This is not about electric power it's about electric hand breaks. Low quality mechanics is the norm in 70000 vehicles because of greed. Not technology issues. A decent hand break is known to humanity.
brakes
In a way it’s both.
Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
41–50 of 82 posts
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#42Running out of fuel is something it’s obviously “easy” to do with other cars. But I’m surprised that the electronics have _no_ power redundancy, there isn’t a manual release for the parking break, and running out of power causes the parking break to fail-closed?
> But I’m surprised that the electronics have _no_ power redundancy,
They do. All the auxilliary stuff is on a 12V bus just like on any other car, powered by a separate 12V battery. I don't know anything about the parking break per se, but this isn't remotely as simple as "the car can't be towed when the main battery is dead". We know that's not correct; this is hardly the first Tesla to run out its battery, you can find people doing this deliberately on youtube as a test!
It's some other failure that locked the brake. And it's unique enough to be notable, and it's a Tesla, so of course it's going to spend the day on the front page of HN while we all endure the incessant tut-tutting of the hacker class who think the bug is much simpler than it is.
Folks, disabled vehicles block roads all the time. Stuff breaks. Cars are complicated. Why do we not care if it's a Renault or Suzuki?
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#43Unanswered: Why did it take 9 hours to move it?
This is imo the real question.
I would have just instantly grabbed some go jacks / wheel dollies like some repo men use to get cars.
Jack up all the wheels and roll it to the side.
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#44Running out of fuel is something it’s obviously “easy” to do with other cars. But I’m surprised that the electronics have _no_ power redundancy, there isn’t a manual release for the parking break, and running out of power causes the parking break to fail-closed?
There is enough battery to put it into tow mode after you "run out". Assuming he either didn't know how or perhaps you can even run through that in service mode.
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#45Running out of fuel is something it’s obviously “easy” to do with other cars. But I’m surprised that the electronics have _no_ power redundancy, there isn’t a manual release for the parking break, and running out of power causes the parking break to fail-closed?
Running of electricity is incredibly difficult on an EV. Also, in what way does a parking brake or a transmission prevent towing? You lift the car onto the tow truck bed like any other tow job. It doesn't take nine hours to hire one that can do the job.
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#46Running out of fuel is something it’s obviously “easy” to do with other cars. But I’m surprised that the electronics have _no_ power redundancy, there isn’t a manual release for the parking break, and running out of power causes the parking break to fail-closed?
There seems to be some discrepancy as the article mentions that it ran out of power, but the owner, Mr Grigg, 57, said that the vehicle had failed despite having shown that it had several miles of charge remaining. And yes, I'm surprised that an important component doesn't have a manual override. Imagine if the vehicle blocked access to a hospital or a busy bridge or tunnel.
Fire Department would just drag it away without thinking twice.
I’m kind of amazed people tolerated this for so many hours. Traffic stoppage costs can really add up.
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
From the fine article: > The handbrakes of electric cars, and some other modern cars, are controlled electronically, unlike those of traditional petrol and diesel cars, which are mechanical. This means that the handbrake often locks when the power fails and the car cannot be pushed or towed. This sounds like a major oversight by Tesla as there should be some override in case a vehicle breaks down in a dangerous posit…
They can be towed, but it is correct that certain electrical failures can prevent the brakes from being released. I know because this happened to me. The tow company sent a flat bed truck and used a winch to pull the car onto the platform. It’s pretty annoying from a design perspective but it also seems like something that any competent tow company should be able to handle easily.
Aren’t breaks disabled once the winch pulls on the hook point?
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
Safety-wise it's better option. Breaking vs just rolling without working brakes. And I really do not like trend of making brakes drive-by-wire instead of mechanical just to (presumably) save few pennies...
Is it? What if it runs out of power at 70mph in the middle of a motorway? I’d have thought sudden breaking would have been the most dangerous thing to do
It shouldn't be as emergency stops can be performed at any point in time - usually when there's an emergency. Obviously it's important that following drivers have left enough space so that they can react in time, but that's down to their driving skill (or lack of, if they're too close).
I'd consider that autonomous vehicles should apply the brakes if they find themselves in an uncertain situation as reducing speed is going to minimise any impact. However, this was being driven acoustically and the handbrake shouldn't have been applied automatically by the power running out. At the worst, if a handbrake fails and can't be used, you can always shove a couple of bricks under the wheels to stop the vehicle rolling.
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#49Unanswered: Why did it take 9 hours to move it?
This is imo the real question. I would have just instantly grabbed some go jacks / wheel dollies like some repo men use to get cars. Jack up all the wheels and roll it to the side.
There is also the option to just tow the car.
https://uploads.tff-forum.de/original/3X/d/7/d7427f37fb68ce3...
Re: Tesla breaks down mid-turn and causes more than nine hours of travel chaos
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is an unhelpful quote. Yes, some cars have electronic parking brakes. It is quite common on new cars today. But they typically require being affirmatively commanded to change between their applied and unapplied states. Nothing about the general existence of electronic parking brakes explains why this particular vehicle would have one engaged mid-turn.
> Nothing about the general existence of electronic parking brakes explains why this particular vehicle would have one engaged mid-turn. Did you notice the part that it run out of battery mid-turn? It seems that the brakes are designed to fail safe in case of a battery failure. I see how someone could argue for that as a design choice. The fact that there is no way to emergency release them without power is more ques…
It seems the wrong choice to me as a handbrake can be emulated by shoving some bricks under the wheels, and a non-movable vehicle could cause serious issues for other people.