Van slammed on the brakes

[murray0710]

Driving in traffic today, with no warning, the brakes were applied automatically with quite a bit of force and then released again. Luckily the car behind me didn't go into the back of me but could easily have caused an accident. There was no need to brake. This is a March 2016 Ocean, 150 dsg. It has acc but nothing was switched on. I'd say it was triggered by stationary car on my right I was passing which was on a slip road but I wasn't close to it as I was in my lane. Anyone else experienced this?

Jim

 

[Loz]

City braking is always active below about 20mph.

 

[murray0710]

Can you switch it off as this was dangerous?

 

[Amarillo]

Driving in traffic today, with no warning, the brakes were applied automatically with quite a bit of force and then released again. Luckily the car behind me didn't go into the back of me but could easily have caused an accident. There was no need to brake. This is a March 2016 Ocean, 150 dsg. It has acc but nothing was switched on. I'd say it was triggered by stationary car on my right I was passing which was on a slip road but I wasn't close to it as I was in my lane. Anyone else experienced this?

I've had this happen to me twice at about 70 KPH on the same section of road, just outside Brasov in Romania. I emailed VW customer services about it. Although they denied it was possible, I concluded it was police speed radar (or police equipment detecting in-car radar detectors) interfering with the frequency of the van's radar used for ACC and City Braking.

[Edit: I've found the thread where I posted about these incidents.
https://vwcaliforniaclub.com/threads/unexplained-acc-braking.24025/ ]

 

[Loz]

Can you switch it off as this was dangerous?

Dangerous to who? If the following car was far enough back he wouldn't and didn't hit you.
Sounds like it was a false trigger as it looked like you were heading for a stationary vehicle but you moved away.
Can't be switched off.
There have been reports of this before but not many considering how many there must be now on the roads.

 

[Sad]

Can you switch it off as this was dangerous?

It can be switched off on our '14 Golf... Personally I'd rather have it on, to only go off once in 'error' in 2.5 years I can't see as a problem...

 

[Ocean Spirit]

- As this is Emergency City Braking it's not supposed to happen at higher speeds (not sure what the cut off point is except for what @Loz points out).
- It will also only activate if you haven't done enough braking yourself so for it to cut in means you haven't recognised a hazard that it has. The system will not be completely infallible in that sense but if it brakes for something you would not have (and I think its pretty rare) it is unlikely be more dangerous. Anybody behind you should be able to stop so long as they drive with a safe distance between them and the vehicle in front. If not then.....they need emergency city braking!!!
Mine has activated twice. Once when I would not have bothered and it startled me but it picked up a pedestrian stepping onto the island in the middle of the road that separated the lanes. Not ideal but in principle it detected an obstacle.
The 2nd time was legit, I was braking and let off the brake when the car infront changed its mind about entering the roundabout. It beat me to it to react.
Either way, no fault as far as i'm concerned but it's strange when it happens particularly if you don't recognise a hazard.

 

[s2bear]

It’s happened to me twice in a month about 2 months ago. Brakes slammed on hard enough to lock the wheels for a split second then back to normal. Made me jump out of my skin. There was nothing directly in front of me either time. Not happened since. It was near traffic lights on each occasion so I wondered if their traffic sensors interfered in some way.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[motacyclist]

I’ve had the rapid cadence braking activate when a car pulled out in front of me from the right, and immediately turned left. The danger was already past when the system activated. Frightens the life out of you when it happens!

 

[flying banana]

Dangerous to who? If the following car was far enough back he wouldn't and didn't hit you.
Sounds like it was a false trigger as it looked like you were heading for a stationary vehicle but you moved away.
Can't be switched off.
There have been reports of this before but not many considering how many there must be now on the roads.

Of course its dangerous!

 

[Loz]

Of course its dangerous!

explain

 

[flying banana]

explain

Just go drive about slamming your brakes on and see what happens. Of course people should drive safe distance etc. But they don't do they. Obvious to me. Imagine it on a motorway. How can it not be dangerous. If you had a bike rack down it could go through someone's windscreen in a bump. Very very dangerous to me.didn't a BMW once stop for no reason and someone ran into it and died. Lost electrics I believe.

 

[Loz]

It doesn't work at motorway speeds only below 19mph according to the literature.
It's a Thatcham approved safety system and passed lots more tests than your theory and now being added as a recognised safety feature for insurers.

So what happens when you need to brake suddenly, say for a child running out between cars do you hesitate in case a car runs into the back or you?

 

[flying banana]

Its a Thatcham approved safety system and passed lots more tests than your theory and now being added as a recognised safety feature for insurers.

True. But so has autopilot and recently a flybe plane tried to autopilot to zero ft and had to be switched off by the pilot. Let's hope these occur rarely but either way. I think it's dangerous. Especially if it makes you cake your trollies when it happens

 

[Loz]

True. But so has autopilot and recently a flybe plane tried to autopilot to zero ft and had to be switched off by the pilot. Let's hope these occur rarely but either way. I think it's dangerous. Especially if it makes you cake your trollies when it happens

No worse than Mrs Loz suddenly shouting "Moose" at me whilst driving along the road in Sweden..

 

[flying banana]

No worse than Mrs Loz suddenly shouting "Moose" at me whilst driving along the road in Sweden..

Ha. I hate it when that happens

 

[Whistler]

True. But so has autopilot and recently a flybe plane tried to autopilot to zero ft and had to be switched off by the pilot. Let's hope these occur rarely but either way. I think it's dangerous. Especially if it makes you cake your trollies when it happens

Bad example - The autopilot wasn't defective it was following the settings it had been given - fly altitude 0 ft. If the the pilot hasn't configured it properly before engaging that is a pilot problem.

 

[Legin]

My Golf used to do this. Its to do with the ACC. Somewhere it was possible to switch off in the menu system, never had a problem after that. Basically the system if very conservative for mildly spirited drivers.

 

[WelshGas]

Moose in North America and Elk in Eurasia.

 

[Velma's Dad]

Moose in North America and Elk in Eurasia.

Ah, well alces alces is certainly known in Swedish as an älg, but the Swedes that I know refer to the beast, when speaking English, as a moose.

I wouldn't want to hit one though, either above or below 19mph.

 

[murray0710]

Erm, of course it’s dangerous, in an ideal world everyone would keep a safe distance. In the real world however they don’t and I’d rather not risk someone running into the back of me because my vehicle decides to apply the brakes on a ‘whim’. I wasn’t changing lane or anything, going relatively slowly and for the avoidance of any doubt there was no reason at all to brake. Also, I’ve only had the van 5 months and done about a 1,000 miles. Sure it’s only happened once but once too often. I’ve got a similar system in my Toyota and never had an issue.

 

[Velma's Dad]

It happened to me once in our car (a Volvo) when driving down a ramp into an underground car park. I suspected at the time that it was the sudden change of light from bright daylight to shadow, but who knows.

I'm old enough to remember stickers on the back of new cars, saying "Discs".

 

[WelshGas]

Ah, well alces alces is certainly known in Swedish as an älg, but the Swedes that I know refer to the beast, when speaking English, as a moose.

I wouldn't want to hit one though, either above or below 19mph.

https://www.carsifu.my/news/cars-are-safer-today-thanks-to-mercedes-benzs-infamous-elk-test

 

[sidepod]

No worse than Mrs Loz suddenly shouting "Moose" at me whilst driving along the road in Sweden..

So now we know your “safe” word

 

[sidepod]

I’m starting to think things are going too far.
The ACC on Miss P’s Evoke is utter dog s**t. It plants the brake pedal to the floor if a car so much as indicates in the middle distance. It just makes progress stressful.
I would deffo draw the line at auto-braking, especially given that it appears a tad digital!!