MailGuy

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Surely if you are at a complete stop you don't need the brake lights to be illuminated as you don't have to warn anyone you are slowing down. If you applied the handbrake your brake lights wouldn't come on either.
Maybe drivers are more polite/informed in the UK? In the US you're asking for someone to think the light is green and you're accelerating. It's the same reason I was taught to never hold a manual transmission with the clutch and accelerator in addition to not burning out the throw-out bearing prematurely.
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If you are driving aggressively on a curvy road in Unbridled mode, with 1 pedal driving, will lifting before a corner act like a downshift to slow you before accelerating into the turn?
 

MailGuy

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If you are driving aggressively on a curvy road in Unbridled mode, with 1 pedal driving, will lifting before a corner act like a downshift to slow you before accelerating into the turn?
Yes. You will get smoother instantaneous transfer of forward acceleration to braking without the corresponding rev in RPM's. The motor and car will both actually slow down creating an immediate deceleration force that can seamlessly transition to full forward acceleration just by moving your foot in the other direction. Think of it like driving a go-kart without brakes.

It won't be limited to unbridle either. You'll get the same feeling in all modes I would expect, just to varying degrees.
 

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Brake lights should really become "smart", and use deceleration detection. That's what their purpose is -- to warn approaching drivers that the car ahead is slowing down or stopped in a lane of traffic.
 

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Brake lights should really become "smart", and use deceleration detection. That's what their purpose is -- to warn approaching drivers that the car ahead is slowing down or stopped in a lane of traffic.
If you can't tell whether the car in front is stopped then in my opinion you shouldn't be driving
 


dbsb3233

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If you can't tell whether the car in front is stopped then in my opinion you shouldn't be driving
Have you ever driven a winding mountain road, where you come around a curve to find traffic stopped and you have to slam on the brakes? That's an extreme example, but it's the type of more sudden situation where seeing those bright brake lights helps someone react quickly.

Or when it's foggy, or nighttime, or any conditions with poor visibility.

Obviously just toodling around town in daylight and good visibility, brake lights while stopped is overkill. It's more for when the situation isn't as perfect.
 

kdryden99

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Brake lights should really become "smart", and use deceleration detection. That's what their purpose is -- to warn approaching drivers that the car ahead is slowing down or stopped in a lane of traffic.
Bad idea. If you are on the highway and you let off the accelarator i wouldnt want the brake light to come on
 

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Bad idea. If you are on the highway and you let off the accelarator i wouldnt want the brake light to come on
Obviously it would need to be set to detect the degree of deceleration and kick in when it's more than just slight coasting slowdown. The point is if regen is acting like the brake and slowing someone down more quickly than coasting would (i.e. at a pace that means braking is applied in any car not using regen), then it should mimic that. Otherwise we have a mix of cars running around that slow quickly WITH the brake lights coming on and others WITHOUT the brake lights coming on. That's gonna be dangerous.
 

kdryden99

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Obviously it would need to be set to detect the degree of deceleration and kick in when it's more than just slight coasting slowdown. The point is if regen is acting like the brake and slowing someone down more quickly than coasting would (i.e. at a pace that means braking is applied in any car not using regen), then it should mimic that. Otherwise we have a mix of cars running around that slow quickly WITH the brake lights coming on and others WITHOUT the brake lights coming on. That's gonna be dangerous.
You would have to link it to regen. Regen is useless on the highway, so if regen could be off if you are reaching speeds of 50+ then the back lights dont turn on. if regen is on ideally speeds 35 and under brake lights will come on. When i downshift i lightly tap the brake to show im braking otherwise when im on the highway and i downshift i dont touch the brake unless i really need to be braking
 

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You would have to link it to regen. Regen is useless on the highway, so if regen could be off if you are reaching speeds of 50+ then the back lights dont turn on. if regen is on ideally speeds 35 and under brake lights will come on. When i downshift i lightly tap the brake to show im braking otherwise when im on the highway and i downshift i dont touch the brake unless i really need to be braking
Really no need to do that though. The whole point of brake lights is to show the vehicles behind you that your vehicle is slowing significantly (or stopped in traffic). I think it would actually be better for the brake lights to work consistently that way, regardless of what method is used to significantly slow the vehicle. To the drivers behind you, they don't care how you're slowing the vehicle, they only care that the vehicle is slowing significantly.
 

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Obviously it would need to be set to detect the degree of deceleration and kick in when it's more than just slight coasting slowdown. The point is if regen is acting like the brake and slowing someone down more quickly than coasting would (i.e. at a pace that means braking is applied in any car not using regen), then it should mimic that. Otherwise we have a mix of cars running around that slow quickly WITH the brake lights coming on and others WITHOUT the brake lights coming on. That's gonna be dangerous.
Agree - the BEV regen and one pedal driving are new to me and cant comment but at the end of the day, if the car is slowing down enough automatically AND at its rate of deceleration other cars around need to slow down too, to avoid an accident or be aware, then yup brake lights should come on. Otherwise we as drivers have to manually tap the brakes to let people behind know and makes no sense. I can think of several situations where if this is not implemented correctly (safely), I might not want to use that feature.
 

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I'm going to go out on a limb and say Ford's engineers and management gave it some serious thought and came up with a reasonable solution to turn on the brake lights when appropriate and otherwise leave them off. I'm sure they didn't decide in a vacuum and they also studied other cars with one pedal mode.
 

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I'm going to go out on a limb and say Ford's engineers and management gave it some serious thought and came up with a reasonable solution to turn on the brake lights when appropriate and otherwise leave them off. I'm sure they didn't decide in a vacuum and they also studied other cars with one pedal mode.
They did say that whether you use the brakes or 1 pedal the regen is still working so im assuming the 1 pedal is linked with the same circuit as the brakes. Most likely if the accelerator is released past a certain threshold the lights come on.
 

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I like watching him. Watched it last week. He doesnt explain the lights but it would make sense that it works like i mentioned above by the way he explains it. Plus he drives a Tesla so he knows how it works on his car.
 

MailGuy

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They did say that whether you use the brakes or 1 pedal the regen is still working so im assuming the 1 pedal is linked with the same circuit as the brakes. Most likely if the accelerator is released past a certain threshold the lights come on.
Regen isn't some separate system that engages and disengages. It's always there. Regen is simply the car drawing energy off the motor and putting it back into the battery rather than applying energy to the motor to propel you forward. From a driving and engineering point of view, the brake pedal, caliper and rotors work the same as on any other car where the computer is controlling the hydraulics, think ABS and ESC. There's been a computer between you and your rotors for years now. The EV difference is the computer simply decides how much current to draw off the motor to achieve the desired deceleration and/if when the hydraulics should be engaged to have the caliper squeeze the rotor for additional stopping power.
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