Poll: Do you use the parking brake all the time, or just when on a slope?
- Thread starter Desiboy
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Daniel M W
Member
I didn't knew that!. In which conditions you noticed that the parking brake turns on automatically?. In my case I engage it if the car tries to roll even a little bit so the weight of the car is not transferred to the "gearbox".
So I would have entered "never" had that been an option.
2002
Well-Known Member
When any car is placed into park it engages the parking pawl, essentially a pin that goes into a gear tooth to keep the car from moving.
Some people worry that the little bit of forward motion that occurs when you release the foot brake after putting a car in park will eventually wear out the parking pawl, so they always set the parking brake/emergency brake prior to releasing the foot brake. Personally I have never done this in any car that I have ever owned, I use the parking brake only when parking on a slope, where in theory it's still not needed but for safety reasons it's better to not be fully relying on the parking pawl to hold the car on the hill, although I would think the odds are relatively slim that the pawl will fail and allow the car to start rolling. It also does put more stress on the pawl when on a slope, but for occasional situations I doubt it is a big deal, but all the time it probably would put more wear on it. I wonder if there are statistics showing that people who live in San Francisco have a higher rate of parking pawl failures?
As for automatic engagement of the parking brake in Clarity, according to the owners manual there are a number of conditions, the primary ones though are if the car is shut off while Brake Hold is engaged, or while LKAS is on. For me that means virtually every time I turn off the car since I always turn on Brake Hold. The only time I turn off Brake Hold is when trying to precision park in a parking lot or in my garage as Brake Hold will not allow you to creep forward an inch at a time. But in those cases I am typically on relatively flat ground anyway so I think the parking pawl is good enough and I don't manually set the parking brake.
I have heard that people in cold climates avoid using the parking brake in freezing weather as it can sometimes freeze and will not release, requiring a tow.
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plus, I like the cool sound it makes too, a bit like moving the flap setting on a jet (35 years ago).fargledaer
New Member
Never because I live on a sand bar in Florida. The only even moderately steep slopes within about 30 miles in any direction are causeways and onramps.
craze1cars
Well-Known Member
This refers to “any car” as long as the car has an automatic transmission. Manual shift cars don’t have a parking pawl. I’m quite certain neither does the Clarity.
I find it unlikely the Clarity has a parking pawl since it lacks a transmission.
I have not yet disassembled mine to confirm.
coutinpe
Active Member
Old habit from when I started learning to drive 50 years ago, they told me I had to always do it. Unsure I would change at this stage of the game...
2002
Well-Known Member
Well yeah manual trannies don't have "Park" so when I said "When any car is placed into park" I meant automatic. Parking pawls on automatics (non-manual in this context) are government mandated, or at least having a mechanism to hold a car on an incline, not engage except at stop or low speed, and meet a requirement for the amount of rollback. Manuals are exempt I suppose since you can effectively do the same thing by leaving it in gear (although we all know how that goes sometimes). As far as I know all automatics including electric cars have a parking pawl, the only exception seems to be Tesla. The Roadster apparently had one but then they came up with a brake caliper that will hold even with loss of electricity and hydraulics so that seems to meet the requirement. Whether Honda does something similar would be interesting to know but I'm guessing they just stuck with the more mundane parking pawl, which they just need an output shaft to install it on.
Interesting that even though we avoid using the word transmission since the Clarity doesn't have one in the traditional sense, the owners manual uses that term, 108 times to be exact (according to Google word count). An example:
"Appears when you try to change the gear position without depressing the brake pedal while the transmission is in P or N"
The manual even uses the terms "gear selection" all over the place. Or like this one where they are describing direct drive "Propulsion is provided by the engine, coupled through the gears to the transmission. This is indicated by the gear icon in the display."
So they chose to use terminology in the manual that is relatable to people even though it could be viewed as technically misleading. But they probably figure those who really want to know will be finding out somewhere else other than the owners manual, which is just trying to explain to the average person how to drive the car.
Richard_arch74
Active Member
craze1cars
Well-Known Member
Well it seems it exists! Wonder where it is...
Thanks!
Thanks!
craze1cars
Well-Known Member
I will comment that from the old days of parking brakes having steel cables and manual linkages and then rusting with age and time....
The parking brake that is never used is the one that will never release when it finally does get used that one fateful time. Crawl underneath and break out the hammer to bang it loose again so it can be driven. Been there. So I do like to “exercise” them periodically in all my cars.
My truck gets the Parking brake activated darn near daily. When towing trailers most of the time and periodically launching boats, I use it all the time. Since Clarity does not do such duties, it pretty much only gets activated when I park it on a hill. Then yes I use it.
The parking brake that is never used is the one that will never release when it finally does get used that one fateful time. Crawl underneath and break out the hammer to bang it loose again so it can be driven. Been there. So I do like to “exercise” them periodically in all my cars.
My truck gets the Parking brake activated darn near daily. When towing trailers most of the time and periodically launching boats, I use it all the time. Since Clarity does not do such duties, it pretty much only gets activated when I park it on a hill. Then yes I use it.
2002
Well-Known Member
If I understand correctly the Clarity parking brake does get automatically activated in a number of different conditions, which the average person will hopefully run into often enough to keep it exercised. But still not a bad idea to manually set it every once in awhile just to be sure.
Actually my parking brake gets manually activated whenever I will be stopped anywhere for a length of time with the car on. I was complaining that there seemed to be no way to turn off the DRL's when parked even though the headlights are turned off. Then someone pointed out that if the parking brake is manually set before turning off the car, then the DRL's will not be on the next time you start the car. The parking brake has to be manually set to do this, the automated parking brake activation sequences won't do it. And it works only that one time, you have to do it anytime you don't want the DRL's to be on. This seems to be a hidden trick purposely built in for that purpose since I can't think of a logical reason why it would otherwise act that way. And I'll bet an unintended consequence is that there are a bunch of people driving around during the day without their DRL's on, the people who always manually set their parking brake before turning off their car.
The Gadgeteer
Active Member
I believe the DRL will activate once the parking brake is released.
Teslawannabe
Active Member
From a mechanical point of view: use it or loose it. Linkages, levers, cables and the like may seize up from lack of use. Even electric motors (case in point, 4x4 transfer case shift motors that never get used sometimes quit working just when you finally go to use them the due to electrical contacts getting dirty and the like).
Yes, having the parking brake set before you start the car (doesn't necessarily have to be before turning it off) keeps the DRLs off (so you can sit in the unmoving car dark if you want), but they turn on as soon as you release the parking brake. As far as I know, there's no way to drive with the DRLs off.
A kid in the class ahead of me at my high school in the 80s parked his car in a lot, got out, and it started rolling -- he ran in front of it to try to stop it, and was crushed to death against a wall. It wasn't a particularly visible slope, and the car wasn't rolling all that fast, per his friends who had to watch that. So I *always* set the parking brake in any car, regardless of the perceived slope. In addition to not liking the car rolling a bit when my kids or others are starting to get out of the car, and any potential stress on the parking pawl, I am a fan of redundancy for things that matter -- like keeping a 4000 pound weight from rolling into me, my kids, my pets, anyone else around, my neighbor's house.
It's just a habit now, one of the mental checklist of steps to arriving somewhere -- gear in park (not really necessary but habit because it is on other cars), parking brake set, power button, garage door button, charge port button, door handle...