Safe Speed Forums

OK, I thought I'd post about this and see what everyone's views are.

For a few weeks now, I've been driving a car with an electric handbrake. (yes, for the man who has everything and is too wimpy to pull on a stick)!

I have to say that I have very mixed feelings about it. Dusty, eat your heart out (and Abercrombie if you're still around, mate)! This is an absolutely gratuitous orgy of techicrap! The last bastion of sanity - a stick, a cable, and some levers, swept away by some switchgear, a computer controller, and some electric actuators!

In its simplest form, it can work like a handbrake. (OK, a handbrake with absolutely no "feel" to it)! Pull the switch once and it comes on, pull it again and it comes off. However, if you choose "full automatic" mode, you can virtually forget you've got a hanbrake! it comes on when you turn the ignition off. When you want to pull away, you just drive off. As it senses the revs rising and the clutch being raised, it just takes itself off automatically. If you stop facing UP a hill (but not down a hill) it won't release for a second or so after taking your foot off the footbrake, to give you a chance to get your feet sorted out before rolling back into the car behind you. Oh, and if you try to do a handbrake turn...

...the car will just stop, in a controlled fashion, with no drama

Have I sold the idea yet???

No thanks!!!...

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

Have you tried reversing down a slope with it in automatic mode? My Smart has hill start assist and if you are easing it backwards, down a drive for instance, every time the brakes bring it to the briefest stop it engages and hold the car for a couple of seconds.

At least you can turn it off

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Driving fast is for a particular time and place, I can do it I just only do it occasionally because I am a gentleman.
- James May

righto.. lets be careful here.... hill start assist and/or auto hold type features are usually done with the hydraulic brakes using the ABS/ESP pump not necessaril linked to the park brake.

as to mr mole's experience, they should be seamless, sadly many aren't..... dare i ask what the vehicle is (in case it's one of ours )?

Ah! You could have a point there! Now you come to mention it, I can't remember whether I've heard the actuator(s) whirring as the brakes release on the hill-hold feature. I shall check tomorrow and report back! If I said it was French, would that be too coy?

Next question (because the manufacturer isn't in a hurry to tell me!) How does it know you're facing up-hill and not down-hill? It really doesn't need much of a slope!

I've got this system on my X5. It works on the hydraulics normally, only reverting to mechanical actuator when parked and the engine is off. The transition is reasonably good but not completely seamless - there is a little lurch on hills. It actually works quite well in traffic to save holding the automatic on the footbrake all the time. As for hillstarts ... it's auto. I dont' really want to do handbrake turns in a 2.5 tonne 4x4....

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

French isn't quite specific enough ... and if it's ours then i'm not answering the 2nd question (it's not exactly difficult to guess mind)!

Our new astra pool cars have as pretty basic cable puller electric park brake on, i've already managed to get it to stall the car by not releasing on pull away

Yes, I did try it this morning and you're quite right, the hill hold is silent. It has nothing to do with the actuators on the rear wheels! Not sure what you mean by "seamless" though?

Whether or not I "like" it is a different matter. At present, I'm still in the situation where I'm reluctant to trust it. I also sometimes forget I've got it, so on very gentle slopes, I take my foot off the brake after coming to a halt, find the car doesn't move, and then get a shock a cople of seconds later when it starts to roll backwards! OK, poor driving practice, I admit, but hey, that's life! The problem is that left to my own devices I usually buy 10+ year old cars for hundreds of pounds. Such cars are obviously out of warranty and I just think of the grief (and expense) of changing a worn-out actuator, so I tend to use the handbrake even less than I do in a conventional car! Added to that, there's something reassuring about heaving on a stick when you're parked on a slope, and knowing how "hard" you've put the handbrake on. This electric one seems to have two settings - "some" and "all" - denoted by a change in note and longer duration of the whirring noise. I tend to leave it in gear as well, on any kind of slope - just to be sure though!

Tried it this morning. The hill hold function seems to be disabled if reverse gear is selected. If I coast backwards in a forward gear or neutral, it does just what you describe, but if I coast down in reverse, it won't.

One of the big problems with electric parking brakes is how they interface with the hydraulic brakes on the vehicle. This is what people are talking about when "seamless" is mentioned.

For example, if you drive up, park on a hill and put the electronic brake on, you are actually applying a "virtual handbrake" based on the hydraulic braking system. When you switch the engine off, the system changes over to a mechanically actuated brake (you can hear the actuator run). This changeover generally causes a "lurch" (a few cm. movement in the vehicle).

In reality, I just put mine in P and this automatically activates the parking brake system and no intervention is required from me.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

on some vehicles.....mostly top end.

Yeah, my "pikey-spec" one definitely applies the handbrake if you ask it to - on a hill or otherwise. If you DON'T ask it to, then the ABS pump seems to do the "hill hold" thing for you (transiently) whether you've asked it to or not - but only if you apply the footbrake and then release it. If I DO apply the handbrake, it then won't release it unless I either drive off, or put my foot on the footbrake. I have experienced the "lurch" on occasions. I put that down to the footbrake working on all 4 wheels and the handbrake only working on the back two, so as I release the footbrake, it will try to hold the weight on just two wheels, causing the suspension bushes to wind up a bit more on the rear axle, which lets the car move an inch or so. To be honest, that's no worse than on a conventional car though.

Just swapped the Pug for a Renault with an electric handbrake.

Most of the time it's OK, you pull the switch when you want it on and it comes off automatically. It also has no ignition key and the card entry system works on proximity so you don't even have to push a button on the remote to unlock the doors. Just walk up to the car, open the door (which you still have to do manually ), sit down, press the start button (keys still in pocket), put it in gear and drive off .... with a feeling you have missed something.

I seem to have a problem reversing up my drive into the garage, it takes the brake off before I've found the bite point on the clutch but that's just a matter of getting used to the car. Not funny when you select 6th instead of reverse though. (not used to there being a gear there).

The Citroen C4 system is worse, it is totally automatic, it applies or not as it sees fit (or you can override it with a big button on the dash).

I have (for scientific purposes only) driven a Prius, and assumed, as I couldn't see an obvious handbrake lever and there was a big P button on the dash, that it had an electric handbrake. They are not very economical when you drive them with the (foot operated) handbrake on.

I'm sorry but .... what's the point?
The old saying springs to mind: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it"

I was a passenger in one some while ago, and my first thought was "this is all very sexy stuff, but in 10 years time, when the car's done 100K, how much of this stuff is still going to work?
My 13 year old passat with 180k on it has an "old fashioned" handbrake and ... it works! It stops me rolling down hills and, when I release it, allows the car to move freely. Sorted.

It seems to me that these (french?) car makers are inventing stuff for the hell of it, when it actually isn't necessary.

Same applies to those pain-in-the-a$$ indicator switches being fitted to new(ish) vauxhalls. Completely threw me first time I drove one! Again, my old passat has a switch that goes clunk and it, like the handbrake, works!

I bet you also have a kettle that you put on a gas ring. These electric ones are just plain unecessary.

It is actually quite likely that the electric parking brake will have better reliability than a mechanical one as there are less moving parts to stick, freeze, wear etc.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

I thought Aston's park brake's were renowned for not working very well
(malcom?)

Ha, Ha.

The Aston parking brake is a manual type located on the outside of the driver's seat near the sill. It is designed so that the handle drops to the down position when the brake is both on and off (so you can get in and out easily). It works just about as well as other handbrakes - i.e. not very well - as it operates on a separate set of pads on the rear discs.

I just put the car in "P" most of the time.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

I'm pretty torn, to be honest. It's certainly convenient, MOST of the time! I get to where I'm going, turn the engine off, and the handbrake applies itself. I drive off, it takes itself off. Hill starts are a breeze, AND I get a cubby box betwen the front seats big enough to put a small child in! In fact, it's only when I get back in my own (old) car or my wife's car that I realise how "convenient" it makes things! Of course, when I'm cursing and swearing with a flat battery in winter and I have to get the spanners out to release it before I can even bump start the car, I might think differently! When it's 10 years old and the warranty is a distant memory and I'm stood in the dealership saying "you want HOW much???!!! " as I try to buy a replacement actuator, I probably won't think it's quite so "convenient"!

I think one reason manufacturers are going over to them is because it makes it easier to pass the braking test. You need to be able to stop on the hendbrake, at a certain rate, fully-loaded, without having to apply more than a certain force on the lever. As friction materials get harder and harder, that becomes quite difficult. With a leccy handbrake, you only need your little finger. I suspect there are also benefits to the electronic stability control system if the "computer" can over-ride (or apply) it at will.

I can clearly see that a key is an improvement over the starting handle and that that live suspension is better than 'direct' (was it called) ... but is the handbrake better with electronics?
Does it take away ? certainly for all car control it does ... even to stop on ice I am regularly told by some rally people I know that they swear by handbrake stopping in ice if all else fails, and that is one the road.
I can totally appreciate that in a decent vehicle that has many facilities to aid road holding and little or no desire to have full driver car control that one may easily question it's requirement to be a hand operated device.

We do all tend to buck at changes initially, but is it safer and better ?
I know I like my cars simple and under my control as much as possible but then I like to know that I can have full use of every available facility if necessary.
A rare requirement perhaps, but one that I'd rather retain that option, but then since I am unlikely to be buying a new modern vehicle any-time soon, I guess I am unlikely to be without one from quite some time, by which time it will either have lost favour, or been totally re-invented and revamped.
Perhaps it could still have an old cable link if you so wanted it ? Is that possible ?

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

Well, if I was shopping with my own money, I'd probably go for the conventional handbrake, but mainly because of the maintenance and complexity issue, rather than the "control" issue. One of the downsides is that because it's a switch, it has no "feel", so I can't tell how hard it is applied. I'm sure it actually applies it every bit as hard as a person could, but I'm always left with the nagging doubt. at least with a lever and cable you can feel how hard it's on. As a result, I find myself not trusting it and leaving it in gear more than I normally would.

In other respects though, I must admit I'm getting used to it!