Parking Brake vs. Emergency Brake

I'm not a big fan of the electronic parking brake and would much prefer the traditional hand-pulled mechanical emergency brake for several reasons:

-Offroad functionality for manual transmission. When navigating tight switch backs such as Black Bear Pass, CO where rolling could be disastrous, or when starting out up a steep hill, it's handy to set the brake and ease it up while engaging the clutch.

- Mechanical simplicity. The cable activated emergency brake has been in use for decades and is easy to service and adjust. Electronics are always less reliable. Not sure what happens if the electronic brake is set and the truck loses all power and needs to be towed.

-Redundant safety. While in college, my beater lost its brake fluid and I literally had no brakes. I was able to drive it to the shop using the hand (emergency) brake under the dash. Modern cars have independent diagonal brake lines, but a master cylinder failure is still possible.

-Slowing down without activating the brake lights. I've done this when Smokey has snuck up on me.

-Fun and games. Haven't played around too much with it, but a front-wheel drive car can do some wild donuts and figure 8's using the emergency brake.

There's nothing wrong with an electronic parking brake especially on a Camry, but a truck should have a mechanical one IMHO.

 

Don't buy a vehicle with one then.

Easy Peasy.

 

Funny just to see how far weve come though. Its not too often everything will fail to the point that you need the "emergency" brake. Being able to actuate it by hand or foot is my preference, but most people are only using them for parking (or not at all).

 

The auto hold functions of modern braking systems are pretty good for point number 1.

 

Electronic brakes will do the same thing, at least with my Explorer. Both of my trucks still have the older system, but our Explorer is electronic. I just took it for a test drive to check it out, never gave it any thought until I read this thread.

When the switch is pulled to set the parking/emergency brake the rear brakes are applied, but it does not lock up the wheels. The car slows quickly. As soon as I released the switch the brakes let go and the car continued to roll. By pulling and releasing the switch for the parking brake I could easily control the vehicle and slow it, or even come to a complete stop. The brake only locked and stayed in the "Park" position after coming to a complete stop. If it did that, I had to go through the normal steps to release the parking brake.

I won't argue that the older system MAY be more reliable, but functionally I can do the same things. In fact, it's easier to do it with my Ford than my Tacoma. To release the parking brake on my 2007 I have to push the pedal nearly to the floor to get it to release. The F150 has a hand release. I can press the E-Brake with my left foot and release it with my left hand.