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More on Prius cruise control

In another recent thread, the question came up of how to restore the set cruise speed, after interrupting it. AFAICT nobody came up with the answer, although several people were puzzled by this apparent lack.

I was too. Such an obvious feature, to be missed by Toyota. So this evening, on the way home, I did an experiment:

  • Activated cruise control by pressing end of cruise lever: icon lit on dashboard.

  • Activated cruise mode by flipping level down, then adjusting to 50mph with up/down flips.

  • Approached a village whose limit was 30mph, so pressed brake in usual way: cruise icon stayed lit but car came out of cruise.

  • Drove through village, controlling speed by foot, while staying around 30mph.

  • At end of limit, flipped cruise lever up: cruise re-engaged and car gently but firmly accelerated to 50mph.

HTH.

Reply to
Andrew Stephenson
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I have a Camry and my experience is the same as you describe with the following addenda:

If I am in cruise and have to come to a stop, the setting is erased.

If I am in cruise, tap out of the control, and after several minutes, am in clear enough traffic to reengage the control, the speed setting will have been erased.

In both cases the cruise icon remains on and cruise will take a new setting w/o needing to be turned on again.

It appears to be the same on our RAV4 as well.

Reply to
tak

The Toyota cruise control will forget the previously set speed if you drop below 25 (or 24) mph. If you never drop below this speed and never turn off the cruise control (as indicated by the dash light, if equipped), then you will be able to hit the resume button.

Reply to
mrv

They've worked this way since the 80's, as long as you don't go below about 30MPH.

Reply to
Hachiroku

There are so many school zones with speed limits of 20 mph near my home it sure would be nice if cruise would set at low speeds too. I've often thought it would be nice if cars were equipped with radio receivers and speed limit signs with radio transmitters and your cruise could negotiate the right speed for you. I'm sure traffic cops writing all those tickets for the farce of a legal $ystem would disagree.

Reply to
jay

Sorry, I assumed that the *resume* feature's function was more obvious. The resume will work as long as the master switch is not turned off and the speed does not drop below 25 MPH (40 KPH).

Some more cruise control tips and tricks:

Besides depressing the service brake pedal, you can cancel the set speed while retaining memory as long as vehicle speed does not drop below 25 MPH if you pull the cruise control stalk towards you, apply the parking brake (1 notch should be sufficient), or depress the clutch pedal just enough to take out the freeplay. These 3 cancellation methods do not illuminate the brake lights, and din the case of pulling the stalk towards you, does not unlock the torque converter.

Reply to
Ray O

A situation where terminology differs, leading to some mild idea disconnection.

Yow. Some of those (eg the parking brake) call for coordination when going at speed. General rule seems: "anything that may signal the driver's desire to vary the set cruise speed."

Reply to
Andrew Stephenson

Most of the time, I just pull the cruise control stalk to cancel, but before that feature was added, I would depress the button on the parking brake handle and pull up just enough to disengage the cruise and push the lever back down. This was effective to slow down without the brake lights coming on, like when a car with lights on the roof appeared in the rear view mirror. ;-)

Reply to
Ray O

Aha! Mister Devious, at it again. ;-) In the Prius one has a foot brake. Fancy stuff is trickier. Easier to move a lever.

Reply to
Andrew Stephenson

Add to the end of this sentence: ".... in the downward (slower) direction". You can give it some gas to accelerate over the set point and then it will drift back down back to the set point when you let up on the gas again.

Overall, I have always liked the way Toyota sets up their approach to cruise control, with the stalk and the way it operates. I just do not like that cancel the memory below 24 MPH feature - oh I mean failure. Tomes Tomes

Reply to
Tomes

I've never tried cancelling the CC with a foot-actuated parking brake, I'll have to give it a try some time. These days I just try to cruise at reasonable speeds.

Reply to
Ray O

A safety feature, I believe. If your speed falls dramatically from the set-point, say for a construction zone, flicking the stalk upward by mistake could have an unhappy outcome.

But I'm guessing, of course.

Reply to
Pemaquid

I see Toyota's approach a safety feature too. I had at least two close mishaps while using another vehicle that retained the speed setting until it was manually shut off. It is a bizarre feeling to start zooming up after having endured a long string of packed stop and go intersections. One other time the vehicle picked up speed as I was maneuvering around a corner. In the time it takes to comprehend what's going on and do something about it a lot of bad can happen.

Reply to
mark digital©

Maybe it is because I have had other vehicles that did not have this flaw that Toyota has, but I have never had a problem in vehicles that remembered the cruise control speed. My Jeep has this memory and I use that memory plenty enough to want it in my Toyotas too. Tomes

Reply to
Tomes

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