well if somebody's so far up your butt that you'll hit them rolling a couple feet, then it's their fault & are liable in most states

 

Actually, my Volt has been 100% perfect since day one - ZERO problems.

If you were alluding to the report of the so called battery fire incident, a few facts are in order. That was one case, which occurred on a crash tested prototype - 30 days after the crash test, and then only when the car was picked up with a fork lift which punctured the battery cells.

Yeah - a real first year design flaw there......................

 

"General Motors Co. is making modifications to the Volt because of a SERIES of fires after test crashes of the plug-in hybrid vehicle. The fires were caused by a coolant leak that occurred when the car's battery pack was punctured during severe side test crashes by NHTSA."

 

Did you happen to read the part about how the crash tested Volts were not properly disposed of before they caught fire?

Electric vehicles and battery electric hybrids have to be handled differently than standard gas engine only vehicles.

 

Does the new Corvette comes with a manual Hand Break
or an Electronic Hand Break - I hate all E-Breaks

 

Electric. Nothing is manual.

 

Lots of talk about electronic parking brakes in the new Top Gear episode. I'm glad they are raising awareness about these silly new e-gadgets.

 

Yes, because Top Gear is the best place to be informed about anything automotive.

 

Neither are forums. But both are good in terms of figuring out the enthusiasts' sentiment.

 

As an old mechanic corrected me decades ago, "Son, trains have emergency brakes, cars have Parking brakes!! It ain't an emergency brake."

 

Wrong. It is (or should be) a redundant device independent of brake hydraulics or battery power, which progressively locks the drive wheels at the driver's command.

 

it's probably called a parking brake so that manuf. don't get sued. It's much easier to make a good parking brake, and you don't want to guarantee emergency features.

 

Fair enough.

 

 

Good luck if you think that a parking brake will stop you in an emergency at 70 mph if you have a complete hydraulic brake failure. There is a reason why the Feds mandated dual hydraulic brake systems in the mid 60's. It will stop you in the distance that it takes a train. You would be better served using both hands on the steering wheel attempting to steer out of trouble or lessen the impact.

 

you are always better off trying to steer around a situation than stop in front of it. but a proper backup brake most certainly will stop you from 70mph or more. if you pull it too hard, obviously you go for a ride (but you are still working the tires to slow you down). but i have prevented several potentially fatal accidents with a mechanical 'parking' brake. three times on track, and at least once on the street that i can recall.

case in point, 08 z06 at heartland park, stock brakes.... they started feeling the slightest bit mushy at the end of one lap, so instead of hitting 155 at the end of the straight, i cruised down at 110 or so to cool everything down. When I eased into the brakes to scrub off about 30mph going into turn 1, the pedal went to the floor and stuck there. Those great z06 brakes did the old 'flex the caliper so hard the pads, pistons, and fluid behind them shot out of the calipers' and I had zero brakes at all. because the brakes are hydraulically isolated diagonally instead of front to rear (gross negligence IMO), i had zero hydraulic brakes at all.

the e brake in the c6 is garbage, largely because of electronic interference with its mechanical application, but it worked well enough to slow me down enough to successfully slalom people, cars, trailers, walls, and small animals and get the car stopped.

many modern cars CAN'T do that and it is a criminally negligent oversight by a bunch of idiot electrical engineers.

 

Engineers engineer. I would not blame it on them, it was a management decision I'm sure of it. The enthusiasts in general also don't seem to realize when a lot of the fun components of the car get deleted. Some folks just buy their sports car to polish it every day.

 

This is what happens on my CTS-V, and it works very, very well.

 

I haven't found a newer thread where all the wrong information in this one gets refuted.

There is park brake hardware in the rear wheel hubs. The only cars that do not have separate park brake hardware are the ones where you need a special turn key to retract the caliper when you change the brakes.

Furthermore, when you have an EPB if you apply it AT SPEED it typically applies the regular hydraulic brakes (like slamming on a brake pedal). Some cars apply them to all 4 wheels, others only apply it to the rear wheels (to mimic the older manual systems). If you hold the switch the hydraulic brakes are used until you get to a very slow speed (under 5 kph) at which point the cable brake is applied.

The EPB has a manual release ON THE MODULE to allow you to in case of no power release the cable brake.

The only thing I want to know is if the at speed braking is 2 wheel or 4 wheel.

 

This thread should have been left dead!