I think you don't understand cruise control. If cruise control is turned on and you start descending a hill, the cruise is designed to downshift to slow and maintain the cruise setting. No brakes are used. If you want to ride the brakes to slow down, turn off cruise. Either way, you have to do something to avoid overtaking and hitting the traffic in front of you. I prefer to let the Exp maintain my speed and save wear and tear on my brakes. If your style of driving is to freewheel down hills and brake when you run up on traffic....go for it and watch for the runoff lanes.
Can I stop the cruise from engaging the brakes on hills?
- Thread starter Deadman
- Start date
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Meeker
Full Access Members
Cruise control on my Expy will DEFINITELY apply the brakes on occasion (I have the adaptive cruise). How do I know? I tried it in stop and go traffic and it is capable of bringing the Expy to a complete stop, then following again when traffic starts up...
I suspect, that it uses engine braking AND brakes to maintain speed as needed. I have to say that there have been hills where I didn't see the transmission shift down and it slowed way too suddenly for it to be engine braking. So, for my XLT with driver assistance stuff anyway, the brakes are potentially used to maintain speed and definitely used to maintain following distance.
I suspect, that it uses engine braking AND brakes to maintain speed as needed. I have to say that there have been hills where I didn't see the transmission shift down and it slowed way too suddenly for it to be engine braking. So, for my XLT with driver assistance stuff anyway, the brakes are potentially used to maintain speed and definitely used to maintain following distance.
Deadman
Full Access Members
We DON'T have traffic. I chose to live in the country. I can set my cruise on a 50 miles trip and many times never encounter a single car to pass/slow down for, etc.... We don't all live on top of each other....
I'd much rather it use the brakes, they are cheap to replace when is wastefully wears them out so it can burn more fuel. The transmission will cost a pretty penny to rebuild when it wears out, so I don't see the point on sending it through hundreds of wasteful extra shifts daily.
I don't like the braking/downshifting to maintain cruise speed setting, either. Guess it's not what I'm used to from a cruise control. It can get irritating when you're going through small, rolling hills.
It doesn't change the gear indicator when mine is holding speed on a moderate downhill, so it must be using brakes only, in those cases. I expect that it's also lighting the brake lights (hope so), but I have no confirmation. It will combine downshifting and braking to maintain speed when the hill is steep enough.
If you're worried about brake overheating on a long downhill, you can disengage cruise control and use the minus (-) button to limit your highest gear to the appropriate point for engine braking. No need to enter manual transmission mode. There's a hill on one of my regular routes where I do that, and it works like a charm. Still think it would have been better to keep the shifting control on a stalk from the steering column, but that's a separate forum topic.
It doesn't change the gear indicator when mine is holding speed on a moderate downhill, so it must be using brakes only, in those cases. I expect that it's also lighting the brake lights (hope so), but I have no confirmation. It will combine downshifting and braking to maintain speed when the hill is steep enough.
If you're worried about brake overheating on a long downhill, you can disengage cruise control and use the minus (-) button to limit your highest gear to the appropriate point for engine braking. No need to enter manual transmission mode. There's a hill on one of my regular routes where I do that, and it works like a charm. Still think it would have been better to keep the shifting control on a stalk from the steering column, but that's a separate forum topic.
Deadman
Full Access Members
I'm not real concerned about the brakes overheating because my hills aren't long, they are more rolling kind of hills, so that makes these ridiculous downshifts and brake applications so annoying because I can feel it jerking as its doing both to hold the extra 1mph off of my cruise speed. Then when it gets to the bottom of the ruling hill, its actually scrubbed too much speed off, so then it needs to hammer the throttle and sometimes downshift to make up that 1 mph that it JUST scrubbed off. Its like its fighting itself when it could just do nothing and it would have the exact same result with no jerking, no shifts, no brakes, and gain 1-1.5 mpg doing so. Seems too obvious to me that its being nothing short of completely wasteful while annoying me. lol
I'll have to mess with the transmission selector buttons more. I'm hoping theres a way to LOCK it into 10th, but I haven't found a way to do that yet in my limited tries.
I'll have to mess with the transmission selector buttons more. I'm hoping theres a way to LOCK it into 10th, but I haven't found a way to do that yet in my limited tries.
Deadman
Full Access Members
Im not sure, but I almost think it immediately drops out of 10th when I hit the M button. I'll have to confirm tho...
