Toyota Prius no snow bunny

I heard that of a number of traction control system. Great in the rain but they don't like the snow where some wheel spin is needed.

Wonder what kind of mpg they're gettin', just sitting there as other vehicles drive around them....

No problem, just turn off the traction control when trying to pull in to your steep snow covered driveway... oh wait... better not live in Pittsburgh.
 
well I guess you would rather not go home anyway (read the comment by the toyota spokesman at the end of the article).
 
toyota oppressive motors knows best

Toyota has been in a terrible habit of denying anything is wrong with their vehicles. How this possibly part of the design. Well if you're in heavy snow the just won't move. That's what the operator would want. To be stuck in a snow storm.

I love this quote...
 
"A vehicle without TRAC in those conditions," Kwon adds. "would probably just start spinning in place and eventually spin out of control. In my opinion, it's better to have the vehicle stop then to have the wheels spinning and out of control."
 
There is no way this fool has ever lived in a part of the country that gets snow. Without traction control there are lots of tricks you can use to get moving in the snow and without losing control. With it apparently, big brother has decided it's not safe for you to continue.
 
I'm glad neither of my cars have electronic nannies. I've gone through every snowfall this year with ease.

That is positively the worst thing I could imagine a car doing in the snow.
 
Some of GM's cars come close (they also cut engine power if a wheel spins), but at least you can switch their trac control off if you want to try snow traction the old fashioned way.
 
Is this cursed approach to traction present in any vehicle using the Toyota Hybrid powertrain (Ford Escape, Nissan Altima, etc)? And do any of those vehicles allow you to switch traction control _OFF_?

I heard that the Toy Seqoia (sp) SUV does the same thing. Any truth in that?

I know of a couple of people who've had to park their Priuses up on the Front Range and drive another vehicle because many of the subdivisions and side streets still have several inches of snowpack on them from our recent parade of snowstorms here in Colorado; they can't even back their Priuses out of their driveways without the car shutting down.
The engineer who programmed this lovely little feature into the TRAC system should be fired.
And as for that idiot Toyota spokesman Kwon, he should be forced to drive a Prius in a snowstorm during rush hour in a major northern city and see if he still thinks its better that that the car cuts all power to the drivetrain when he's stranded on the side of the freeway for a few hours.

Yeah especially for us michigan residents we get lake efffect snow on top of our other types of snow that we get. I would not trust this car in Michigan during the winter. because lets pretend for a moment we are driving up a road in michigan in a prius that is very slippery from ice with a slight grade and my car begins to slip now keep in mind in other cars you usually either have
A. 4 wheel drive for you truck and SUV drivers complete with ABS and traction control
B. All wheel drive with said ABS and traction control
Do you have this luxury in the toyota? (other than the TRAC control) Nope as soon as you begin to slide the car shuts off and now you have to either restart the engine or if its a steep grade then push it up and hold up traffic. This is a serious flaw for those of us up in the snowbelt that have these cars (I'm not one of them) and it could cause accidents. And maybe Mr. Kwon does not understand how much hell snow can bring to your drive. maybe we should plop him down in one of the snowbelt states for a week and see how he handles driving in a snowstorm. And what he said is also one of the stupidest things i have ever heard. toyota should look into firing this man and replace him with someone who can actually knows what they are talking about

Kurt's right about many GM vehicles coming close. Both the 2004 Malibu LT and the 2005 Terraza fwd van have traction control systems that work this way. The Malibu never brought me to a complete stop because of it, but the van has on one occasion- going up a steep gravelled grade. When the tires started slipping it cut power until I ended up stopped. At that point I couldn't get moving again because of the system, until I switched it off, backed up a bit, and got moving (once stopped you inevitably spin quite a bit trying to get restarted from the same place, even with the system "off").
 
To say I was a bit surprised that traction "control" is equivalent to "motion stop" is an understatement. I was always under the impression that it was meant to transfer power to the non-slipping wheel. But in both these cases, it seems to simply kill power altogether, regardless of the offending drive wheel!

Oh, and the Prius definitely needs an override switch somewhere. So do any other vehicles with this specific form of TRAC that lack the switch. Otherwise finding yourself stalled out on a hill (potentially in the middle of other traffic that *isn't* stalled) can be a dangerous situation.

I'm amazed at the comments in the article and the ones above.
 
Doesn't anyone know how Traction Control works? When the wheels slip the brakes are applied. What happens when the brakes are applied in a vehicle?...?.....?......? The car doesn't go anywhere. All vehicles with TC have this 'anti-feature'.. Thus automakers put TC-disable switches into the vehicles specifically for this 'starting from a dead stop in snow' situation.
 
This specific issue has been around since the first Prius' came out. TC is a key part of the Prius due to the electric motor torque so disabling it is not an option. Beginning with 2006 models an electronic solution similar to LSD was added. Problem solved. Next issue.

Note the first two paragraphs from the article.
Quote: The Toyota Prius is known to occasionally shut down its hybrid engine system for no apparent reason, wear tires quickly and unevenly, even drain a battery dry when parked for an extended period. But here's one of the oddest Prius stories on file at ConsumerAffairs.Com: Unquote:
That first situation was the infamous software glitch which was solved in mid 2005 with a reflash on the fuel flow algorithm. Problem solved and no more occurances.
The second is a normal situation for any vehicle kept undriven for long periods....disconnect the battery...Hellooooo.
The last sentence is telling.... they pulled this occurance from their '...Prius stories on file at Consumer Affairs.' How long has this story been on file at CA? It's been known for at least 5 years and has been all over the Prius boards since the first winter. As noted above.. problem addressed and solved in 2005 with the electronic adjustment.

Actually kdhspyder, no, only *this* type of traction control works this way. Braking *both* drive wheels is stupid in the first place- originally my understanding of ABS-based TRAC is that the spinning wheel got braked, forcing the torque to be transferred to the *other* side, NOT killing forward drive altogether. But this system seems to be favored by many companies for a cheaper solution that lets them claim to have traction control. In reality it is pretty much worthless though.

Correct except that if both wheels have no traction, such as the case stated or the more common one where there has a huge snow fall blocking a vehicle in, the brakes would be applied to both wheels. This is what was occuring. This is why the TC has a disable switch in most vehicles.
 
The 2006/07 Prius' have an electronic solution that allows some wheel spinning of one or both wheels.

This isn't directly related, but Honda just announced a recall on bad voltage converters on Civic hybrids. Apparently it'll stop the Civic dead in its tracks.
 
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070208/honda_recall.html?.v=3