Crawl control worth it?

I've used Crawl Control a few times. It sucks at the lowest speed. Regardless of the terrain, it bucks like an angry thoroughbred. Mid-speed seems fine. I used it to crawl up a slick muddy hill and - besides the weird noise, it worked nicely. I tried it without Crawl Control, without traction control in 4L with the diff locked. I got more slippage this way, but it was quieter and smoother. I suspect that if I got it mired pretty deeply, the Crawl Control might help me get out because it did do a good job of shifting power around. I'm looking forward to our first snow this year. We have some pretty steep hills and, based upon my mud test, I bet that the Crawl Control will be pretty useful.

 

That's good news. I hope you are right about performance in snow.

 

I can't speak to crawl control but Down Hill Assist on earlier models were practically usless in winter conditons with ice or hard packed snow. In deep snow there may be some advantage to engine braking which there is a lot of in The low range set up that crawl control uses.

Being in low range going down slippery hills is not always good. I would Just us the abs brakes and keep vehicle in high range.
One very important point. In winter conditons, don't expect all terrain tires t work very well braking except in deep snow conditions. They don't handle ice and cold packed snow being in low range. You need snow tires to take full advantage of any traction system. They are all limited to the available traction at the wheel.

 

I'll have crawl control in about a month! yippee!

 

...I want to update this post. Since I posted this last, I got stuck in a pretty precarious spot. I was heading out to find some birds, on a road that I've driven up a hundred times. It's normally pretty mild, with one or two bad spots. Well, our last rain did a number on this road, and I ended up in a washed out section.



The CC is absolutely what got me un-stuck. I didn't have to dig out at all. In the first pic you can see where the rear tires were just digging sand, this was with the locker engaged. I forgot about the CC initially, but after spinning the tires, it dawned on me, that this is what it was made for. I engaged it, and it didn't get me out right away, as a matter of fact, it didn't work the first attempt. I had to stop due to heating up my tranny. I let this cool down until the light went out and tried again. This time forward and reverse, and moving the steering wheel (as much as I could, it couldn't turn much since the front passenger tire was pinned against the dirt) and I was able to make it out. It still took a few minutes, but I was out. This had a pucker factor of 9.5, this is a mid-slope road and I was on the down hill side. As a matter of fact, the truck started to float back and forth. One bad move and it would have been an E-ticket ride to the bottom. I am totally sold on CC now. It made all the difference in this scenario. Everything, including the locker worked great. Now, could I have gotten out with only A-trac and a MT, maybe, I don't really know. I have an FJC and it has the standard A-trac with a locker in it, no CC. I haven't had it in this type of situation (it's my wife's and I'm not allowed to wheel it very often, she's worried I might beat it up....I can't understand why). I know for a fact that the CC made a huge difference on this scenario though, and I'm super stoked on it now. It saved me, at minimum a lot of digging, at the worst it saved me a quick trip down the mountain on an undesignated route of travel.,



PS: Did you know that the tilt/incline gauge has a red section, I do now!

 

A-TRAC lives in Crawl/Multi-Terrain and looks like you found out!
Rear locker is ok, but having traction control on the front tires (where the most weight is over on an empty pick up) is the bomb! Hint: Cross over and/or straddle deep ruts rather than drive down in them (on pupose). Was you wife yelling very loud? LOL

 

David k, yeah I normally would straddle something like that, but I couldn't see it until I was in it. A large mound of dirt had washed down the hillside in front of the ditch. I just saw it as I came over that mound, and by then it was too late. Thank God the wife wasn't with me, that would have been worse than if I'd of rolled it. My partner in crime was my hunting buddy, my 2 YO GSP. I made him get out at one point, when the truck started rocking real good. I figured if I ended up at the bottom of the hill that he could go for help just like Lasie.

 

surprise rut! glad you got out safe without damage!

 

If your a/t light came on I'd change the fluid asap. I'm not sure about the 3rd gens but generally with vehicles the light comes on the temps have gotten hot enough to burn the fluid.

 

Good job!
What is the dog wearing a GPS and two-way radio?

 

He's wearing a GPS tracking collar, and a shock collar.

 

A few scratches on the front bumper's all, it could have been much worse.

 

Here's another update to using my CC. After my adventure in the ditch, I began to notice a shimmy when I would apply the brakes. I figured that I had heated them up due to the CC being used for to long. I took it to the dealer today and they confirmed it. The drums needed to be resurfaced, It rides great again, no shimmy. I now know not to just let the CC go for to long, the drums will heat up to quickly. I wish
Toyota would have put on 4 wheel disks.

 

I really like using the CC for hill decent speed control. We only have snow right now so I'm looking forward to the thaw to test it out on terrain.

I have yet to see CC work properly in snow.

 

I like it for that also. When 1st gear isn't slow enough, the CC can slow you down even more.

 

Can I ask you 2016 Off Road 4WD Automatic trans guys something?
Since A-TRAC is incorporated into Terrain-Select and/ or Crawl Control and has no separate button to activate/ deactivate, I appreciate your feedback and posts on using it. A YouTube of you guys driving in a Low Range, steep, rutted or rocky condition would be great, too! Showing the truck during different terrain selections on the dial. The Crawl Control is just a speed control yes, and the throttle or brake pedals are self-controlled, as in the DAC we 2009-2014 Tacomas have?

 

You're correct, the CC dos control both brakes and throttle.

 

I'm not sure if these have been posted before, but here are some youtube video's of the CC working in a river, and in flat soft sand in Hawaii. I didn't like the initial video's of the "going uphill and using gravity to get us out" method previously. Good job OP on the pics and the update. Didn't know the brakes would be used so heavily.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CygvvSzaksk&list=LLF4JNyE6ApC2zSLd_dBhgvg&index=8


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMzlXDf07kQ&list=LLF4JNyE6ApC2zSLd_dBhgvg&index=9

 

How long were you running the CC on that ditch? I know you said the transmission over heated and you had to take a break. How long was it running CC before that?

 

I would guess a full minute or so. It's hard to say, I wasn't really paying to much attention to the time. It wasn't a quick evolution by any means. In my mind I was thinking about the Toyota video where they pull out of the sand, that took them awhile too. I was waiting for something "magic" to happen and it just didn't work that way for that situation. Next time that happens I'll stop and re-evaluate before everything get's to hot. At least the dealer took care of my problems without any hassle.