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Steep Hills and Stop Lights

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May have to write it off as a fluke.

I can imagine that there are some limits to the "hill hold" feature and you may have found it.

I think a hill that extreme calls for two-foot operation.

If you have a manual transmission, it might require use of the emergency brake too.

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Thanks again for the replies.

 

My home has hills but nowhere near as steep as downtown Seattle. I was trying to find one of those streets so I could Street View and show you guys but the street system is so illogical. The only way I even found it was nav taking me there randomly.

 

I can assure you that the grade was extreme. I'm going to guess 60-70 degree, if you can picture that.

 

I wonder if there is some "timeout". So for example you're sitting there with the brakes applied but because there's a red light at the peak you're there 2-3 minutes before you can go. If the Hill Assist assumes you'd be applying brakes no longer than a few seconds to a minute, that would explain what I experienced. But that'd be a huge issue. And in any event it doesn't explain why the car wouldn't accelerate immediately.

 

I have no way to replicate it for the shop because there are no super-steep Hills around. Sigh

 

If it was 60-70 degrees your front wheels would lift off the ground and your rear bumper would hit the road. Maybe that's why you couldn't get going!

 

But no, there is no timeout. The Hill Start begins when you let off the brake pedal, not when you first push it. And the steepness of the hill makes no difference, as long as it's over the 1% as described in my post above. So whatever the problem was that prevented you from going has to be with the powertrain, not the the Hill Start system. Regardless of whether you're on a hill or not, pushing the gas pedal to the floor should always make the ICE come on, so something strange was going on.

Edited by Waldo

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If it was 60-70 degrees your front wheels would lift off the ground and your rear bumper would hit the road. Maybe that's why you couldn't get going!

 

But no, there is no timeout. The Hill Start begins when you let off the brake pedal, not when you first push it. And the steepness of the hill makes no difference, as long as it's over the 1% as described in my post above. So whatever the problem was that prevented you from going has to be with the powertrain, not the the Hill Start system. Regardless of whether you're on a hill or not, pushing the gas pedal to the floor should always make the ICE come on, so something strange was going on.

 

When I say "60-70 degrees" I'm referring to what you'd see if it were a two-dimensional plane. And I'm perhaps exaggerating. Using the following:

 

post-11783-0-74032600-1411005155_thumb.png

 

I'd put it at about the 56.31 degree line. It was THAT steep. Not long either, just the length of half a city block to the top of it. But you're stopped on it if the light at the top is red and traffic is horrendous.

 

So I did pull the sticker and it does indicate Hill Start Assist should be on the car. Then again, it indicates the car should have 47MPG...which we all know now to be false. I'll schedule a visit with the service dealer in a week or so; they're already sick of me over the fuel fill inlet message...oh well.

 

Thanks again guys.

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When I say "60-70 degrees" I'm referring to what you'd see if it were a two-dimensional plane. And I'm perhaps exaggerating. Using the following:

 

attachicon.gifGrades_degrees.svg.png

 

I'd put it at about the 56.31 degree line. It was THAT steep. Not long either, just the length of half a city block to the top of it. But you're stopped on it if the light at the top is red and traffic is horrendous.

 

So I did pull the sticker and it does indicate Hill Start Assist should be on the car. Then again, it indicates the car should have 47MPG...which we all know now to be false. I'll schedule a visit with the service dealer in a week or so; they're already sick of me over the fuel fill inlet message...oh well.

 

Thanks again guys.

 

At 56 degrees all the fuel in your tank would slosh to the back and you wouldn't pick up anything if you had less than half a tank. All the oil in the oil pan would probably slosh away from the pickup as well, so maybe the traffic was from all the cars with blow engines?

 

Just googled and found this: http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/steepest.htm. Looks like the steepest street in Seattle is 28%, which is about 15 degrees. That's still pretty steep, but nowhere near 56 degrees.

 

Either way, shouldn't make any difference to your problem, but without any codes, there isn't likely anything your dealer is going to be able to do.

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