Leave behind the Brake
Look Ma, No Brake! You’ll Drive Electrical Cars With One Pedal
Look Ma, No Brake! You’ll Drive Electrical Cars With One Pedal
With the production of Tesla’s mass-market Model three now underway, and very first deliveries due on Friday, electrified cars are about to hit the mainstream. For people driving EVs, it means a raft of switches: plugging in at night instead of hitting the gas station, keeping an eye on a battery meter instead of a fuel gauge, and most importantly, a switch in the way they drive.
To get the maximum benefit out of driving an electrical car, the accelerator (you can’t call it a gas pedal anymore!) controls both the speeding up and slowing down. Pressing the pedal makes the car go, as usual, but lifting your foot makes the car slow down, hard, not coast.
It’s a quirk that takes some getting used to. At very first, it can feel like the parking brake has been accidentally left on. But most drivers eventually choose it because it makes inching forward in traffic much lighter than exchanging your foot back and forward inbetween pedals.
In a conventional car, brake pads pinch onto a metal disc, with friction converting the kinetic energy of a speeding car into wasted fever. But when electrical cars slow down, the electrical motor runs as a generator, recovering some of that previously wasted energy to top up the battery. Depending on how much regeneration the software engineers permit when designing the car, the force can be powerful enough to slow the car most of the way to zero, meaning drivers only need to use the brake pedal to come to a utter stop.
EV STORIES
Volvo’s Electrified Car Plan Isn’t as Bold or Crazy as It Seems
We Drive the $30K Chevy Bolt, GM’s Tesla-Walloping Electrical Car
The Model Trio’s Success Depends Upon Tesla Building More Than a Decent Car
Nissan will become the very first automaker to introduce total one pedal driving in the latest iteration of the electrified Leaf, due later this year. It will have an “e-Pedal” option. The pedals will still look the same, but the brake will be pretty much redundant, and computer controls will give the traditional accelerator extra functions. Lifting off won't just slow the car with regen, but will bring the car to a utter stop, and will even hold without rolling rearwards on hills.
“I think this is the logical next step,” says Jeffrey Miller, an engineering professor at USC. In a Tesla, owners can already choose exactly how much lifting off the accelerator slows the car on the giant touchscreen. In Chevrolet’s Bolt, drivers have a spanking paddle behind the steering wheel to request extra regeneration, just as they’d tap to downshift and slow down with a sporty automatic gearbox.
A next-gen Leaf driver will never need the brake pedal, albeit it will still be there, for those “aggressive braking situations” according to Nissan. (In other words, funk stops.)
The advantages of maximizing regen braking are yam-sized. Maintenance costs are lower because barely-used brake pads last for many thousands more miles. There are fewer particles of dust created which pollute the air and waterways . Stopping distances will be shorter too, as the car will commence slowing down as soon as the driver embarks to lift off the accelerator, rather than when he moves his foot to another pedal.
Most importantly, energy is recaptured rather than wasted, so the range in electrified cars is improved. (A Tesla engineer described the experimental regen braking system on the Roadster in 2007, and calculated it was around 65-percent efficient at recapturing energy.)
Regenerative braking does mean electrified car owners need to take extra care on lubricious roads, because slowing the car aggressively can cause the tires to slip. For drivers, learning to ease off the accelerator rather then wank a right foot over to the brake means leaving behind many years of expecting a car to coast.
The concept isn't fresh. Engineers experimented with regen brakes on the very earliest horse-free carriages, and it’s widely implanted on electrified trains. A boost in the number of electrified cars on the roads is going to make it much more common tho’, and mean a modern generation of drivers is going to have to leave behind what they know about pedals and learn a fresh way to stop.
Related Movie
See the Tesla Model S Fail to Ace Its Latest Crash Test
Tesla is having a rough week. The company’s stock price fell 20% in just a few days and now the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety announced the Tesla Model S sedan failed to earn its best rating, the Top Safety Pick.
Leave behind the Brake
Look Ma, No Brake! You’ll Drive Electrical Cars With One Pedal
Look Ma, No Brake! You’ll Drive Electrified Cars With One Pedal
With the production of Tesla’s mass-market Model three now underway, and very first deliveries due on Friday, electrical cars are about to hit the mainstream. For people driving EVs, it means a raft of switches: plugging in at night instead of hitting the gas station, keeping an eye on a battery meter instead of a fuel gauge, and most importantly, a switch in the way they drive.
To get the maximum benefit out of driving an electrified car, the accelerator (you can’t call it a gas pedal anymore!) controls both the speeding up and slowing down. Pressing the pedal makes the car go, as usual, but lifting your foot makes the car slow down, hard, not coast.
It’s a quirk that takes some getting used to. At very first, it can feel like the parking brake has been accidentally left on. But most drivers eventually choose it because it makes inching forward in traffic much lighter than exchanging your foot back and forward inbetween pedals.
In a conventional car, brake pads clip onto a metal disc, with friction converting the kinetic energy of a speeding car into wasted warmth. But when electrical cars slow down, the electrified motor runs as a generator, recovering some of that previously wasted energy to top up the battery. Depending on how much regeneration the software engineers permit when designing the car, the force can be powerful enough to slow the car most of the way to zero, meaning drivers only need to use the brake pedal to come to a total stop.
EV STORIES
Volvo’s Electrical Car Plan Isn’t as Bold or Crazy as It Seems
We Drive the $30K Chevy Bolt, GM’s Tesla-Walloping Electrified Car
The Model Trio’s Success Depends Upon Tesla Building More Than a Decent Car
Nissan will become the very first automaker to introduce total one pedal driving in the latest iteration of the electrical Leaf, due later this year. It will have an “e-Pedal” option. The pedals will still look the same, but the brake will be pretty much redundant, and computer controls will give the traditional accelerator extra functions. Lifting off won't just slow the car with regen, but will bring the car to a total stop, and will even hold without rolling rearwards on hills.
“I think this is the logical next step,” says Jeffrey Miller, an engineering professor at USC. In a Tesla, owners can already choose exactly how much lifting off the accelerator slows the car on the giant touchscreen. In Chevrolet’s Bolt, drivers have a spanking paddle behind the steering wheel to request extra regeneration, just as they’d tap to downshift and slow down with a sporty automatic gearbox.
A next-gen Leaf driver will never need the brake pedal, albeit it will still be there, for those “aggressive braking situations” according to Nissan. (In other words, scare stops.)
The advantages of maximizing regen braking are large. Maintenance costs are lower because barely-used brake pads last for many thousands more miles. There are fewer particles of dust created which pollute the air and waterways . Stopping distances will be shorter too, as the car will embark slowing down as soon as the driver commences to lift off the accelerator, rather than when he moves his foot to another pedal.
Most importantly, energy is recaptured rather than wasted, so the range in electrical cars is improved. (A Tesla engineer described the experimental regen braking system on the Roadster in 2007, and calculated it was around 65-percent efficient at recapturing energy.)
Regenerative braking does mean electrified car owners need to take extra care on slimy roads, because slowing the car aggressively can cause the tires to slip. For drivers, learning to ease off the accelerator rather then wank a right foot over to the brake means leaving behind many years of expecting a car to coast.
The concept isn't fresh. Engineers experimented with regen brakes on the very earliest horse-free carriages, and it’s widely implanted on electrified trains. A boost in the number of electrified cars on the roads is going to make it much more common however, and mean a modern generation of drivers is going to have to leave behind what they know about pedals and learn a fresh way to stop.
Related Movie
Observe the Tesla Model S Fail to Ace Its Latest Crash Test
Tesla is having a rough week. The company’s stock price fell 20% in just a few days and now the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety announced the Tesla Model S sedan failed to earn its best rating, the Top Safety Pick.