch up.

[Dave Liquorice]

Well I guess modern braking systems are better than they were but I wonder how much is down to the fact that changing down to slow down doesn't put your brake lights on so the half asleep person behind you doesn't notice... Same with holding the car on the foot brake when stopped in traffic.

Modern brakes still fade and you don't get much warning. BTDTGTTS. OK it was a "sprited" decent of Hartside to Melmerby (approx 1200' decent in under 4 miles) which is a great driving road when you know it. After that experience I use the gears to limit decent speed with the brakes as a fine trim.

[Andy Burns]

My car does brake disc "wiping" to ensure discs are dry when it's raining, no reason the electric car can't occasionally do the same to stop the calipers/pistons seizing.

[Xeno]

Just because an electric car has *regenerative braking*, do not assume that the *service brakes* will never be used. In fact, they will always be used in circumstances involving slow speed manoeuvres since the regen braking will be virtually useless under such conditions.

I suggest you go for a drive in an electric car and see just how often you will be mashing that brake pedal.

[Max Demian]

I used to do that on my Mk 1 Escort by holding my left foot on the brake pedal after going through a puddle (or even in heavy rain). Then I tested it with a quick stab with my right to check the brakes worked and didn't pull to the left or right.

[Vir Campestris]

A few years back I had a rental Renault in Tenerife with one. I may have been doing it wrong... but... I think what you were supposed to do was just drive off. The car would then release the handbrake, and away you went. (No handbook of course, and I couldn't really ask the rental people, I speak almost no Spanish and they spoke almost no English)

All was well until we stopped on a steep uphill.

The car slipped back a little, then wound the handbrake on harder all by itself.

When the lights changed I drove off. Or tried to - the handbrake was on so hard that I stalled the engine. I dipped the clutch of course... and then it let the handbrake off.

I hit the footbrake rather quickly!

(Incidentally it had a wheel sensor fault. Once or twice the ABS light came one, and then once the speedo suddenly dropped to zero. Aha, I thought, there's a problem with the wheel sensor that feeds the ABS and speedo. Could I explain that when I returned the car? Could I ****.)

Andy

[Commander Kinsey]

I'm not aware of a law requiring me to use the handbrake. Only that you have to have a working one. You;'ll be telling me I must engage it at a traffic light next.

I did park mine on a hill without the handbrake once - as the handbrake was busted (they only last 2 weeks after the MOT anyway - they're operated by a f****ng bicycle cable!). I walked away from the car and a gardener at the house I was visiting shouted "your car's dancing!". It was moving backwards down the hill in spurts of about 4 inches. Presumably the distance travelled with one forced compression of a cylinder. I turned the wheels to the kerb on that hill from then on.

Oh there was a time a long time ago with my first car - a Rover Maestro. Small engine, heavy car. That actually rolled down the hill backwards with it in 1st gear (I was still in it, I was just testing how well it held it). The hill wasn't all that steep either.

[Ralph Mowery]

Not that it probably would make any difference, but I was always told to put the manual into reverse as that gear ratio was the one that was the lowest (highest)ratio and it took more force to move the car with the engine off.

[Commander Kinsey]

And I was always told to put it in the gear that would make it go uphill, causing the engine to rotate the wrong way if it rolled downhill. Harder to turn an engine backwards?

I thought reverse was the same ratio as 1st. I've reversed quite a few cars at full speed (for j-turns), and they go about as fast in reverse as you can go in 1st (about 25mph). I had an auto that would do 50! Autos of that era had no 1st ratio. They had 2, 3, 4, 5. The torque convertor was used to go slower.