Live data from Hacker News

Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

news.uci.edu

211–220 of 320 posts

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#211
post #169

Just want to point out that most electric and hybrid vehicles use regenerative braking most of the time and only use real brakes at very slow speeds or in emergencies. So it might be totally misleading to say that electric vehicles are the problem, when they are probably the solution.

Inspection station in my state made comment to me that EVs are failing inspection for rusted brake components because of their heavy use of regen. Add to cost of ownership.

My 2021 EV simply favors mechanical braking over regen for a short period at the start of each trip, specifically to avoid this. (Seems a trivial software feature once you have hybrid braking at all...)

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#212
post #176
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inspection station in my state made comment to me that EVs are failing inspection for rusted brake components because of their heavy use of regen. Add to cost of ownership.

> Inspection station in my state made comment to me that EVs are failing inspection for rusted brake components because of their heavy use of regen. Are you suggesting some metal brake components have unusual rust because of disuse , where they aren't being used regularly enough for friction to "clean" their surfaces? Otherwise I don't see how regenerative breaking could cause rust, since the braking force is supplie…

its pretty obvious he's saying its because the main brakes dont get used because regenerative breaking is enough to stop the car.

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#213
post #3

Electric vehicles are heavier, which means they must spend more brake pads to stop. But they also use regenerative breaking, which reduces pad wear. So I'm not sure if they make it worse or not.

EVs indeed have regenerative braking. Which means they use their actual brakes so infrequently that they commonly need to be replaced because of corrosion issues on some models. If you use your brakes, the corrosion comes off in the form of brake dust. When you don't use them, it builds up and reduces the effectiveness of the brakes to the point where it becomes a safety risk.

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#214
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Recently had to learn how to force a Prius to use the brakes, as the rotors were rusting up & starting to pit! I could not get my partner to brake hard enough to really engage the brakes. They just would not do it, would not brake hard enough to actually use the real brakes, no matter the prompting & even knowing how critical it was that we start to de-rust these rotors. What I found out is: if you put the car in neu…

I would have expected cars that have both conventional and regenerative brakes to keep track of how often the conventional brakes are being used and to automatically increase the use of the conventional brakes if they aren't being used enough to keep them in good shape. Are there any that work that way?

The polestar 2 does the simpler thing of biasing towards mechanical brakes for a little while at the start of every trip. (I suspect this has the advantage of detecting brake failure in more controlled circumstances as well, but that's not specifically documented.)

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#215
post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a shame this is used as an excuse to keep the heavy ICE SUVs and trucks. There are many EVs lighter than an average pickup truck. If people really cared about this, they'd demand train-based public transport instead (no tires! fully electric! self-driving too!), or at very least limits on car weight regardless of the engine.

Trains also have brakes which produce large quantities of fine particles. This is especially a problem in enclosed spaces with limited ventilation: on parts of the London Underground, air pollution in the tunnels can be many times worse than on the streets above.

Trains are also way more efficient than cars at transporting people. If everyone taking the train was driving instead you can bet air quality would be way worse.

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#216
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crusing is much more efficient than one pedal driving. So it does not save power at all.

Are there any cars that "cruise" (by which I assume you mean maintain velocity without applying a pedal)? Non-EVs mostly sort of do so, they still slow down gradually. I'd be interested in trying a car that cruises indefinitely. Sort of an automatic, always on cruise control.

On mine it's a driver preference setting - there are a couple of settings like that which I set to "make the drive more ICE-like because I still drive ICE cars occasionally and don't want to be betrayed by developing EV-specific habits" (even though EV "style" driving features, like 1-pedal, are generally more comfortable/relaxing.)

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you talking about the hold mode they introduced a couple years back? It will bring the car to a stop but (as compared to the previous mode where you had to press the break yourself below ~4-5 mph), but I'll be good money it's using the brakes to do so. Particularly when it's activated on an incline.

I drive an EV6, and I’m almost confident it uses (or can use) regenerative braking to come to a complete stop. If I use the ePedal or the brake paddle, the stop is super gradual and you never feel the “grab” that you feel when using the brake. Also, I can sometimes feel/see it slightly rolling (so it’s not even truly a complete stop). I’ve seen some people swear that the EV6 always uses friction braking at stops, but…

It's probably using mechanical brakes just to anchor itself while stopped (automatic parking brake).

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#218
post #19

Clickbait. "The toxicity and health effects of brake wear particles are largely unknown". Is there any real harm found? What's the concentration of them close to the dangerous road? What's effect of them comparing to pm10 or pm2.5?

Familiar with asbestos? Its pretty widely regarded as a bad time https://www.asbestos.com/exposure/automobiles/

Asbestos in brake pads is no longer an issue I'd hope.

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m pretty sure they grease the rails in some spots, particularly the curvy bits that are often near platforms so it would get stuck to the rails and such. Cars would put out massively more pollution but it’s more free to blow around in the wind. I had some boxes stored in a storage cage in my apartment car park and after 6 months sitting there, they were all coated in a thick black dust. Since there was no wind or r…

They don't grease the cross beams on ceilings though, and those things are nasty in train stations. Same stuff you see creeping up the walls around the tracks in the subway tunnel. Not a competition though, the pollution is bad and we're all so used to it.

>Not a competition though

It is quite important to discuss exactly where the top sources of pollution are through so we can cut back on the worst sources of them to have the most impact.

Re: Vehicle brakes produce charged particles that may harm public health: study

#220
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crusing is much more efficient than one pedal driving. So it does not save power at all.

IIRC 10% more effective to be precise. The UX is worth the cost.

I agree. It’s similar to the discussion of saving emergency by not using AC. No thanks.
Post reply on HN