Crawl Control a "gimmick"?

I keep reading in this forum that people think the crawl control is a gimmick. It seems like for some reason there is a general dislike of technology. I'm not sure what the average age of people here is, but this sounds like the kind of thing I would hear from my 73 year old dad who thinks life was easier before computers, mostly because he has no idea how to use one.

I've read numerous times here that people think that a good driver can do what crawl control can using the pedals. Crawl control, when used on the way up a hill or down a hill, will vary both the braking and power to each individual wheel, so that the car stays level and doesn't tip.

The most common problem when going up or down a steep hill is that the tires on one side will slip while the tires on the other side won't. The end result is you end up not pointing straight. So if the tires on the passenger side start to slip while going down a hill, crawl control will apply the anti-lock brakes to the passenger side wheels while giving some power to the drivers side wheels, so that the car levels out.

As far as I know, pressing down on the gas pedal applies power to all wheels equally, and pressing the brake pedal applies the brakes to all wheels equally. So no, you cannot replicate crawl control even if you are an excellent driver anymore than you can replicate anti-lock brakes to stop your car when sliding on ice if the car doesn't have them.

This is an excellent feature and exclusive in the class to the Tacoma. Yes, there are plenty of people who never go off road and live in warmer climates with no snow, and for those people they will not need this feature, and probably do not even need a 4x4. But for those of us in the snow belt, or anyone who does some serious off roading, this would be a great feature to have.

 

you need 4 brake pedals and 4 extendable eyes to do what crawl control does.

incredible

 

Are you talking about Crawl control (aka Hand throttle) or Multi terrain select (aka smooth ATRAC) ?

Oh and Eric... Crawl Control and Multiterrain are both useless in snow belt or deep mud.
Both work great on other terrain.

 

The people that think its a gimmick are the people that think its being marketed as something its not.

 

Nice effort post. Its definitely a cool feature to have at your disposal.

Unfortunately I am a MT luddite so I won't have it.

 

you're living in the past, man

 

I'd love to have it on my 4x4. The same as I'd never want to have a truck that didn't have ABS or airbags. And quite frankly I thought the rear-view camera was a silly gimmick when I bought the truck; now I don't think I'd want a car without it. And the Mazda3 we just got has blind-spot monoriting... that's going to be a must-have on my future vehicles, too.

And don't say I'm a lazy driver or it's all stuff to dumb-down the experience. Maybe blind spot monitoring wasn't as needed 20 years ago, but frankly drivers are more aggressive, distracted and generally dumber these days... whipping up and passing on the right, hovering along in your blind spots, etc. I'll take every advantage I can get. Every advance is always poo-pooed by the old school... first it was probably radios in cars, then automatic transmissions, then seat belts, then fuel injection, then ABS, auto dimming rear-view mirrors and heated side mirrors, ... yet todays cars are SOOOO far superior to anything on the market 25 or 30 years ago it's utterly amazing.

 

Like the locker it's a gimmick if you don't use it. Unlike the locker, it only adds electronics and like other cp controlled accessories, they are all helpful but not a durability or maintenance issue

 

I guess I wouldn't have to worry about you stealing my truck.

 

It is just the further dumbing down of vehicles....one day the human interaction will be removed..."driving" a vehicle will be like a Disney Land ride...

 

Don't want a repeat of Skynet.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AL6Na4v8H_o

 

exactly - I was skeptical about some of these features until i had them on my Silverado and ended up loving them. Tailgate camera - what a godsend in parking lots here in Colorado where everything is an SUV or truck - having a fish eye view makes it so much easier to at least get started backing out of a spot. It had the other goodies too but one Toyota does not have that I ended up really liking was lane assist - it would warn you when you were drifting out of your lane - and that truck was so damn big it was easy to do - I thought I would never need/use it - i was surprised the number of times it gave me nice subtle feedback to get back in the middle of the lane. That actually made me feel better about my teenagers driving it too as they learned to deal with such a big vehicle. I for one am glad for the advancements. If you don't want them you don't need to get them. And heated seats - never ever ever again w/o them here in Colorado.

 

How is it exclusive when I got it on our LX570? And it's an option on Land Cruisers and 4 runners... ?!?!?!!?

 

Pretty sure he meant in the mid-size truck class.

 

I'm going to reserve judgement until I see some real world tests by Tacoma owners. I can tell you that the ATRAC I have in my '09 Tacoma is incredibly useful and often times makes the locker unnecessary.

 

Awesome! Got it going in my office now.

 

Ohhhhhhhh got it.

 

Still a gimmick... Lol