Brake pedal behavior: Preference?

[Indy]

My experience with brake regen in an EV actually reminds me most of driving a manual gas vehicle and using the gears to create engine braking. I used to challenge myself to not use the brakes at all and come to as close to a stop as possible without killing the engine just by downshifting at appropriate RPMs.

I have grown to enjoy regenerative braking while street driving. It's convenient, and I feel my formative years driving a manual allowed me to adjust to it quickly (like in a day).

I generally rely on gearbox / low range gearing for managing velocity in off-road driving, only using brakes to come to a complete stop or hold on inclines - my diesel Land Rover has a very low crawl ratio with an 8speed ZF auto trans in low range, such that I need to apply the throttle in low range and 1st gear to move downhill in anything shallower than something that looks like you're going to headstand on the front bumper and you feel like you're hanging from the seatbelt.

If a BEV replicated this feeling off-road, even if it requires a low range transfer case, I would be happy.

Wow. Old school. I remember those days. Everything is automatic these days.

 

[Logan]

If you haven’t felt 1-PD with a strong regen, it’s very much like driving a manual and just lifting your foot off the accelerator without touching the clutch.

Its true.

Although it depends on which gear we're talking about .

I do the same with my paddle shifters. Hence the reason I’d enjoy those on the Scouts but not a must have. Especially nice when someone is riding my a$$ and I want to slow really quickly without brake lights

I actually do this as well. Just with using the regen paddles for adjusting regen (similar to how you'd do it with paddle shifters in a DCT or other "manually shifted automatic" transmission).

My experience with brake regen in an EV actually reminds me most of driving a manual gas vehicle and using the gears to create engine braking. I used to challenge myself to not use the brakes at all and come to as close to a stop as possible without killing the engine just by downshifting at appropriate RPMs.

I have grown to enjoy regenerative braking while street driving. It's convenient, and I feel my formative years driving a manual allowed me to adjust to it quickly (like in a day).

I generally rely on gearbox / low range gearing for managing velocity in off-road driving, only using brakes to come to a complete stop or hold on inclines - my diesel Land Rover has a very low crawl ratio with an 8speed ZF auto trans in low range, such that I need to apply the throttle in low range and 1st gear to move downhill in anything shallower than something that looks like you're going to headstand on the front bumper and you feel like you're hanging from the seatbelt.

If a BEV replicated this feeling off-road, even if it requires a low range transfer case, I would be happy.

And 100% agreed on offroading. Low range and first gear == a LOT of control going down a rocky waterfall .

My first vehicles I drove, were all manuals as well (~97 Honda Civic, and 97 Jeep Wrangler). And the TJ had a lift, lockers, and 33's, and was used as a wheeling vehicle. We even added a "hand throttle", that we created using an old bike friction shifter. We routed the cable through the shift boot, and clamped it to the shifter below the shift knob. So we could dial in an RPM with the bike shifter with your ring finger/pinky, and then feather the brake/clutch while crawling.

And it made it a LOT easier to drive over chunky low speed trails, without your foot bouncing on the throttle making you "see saw".

 

[LastDayScout]

It's funny you say that. Reading this thread, I was thinking this would be an easy transition for me coming from all manual-transmission vehicles where I typically rev-match upshifts and downshifts and mostly do engine braking. It's a fun game to me to see if I can time things so that I don't have to touch the brake pedal at all and I've gotten quite good at it in traffic or when coming to a stop on an incline. Technically it's two pedal driving instead of the normal three pedal driving, haha.

I almost never touch the brake pedal in my EV. It always takes a second to reset my brain in an ICE vehicle.

 

[MountainDad]

I do the same with my paddle shifters. Hence the reason I’d enjoy those on the Scouts but not a must have. Especially nice when someone is riding my a$$ and I want to slow really quickly without brake lights

In both my Polestar and my wife's GV60, when full regen occurs whether you touch the brake or not, the brake lights come on. This is a safety measure for a good reason, specifically because of the one you highlight.

 

[oldgeeksguide]

And like you are throwing energy away and money out the door when you hit friction brakes in an ICE vehicle!

Just to clarify, rav4 hybrid has blended brakes, so regen happens when you hit the brake pedal.

 

[RodorW]

With one-pedal off in the bolt it’s always regen-ing when you let off the accelerator, even if it’s not actively slowing, but on the pedal the first, 15% or so of the break pedal is just regen strength, then friction breaks

 

[MountainDad]

With one-pedal off in the bolt it’s always regen-ing when you let off the accelerator, even if it’s not actively slowing, but on the pedal the first, 15% or so of the break pedal is just regen strength, then friction breaks

Polestar uses blended braking always, with varying levels of regen vs friction. I swear it has intelligence integrated with the vision-based collision avoidance system because it will come to a stop with F1 precision on a stop line with no brake pedal input. The Polestar has two levels of regen, "Low" and "High".

My wife's GV60 is more traditional. It has four levels of regen (1-3 and "Max," true one-pedal.) the default is Level 3 which is equivalent to Polestar's "Low" regen setting. The "Max" is a bit stronger on lift-off than Polestar's "High" regen setting. I prefer the Polestar's calibration, but the GV60's "Max" is easy to use and well-calibrated.