Crawl Control - the poll

Honestly I think it really depends on where you live and what you do.

Most the situations I have been in where I used it was mid-climb, on large wet rocks and boulders, where my tires were just spinning. Also in that situation letting off the brake to apply gas would leave me rolling backwards. Yes there are other options I could use there, but being able to hit a button, the truck took a second to think and I was out 2 seconds later was AMAZING.

Though if I still lived in Illinois, Florida, New York, New Jersey, I'd probably have a harder time finding a need for it.

It's far from a sales gimmick, and anyone who thinks that obviously doesn't have a practical need or use for it. It does exactly what it's advertised to do. Aside from less clearance, I've been able to go everywhere my Jeep friends with giant rock crawling 33-35-37's and up with lockers have been able to go. When traction becomes an issue on a climb, that's where you will see the capabilities of the Crawl Control, even on the stock OR tires.

 

RTFM! There's a like kinda specific order of operations to get it to slide right into 4LO. Moving makes it more difficult. Usually I shift in N with the clutch in, and then as soon as I start to let the clutch engage, you can hear it line up and slide into gear.

 

No one "needs it". Anything that it does can be done without it. It's just a nifty trick at best which to me is a sales gimmick. To others, perhaps not.

 

So you can independently control the braking of each wheel without using it?

There's definitely value to having it.

 

ATRAC does it for you or better yet lockers.

Value in general, sure for some. Value with respect to off-roading capability relative to a non-crawl equipped Tacoma? nah

 

That looks all relatively flat. No offense but a subaru outback or crosstrek could probably do that just fine. 2wd would go nowhere in the trails we have out in the northwest. I got stuck doing about a 45 degree hill climb and was in 4low with it locked. Crawl control took me out of the tree root I was stuck on and I powered through the rest.

 

Yeah, it's not flat by any means. 300 foot elevation change in less than a mile and I have been a lot of places out west in 2wd, you just have to know how to drive it in 2wd.

 

Gimmick.

 

Sounds like you went through when I did February/March time frame. If so, that was all melting snow that made that little river. I got through it but broke a tie rod. So pissed.

 

The one and only time I tried it, it didn't pull me out of thick clay mud and it actually kept digging itself even more in than I did. Haven't used it since.

 

fake news!

 

The only reason I bought the truck was to get jerked back and forth by my truck's ABS.

 

Well the results are kinda interesting for this poll. Thanks to everyone who contributed. So far, it seems 70% of the responders are either not using it or think it's a gimmick, which is actually a little bit less than I thought. I'm surprised that 30% of people here are actuallly using the feature. I'm going to have to try it out some more as it seems to have a reasonable amount of support from people who have actually used it.

 

Crawl got me out of some pretty deep mud when I was spinning - I could have gotten out without it's help I'm sure, but it was cool to turn on crawl and let it do its work. For most applications I prefer using the MTS though - on the rock setting I was climbing up rocky ledges on a narrow trail and 3/4 of the crew had to turn around, the other folks made it up the steep gorge but were spinning tires left and right. With MTS on I never lost traction once on wet slippery rocky surfaces.

 

To me it is a gimmick. I feel anti lock brakes work pretty good in hairy situations.

To be candid, If the efforts put into crawl control were redirected to getting the rear axle and transmission right, people would be a lot happier.

This is my personal opinion. Though, to be fair, I really need to test it for what it is. I personally don't find my stock, $36k TRDOR to be a hardcore crawler so my wheeling is not white knuckled in nature.

 

I'm happy to replace that holder for a feature like the CC. Personally I didn't use it (yet), but no doubt with the locker diff, is another cool tool in the OR arsenal. Also I think that this feature will benefit the resale value later, (at least better than a sunglass holder) IMHO.