WEBVTT Kind: captions Language: en 00:00:00.120 --> 00:00:02.336 If you’ve been following the channel for a little while, 00:00:02.336 --> 00:00:05.925 you may know that I think an awful lot about automotive lighting. 00:00:05.925 --> 00:00:10.876 Brake lights and turn signals take up far more of my brainspace than they arguably should - 00:00:10.876 --> 00:00:18.463 but, of course, when needlessly ambiguous combined stop and turn signals keep finding their way onto new car models 00:00:18.463 --> 00:00:23.163 in a world where the obviously better solution of separating those two signals 00:00:23.163 --> 00:00:29.315 into dedicated amber indicator lights for turning and dedicated red stop lamps for stopping 00:00:29.315 --> 00:00:34.320 is not only an option but in fact required in pretty much every country on the planet except for this one for some reason - 00:00:35.104 --> 00:00:36.440 well it’s prone to happen. 00:00:36.440 --> 00:00:37.935 But I’ve already made a video about that. 00:00:37.935 --> 00:00:39.051 [clunk] 00:00:39.051 --> 00:00:43.723 This video is about a whole new and entirely different brake light problem! 00:00:43.723 --> 00:00:47.705 You didn’t used to have to think about what makes a car’s brake lights come on. 00:00:47.705 --> 00:00:50.318 They came on whenever you depressed the brake pedal. 00:00:50.318 --> 00:00:55.875 And since the brake pedal was the only thing that could slow the car enough to warrant the brake lights coming on, 00:00:55.875 --> 00:00:58.758 a simple switch on that pedal was all we needed. 00:00:58.758 --> 00:01:00.942 But this is swiftly changing. 00:01:00.942 --> 00:01:04.205 Modern cars often slow down all on their own - 00:01:04.205 --> 00:01:09.595 maybe you’re using radar adaptive cruise control, or maybe the car has automatic emergency braking. 00:01:09.595 --> 00:01:13.243 Or perhaps you have an electric car with a one-pedal driving mode. 00:01:13.243 --> 00:01:18.236 And with these new features, we now have no choice but to control the brake lights with… 00:01:18.796 --> 00:01:19.686 software. 00:01:19.686 --> 00:01:23.096 [thunderclap] 00:01:23.096 --> 00:01:27.171 As the old saying goes, one man’s software is another man’s nightmare, 00:01:27.171 --> 00:01:31.693 and somebody at Hyundai (and quite possibly Kia) really dropped the ball. 00:01:31.693 --> 00:01:35.191 The way the Hyundai Ioniq 5 handles its brake lights, 00:01:35.191 --> 00:01:39.724 or at least the US-market 2022 Hyundai Ioniq 5 with software as-delivered, 00:01:39.724 --> 00:01:44.873 is so astonishingly bad that I think it warrants a recall. 00:01:44.873 --> 00:01:47.378 And I assure you that’s not hyperbole. 00:01:47.378 --> 00:01:51.081 Take a look, here I am going 60 miles an hour on a country road. 00:01:51.081 --> 00:01:54.058 And through the magic of buying two GoPros, 00:01:54.058 --> 00:01:57.048 here’s the back of the car and its third brake light. 00:01:57.048 --> 00:01:59.721 Watch as I bring the car to a stop. 00:02:00.364 --> 00:02:06.571 [A descending whirr from the electric motors as wind and road noise diminish] 00:02:06.571 --> 00:02:11.694 Notice that the brake lights have not illuminated, but the vehicle is rapidly slowing. 00:02:11.694 --> 00:02:14.716 If this accelerometer app of mine is to be believed, 00:02:14.716 --> 00:02:19.077 it’s pulling about .25G with a peak almost .3. 00:02:19.077 --> 00:02:28.109 It only takes about 13 seconds to come to a stop from 60 miles an hour, but someone following me would have no warning that I was slowing down so rapidly. 00:02:28.109 --> 00:02:30.976 In fact, they’d only get the warning once I had stopped. 00:02:33.075 --> 00:02:34.718 A little late there, bud. 00:02:35.110 --> 00:02:37.296 Why didn’t the brake lights illuminate? 00:02:37.296 --> 00:02:39.622 That’s a great question to ask Hyundai, 00:02:39.622 --> 00:02:45.371 but in the meantime I can tell you that although I was indeed commanding the car to stop, 00:02:45.371 --> 00:02:48.711 I never touched its brake pedal to do that. 00:02:48.711 --> 00:02:55.370 I was using the car’s i-Pedal mode, which is Hyundai’s Apple-esque name for one-pedal driving. 00:02:55.370 --> 00:02:57.253 I’ll explain what that is in a moment, 00:02:57.253 --> 00:03:04.129 but what’s perhaps even worse than the car’s just atrocious behavior is that, as far as I can tell, 00:03:04.129 --> 00:03:13.243 this is not actually violating any federal motor vehicle safety standards thanks to a technicality and poorly-worded, outdated regulations. 00:03:13.243 --> 00:03:14.703 Yay! 00:03:14.703 --> 00:03:20.875 To understand the problem here, first it’s important to understand what one-pedal-driving is and does. 00:03:20.875 --> 00:03:25.332 An electric car, just like any other, has an accelerator pedal and a brake pedal. 00:03:25.332 --> 00:03:29.071 And they work just like you would expect: press that one to go faster, 00:03:29.071 --> 00:03:31.232 and press that one to slow down. 00:03:31.232 --> 00:03:35.257 Hyundai even helpfully labeled them plus and minus in case you forget. 00:03:35.257 --> 00:03:39.109 In an ordinary car, the big one engages the friction brakes. 00:03:39.109 --> 00:03:47.290 But an electric car, along with most hybrids, can turn its electric motor into a generator and will use it to slow down whenever possible. 00:03:47.290 --> 00:03:53.713 This regenerative braking allows it to capture the kinetic energy of the moving car and put it back into the battery 00:03:53.713 --> 00:03:56.975 rather than just turn it into heat as brake pads do. 00:03:56.975 --> 00:03:59.557 And that makes the car more energy-efficient. 00:03:59.557 --> 00:04:05.253 The first hybrid cars (like most to this day) use the brake pedal to control this function. 00:04:05.253 --> 00:04:10.576 Rather than immediately engage with the brake master cylinder to squeeze the calipers together, 00:04:10.576 --> 00:04:17.730 the first portion of the brake pedal’s travel functions as a sensor input which gives the car a braking request value. 00:04:17.730 --> 00:04:23.342 If you stomp on the pedal and go past that sensor region it does directly engage with the friction brakes - 00:04:23.342 --> 00:04:25.722 you don’t want a computer getting in the way of that. 00:04:25.722 --> 00:04:29.722 But except in panic-stops or low-traction situations, 00:04:29.722 --> 00:04:35.175 these blended-braking systems will use the electric motor to recapture as much energy as possible 00:04:35.175 --> 00:04:40.708 before blending in the friction brakes either when you need more braking force than the motor can muster 00:04:40.708 --> 00:04:44.018 or simply to bring the car to a complete stop. 00:04:44.018 --> 00:04:47.654 But the accelerator pedal is also a computer input. 00:04:47.654 --> 00:04:53.395 It hasn’t been tugging on a real throttle cable for many years regardless of what’s powering the car - 00:04:53.395 --> 00:05:03.331 it simply tells the car’s powertrain control module essentially how much you’re pushing on it, and then the PCM does whatever it needs to do to make the car go. 00:05:03.331 --> 00:05:09.874 But now that we have regen braking in the mix, you could also use the accelerator to make the car slow down. 00:05:09.874 --> 00:05:14.622 Rather than put zero forward power at the top of the pedal’s range of motion, 00:05:14.622 --> 00:05:21.176 you can put it down a ways and make the top quarter or so of the pedal’s travel range provide a braking input, 00:05:21.176 --> 00:05:25.510 with increasing brake intensity the more you let off the pedal. 00:05:25.510 --> 00:05:30.258 Doing this allows the driver to both accelerate and slow down with the same pedal, 00:05:30.258 --> 00:05:35.807 and when implemented well, it allows you to never touch the brake pedal except in emergencies. 00:05:35.807 --> 00:05:40.102 This is cool and lots of people really like this one-pedal driving, 00:05:40.102 --> 00:05:45.894 but it means we can no longer rely on the brake pedal switch alone to turn on the brake lights. 00:05:45.894 --> 00:05:47.603 And in case you weren’t aware, 00:05:47.603 --> 00:05:50.733 a car’s brake lights ARE SUPER DUPER IMPORTANT! 00:05:50.733 --> 00:05:55.629 They warn the driver behind you that you’re slowing down - potentially quite abruptly. 00:05:55.629 --> 00:06:00.955 You want that to be clear in an instant because you’re not in control of the car behind you, 00:06:00.955 --> 00:06:02.519 somebody else is. 00:06:02.519 --> 00:06:07.810 And if you don’t give that somebody else sufficient warning that your vehicle is slowing down right now, 00:06:07.810 --> 00:06:09.772 they might just run into you. 00:06:09.772 --> 00:06:12.611 And both parties involved would rather that not happen, 00:06:12.611 --> 00:06:15.594 which is the entire reason brake lights exist, dontcha know. 00:06:15.594 --> 00:06:21.738 Now, this newfangled electrical car still has a traditional brake pedal switch like cars of old. 00:06:21.738 --> 00:06:25.068 It needs it to enable the shift interlock and the whole 00:06:25.068 --> 00:06:27.210 “depress brake to start vehicle” thing, 00:06:27.210 --> 00:06:30.539 but it will still light up the rear end nice and bright. 00:06:30.539 --> 00:06:35.178 And the car does in fact rely on it for the brake lights in some settings. 00:06:35.178 --> 00:06:44.221 When I drive the car in either its Level 0 or Level 1 regen settings, that brake pedal switch is the only thing that turns the brake lights on. 00:06:44.221 --> 00:06:46.352 Right, I should explain that. 00:06:46.352 --> 00:06:51.963 Uh, these levels here adjust how aggressively you want the vehicle to use its regenerative braking 00:06:51.963 --> 00:06:54.410 as you let off the accelerator. 00:06:54.410 --> 00:07:00.971 Electric car nerds call this "throttle-lift-off regen," and you switch between modes with these shift paddles. 00:07:00.971 --> 00:07:06.767 Level 0 provides no regen at all, and moving to level 1 is almost indistinguishable from coasting; 00:07:06.767 --> 00:07:12.684 there’s just a teeny bit of resistance, similar to what a car with a traditional automatic transmission feels like. 00:07:12.684 --> 00:07:18.840 Hit level 2, though, and now the car starts noticeably slowing down whenever you lift off the gas pedal. 00:07:18.840 --> 00:07:22.906 Enough to warrant brake light activation, and sure enough, 00:07:22.906 --> 00:07:24.461 Hyundai thought of that! 00:07:24.461 --> 00:07:28.568 In this mode, the brake lights come on once you’ve released the accelerator. 00:07:28.568 --> 00:07:31.688 You have to let off all the way, but that’s OK. 00:07:31.688 --> 00:07:37.149 Even just barely touching the gas pedal almost entirely removes the braking effect. 00:07:37.149 --> 00:07:42.569 Move up to level 3 and now the throttle-lift-off regen is getting pretty aggressive. 00:07:42.569 --> 00:07:50.280 The throttle mapping has changed enough to where you can actually modulate the amount of regen you’re getting at the top of the pedal’s travel. 00:07:50.280 --> 00:07:56.484 Yet… the brake lights are still only coming on when you’re completely off the pedal. 00:07:57.296 --> 00:07:58.916 This doesn’t bode well. 00:07:58.916 --> 00:07:59.827 No it doesn’t. 00:07:59.827 --> 00:08:02.669 But we still aren’t in one-pedal-driving mode. 00:08:02.669 --> 00:08:08.139 Although it slows you down fairly aggressively, level 3 regen will not bring the car to a stop - 00:08:08.139 --> 00:08:15.166 you need to press on the brake to stop completely, and once you let off the car will creep forward like a traditional automatic 00:08:15.166 --> 00:08:23.893 (unless, that is, you use the auto-hold function - Hyundai was not shy about giving you every conceivable option on this car). 00:08:23.893 --> 00:08:29.461 Engage the i-Pedal mode, though, and now the car offers true one-pedal driving. 00:08:29.461 --> 00:08:34.552 Let off the accelerator and the car will provide aggressive regen braking as long as it can 00:08:34.552 --> 00:08:39.993 before seamlessly engaging the friction brakes to bring you all the way to a complete stop. 00:08:39.993 --> 00:08:45.341 And I must say, the powertrain tuners over at Hyundai did an excellent job here. 00:08:45.341 --> 00:08:53.234 There’s a big range of travel in the “negative” portion of the throttle input which allows quite a lot of brake modulation with practice. 00:08:53.234 --> 00:08:54.900 And the stops it makes? 00:08:54.900 --> 00:08:56.753 Absolute perfection. 00:08:56.753 --> 00:09:04.121 It’s nearly impossible to bring a car to a complete stop without at least a little bit of jerk at the end as the brake pads lock the rotors in-place, 00:09:04.121 --> 00:09:10.701 but this car stops with as much finesse as those ultra-smooth elevators where you can’t really feel that the cab has stopped 00:09:10.701 --> 00:09:13.255 but then the doors open so apparently it did. 00:09:13.255 --> 00:09:16.035 It’s literally just like that with almost every stop. 00:09:16.035 --> 00:09:17.434 It’s amazing. 00:09:17.434 --> 00:09:18.976 But the brake lights. 00:09:18.976 --> 00:09:20.955 Somebody forgot about the brake lights! 00:09:20.955 --> 00:09:27.925 They still, even in i-Pedal mode, only come on when your foot is completely off the pedal. 00:09:27.925 --> 00:09:29.895 And this is terrible! 00:09:29.895 --> 00:09:35.216 Remember that “quite a lot of brake modulation” thing I said just a few sentences ago? 00:09:35.216 --> 00:09:42.391 Near the top of the pedal there’s a lot of regen to be had - way more than you get in levels 2 or 3. 00:09:42.391 --> 00:09:48.755 But the brake lights will not illuminate unless and until your foot is completely off the pedal, 00:09:48.755 --> 00:09:55.128 so if you stay near but not quite at the top, they just don't illuminate. 00:09:55.128 --> 00:09:57.313 And that’s bad! 00:09:57.313 --> 00:10:01.687 That’s what was going on in my 60-zero stop earlier in the video. 00:10:01.687 --> 00:10:06.269 By lifting almost-but-not-quite entirely off the gas pedal, 00:10:06.269 --> 00:10:09.220 the car slows down very aggressively. 00:10:09.220 --> 00:10:12.535 In fact, if you watch the power “gauge” 00:10:12.535 --> 00:10:18.378 you can see that the car is performing almost the maximum amount of regen braking that it can. 00:10:18.378 --> 00:10:23.911 Yet, the brake lights never lit up because I didn’t completely release the pedal. 00:10:23.911 --> 00:10:30.806 I know you’re just watching a video and seeing falling numbers on a speedometer probably won’t convey just how much the car slows down here, 00:10:30.806 --> 00:10:32.248 but it’s a lot. 00:10:32.248 --> 00:10:36.132 Enough to dislodge some loose articles in the car in an earlier take. 00:10:36.972 --> 00:10:40.169 [ka-thunk as loose articles are dislodged in this earlier take] 00:10:41.121 --> 00:10:44.291 Yet still - no brake lights. 00:10:48.209 --> 00:10:50.690 This is, quite frankly, dangerous. 00:10:50.690 --> 00:10:58.771 And it’s likely my car’s E-GMP platform mates like the Kia EV6 and Genesis GV60 have the same problem. 00:10:58.771 --> 00:11:02.965 If you use the one-pedal-driving mode, you’re risking being rear-ended, 00:11:02.965 --> 00:11:06.809 possibly getting pulled over and ticketed for malfunctioning brake lights, 00:11:06.809 --> 00:11:13.809 or even potentially being found partially at-fault in a rear-end collision if the driver who hit you can prove your brake lights weren’t working - 00:11:13.809 --> 00:11:19.924 which, with the proliferation of dashcams, is definitely not out of the question. 00:11:19.924 --> 00:11:23.064 Once I realized the car was behaving this way, 00:11:23.064 --> 00:11:29.777 which took quite a while as you generally don’t get to see what your brake lights are doing unless you’re paying close attention at night, 00:11:29.777 --> 00:11:32.230 I stopped using i-Pedal mode. 00:11:32.230 --> 00:11:38.009 Hyundai spoiled a really quite good one-pedal-driving mode with this little oversight. 00:11:38.009 --> 00:11:43.191 One reason some folks don’t like one-pedal driving is that it can be quite nauseating. 00:11:43.191 --> 00:11:49.430 Going from acceleration to braking and right back is one way to make your passengers pretty queasy, 00:11:49.430 --> 00:11:54.894 and when a one-pedal driving mode doesn’t have a decent dead-band in the center to allow for coasting 00:11:54.894 --> 00:11:59.244 and a wide-range of differing brake intensities at the top of the pedal, 00:11:59.244 --> 00:12:05.121 it’s really hard to avoid a rubber-bandy, stomach-upsety back and forth sloshing motion. 00:12:05.121 --> 00:12:10.774 But this car manages to avoid that quite well so long as you use the pedal gently. 00:12:11.530 --> 00:12:16.132 But if you’re using the pedal that gently the brake lights basically don’t work! 00:12:16.132 --> 00:12:19.556 They won't come on until you’ve come to a stop. 00:12:19.556 --> 00:12:22.391 And that’s not what they’re supposed to do! 00:12:22.391 --> 00:12:25.373 And it’s not like this is a new problem at all. 00:12:25.373 --> 00:12:31.856 You may remember that back in 2016, Chevrolet released a frumpy little egg-shaped EV called the Bolt. 00:12:31.856 --> 00:12:36.701 And from the very beginning these cars offered a fantastic one-pedal driving mode. 00:12:36.701 --> 00:12:40.160 It works just as well as Hyundai’s, perfect stops and all, 00:12:40.160 --> 00:12:45.324 although to get full regen you actually need to squeeze this little paddle on the back of the steering wheel. 00:12:45.324 --> 00:12:48.334 But, that adds its own element of fun. 00:12:48.334 --> 00:12:52.634 Now, because General Motors suffers from this chronic condition called 00:12:52.634 --> 00:12:54.198 “being GM” 00:12:54.198 --> 00:13:00.249 they thought that re-using the parts bin shifter from a Buick would be a fine way to select between drive modes so... 00:13:00.249 --> 00:13:01.845 that’s what they did. 00:13:01.845 --> 00:13:05.734 Put it in Drive and it behaves like a normal automatic, creep and all, 00:13:05.734 --> 00:13:09.653 but bump it back again to L and you’re in one-pedal mode. 00:13:09.653 --> 00:13:12.398 You know, L for one-pedal. 00:13:12.398 --> 00:13:19.306 Despite that, somebody at GM thankfully realized that a one-pedal drive mode would need a way to turn on the brake lights, 00:13:19.306 --> 00:13:28.416 so they snuck an accelerometer somewhere in the car that will activate the brake lights if the car is pulling more than about .2G of deceleration. 00:13:28.416 --> 00:13:33.571 So, when driving the Bolt in “low gear” the brake lights work just fine. 00:13:33.571 --> 00:13:36.211 They come on well before my foot is off the pedal, 00:13:36.211 --> 00:13:40.212 and in fact what the pedal is doing doesn’t actually matter at all. 00:13:40.212 --> 00:13:43.812 If that accelerometer detects enough slowing doing is happening, 00:13:43.812 --> 00:13:45.841 on go the brake lights. 00:13:45.841 --> 00:13:50.216 Truthfully, though obviously miles better than what my new car does, 00:13:50.216 --> 00:13:55.130 I think that this solution is way overcomplicated and a bit flawed. 00:13:55.130 --> 00:13:57.753 For a start, being accelerometer-based, 00:13:57.753 --> 00:14:01.123 the brake lights go out once you have come to a stop. 00:14:01.627 --> 00:14:04.557 That’s technically fine, I suppose, 00:14:04.557 --> 00:14:08.774 but living in a country where almost everybody drives an automatic transmission, 00:14:08.774 --> 00:14:14.011 being stopped in traffic without an illuminated rear-end tends to worry me a little. 00:14:14.011 --> 00:14:21.561 Supposedly this was fixed for 2022 model Bolts, and hopefully GM continues that behavior with their new EV offerings. 00:14:21.561 --> 00:14:26.753 But my bigger question is - why did you use an accelerometer at all? 00:14:26.753 --> 00:14:33.076 Just use the accelerator pedal position and turn on the brake lights when it’s somewhere that requests regen braking. 00:14:33.300 --> 00:14:37.033 When I first got my new car, I thought that’s what Hyundai had done. 00:14:37.033 --> 00:14:44.684 One of the first things I did was take it out at night and watch the rear window glass to see what the brake lights were doing with one-pedal-mode engaged. 00:14:44.684 --> 00:14:50.142 I could tell that they were behaving based on the pedal position, and they stayed on when stopped, so I thought 00:14:50.142 --> 00:14:54.138 “good job, Hyundai, you didn’t overthink this like GM did”. 00:14:54.138 --> 00:15:00.528 But I didn’t realize that they were only coming on when the pedal was all-the-way let off until, 00:15:00.528 --> 00:15:03.214 well, until a couple of months ago actually. 00:15:03.214 --> 00:15:07.701 Now I realize they underthought this by a staggering degree. 00:15:07.701 --> 00:15:12.285 Now, so far I’ve been talking about electric cars and their one-pedal driving mode, 00:15:12.285 --> 00:15:17.965 but remember that there are plenty of combustion-powered cars out there with adaptive cruise control. 00:15:17.965 --> 00:15:22.444 Those cars will automatically adjust speed and following distance to the car ahead, 00:15:22.444 --> 00:15:26.732 letting you drive miles and miles without touching any pedals. 00:15:26.732 --> 00:15:33.428 Those systems need the capability to brake quite aggressively in case you get cut off or if there’s sudden traffic, 00:15:33.428 --> 00:15:37.350 so they most definitely need a way to turn on the brake lights. 00:15:37.350 --> 00:15:40.785 Luckily, this wasn’t something Hyundai overlooked. 00:15:40.785 --> 00:15:48.727 The brake lights perform just fine when using adaptive cruise control, so it’s really only the i-Pedal mode that’s problematic in my car. 00:15:48.727 --> 00:15:50.932 And honestly that sorta makes sense 00:15:50.932 --> 00:15:57.267 as Hyundai puts the same highway driving assist technology that my car has in plenty of their conventional cars, 00:15:57.267 --> 00:15:59.857 and I doubt the systems are all that different. 00:16:00.480 --> 00:16:03.466 But… does that actually make sense? 00:16:03.466 --> 00:16:10.466 Why would the car turn on the brake lights without brake pedal input when using adaptive cruise, but notin one-pedal driving? 00:16:10.466 --> 00:16:15.333 I can’t claim to know Hyundai's thought process or motivations, 00:16:15.333 --> 00:16:20.910 but in the regulations that govern when stop lamps are required to illuminate here in the US, 00:16:20.910 --> 00:16:25.747 there’s a key distinction between service brakes and supplemental brakes. 00:16:25.747 --> 00:16:28.379 Strap in, folks, we’re gettin’ in the weeds. 00:16:28.379 --> 00:16:35.660 Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 108; Lamps, reflective devices, and associated equipment states that 00:16:35.660 --> 00:16:41.379 Stop Lamps are to be steady-burning and must be activated upon application of the service brakes. 00:16:42.359 --> 00:16:43.254 That’s it. 00:16:43.254 --> 00:16:48.657 There’s no standard for G-force or meters per second squared deceleration or anything like that, 00:16:48.657 --> 00:16:52.695 they just have to come on when you apply the service brakes. 00:16:52.695 --> 00:16:54.270 But what are the service brakes? 00:16:54.270 --> 00:16:56.010 What does that mean? 00:16:56.010 --> 00:17:00.418 Well, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 105 says 00:17:00.418 --> 00:17:05.225 “Each vehicle must be equipped with a service brake system acting on all wheels. 00:17:05.225 --> 00:17:10.683 Wear of the service brake must be compensated for by means of a system of automatic adjustment.” 00:17:10.683 --> 00:17:14.980 So, in other words, they just mean the regular ol’ brakes. 00:17:14.980 --> 00:17:17.569 But, of course, that’s kind of ambiguous. 00:17:17.569 --> 00:17:23.018 Regenerative braking systems often don’t actually engage the friction brakes until necessary, 00:17:23.018 --> 00:17:30.859 and since many hybrids and EVs are two-wheel drive, regen braking wouldn’t be considered acting upon all wheels. 00:17:30.859 --> 00:17:40.678 Doin’ a Ctrl-F on standard 105 reveals that regenerative braking is a thing the standards writers are aware of, so that’s good I guess. 00:17:40.678 --> 00:17:43.278 But is that part of the service brakes? 00:17:43.278 --> 00:17:45.379 Well… it depends. 00:17:45.379 --> 00:17:52.954 The standard says that “For an EV equipped with RBS, the RBS is considered to be part of the service brake system 00:17:52.954 --> 00:18:01.662 if it is automatically controlled by an application of the service brake control, if there is no means provided for the driver to disconnect or otherwise deactivate it, 00:18:01.662 --> 00:18:06.943 and if it is activated in all transmission positions, including neutral.” 00:18:06.943 --> 00:18:08.579 And there we have it. 00:18:08.579 --> 00:18:15.326 When using adaptive cruise control, my car is almost certainly applying an automated input to the service brake system, 00:18:15.326 --> 00:18:21.774 as would be the case for any Hyundai that’s not electric, so the brake lights must and will activate. 00:18:21.774 --> 00:18:28.744 But since its one-pedal driving mode can be deactivated, and it also doesn’t work when the car is in neutral (I tried), 00:18:28.744 --> 00:18:31.940 that’s not considered part of its service brakes. 00:18:31.940 --> 00:18:36.100 So, technically, it’s not required to light up the rear end. 00:18:36.100 --> 00:18:40.721 It’s not actually violating anything by having brake lights that don’t always work. 00:18:41.533 --> 00:18:45.417 This is utterly and completely bonkers and needs to be fixed ASAP. 00:18:46.061 --> 00:18:49.150 You don’t even need to rely on my interpretation here. 00:18:49.150 --> 00:18:56.359 Back in 2009, a lawyer for Eaton asked the NHTSA for clarification on when the brake lights should activate 00:18:56.359 --> 00:19:02.993 as Eaton was working on some sort of hydraulic regenerative launch system thingy called Hydraulic Launch Assist. 00:19:02.993 --> 00:19:08.895 It wasn’t a regenerative braking system as defined by standard 105 because it wasn’t electric, 00:19:08.895 --> 00:19:16.382 which meant it definitely wasn’t part of the service brakes, and they wanted to know whether the brake lights should come on when using it. 00:19:16.382 --> 00:19:24.067 NHTSA wrote back that “Because the HLA system is a supplemental brake system (i.e., not the service brakes), 00:19:24.067 --> 00:19:30.250 the standard does not require the stop lamps to be activated upon activation of the HLA system.” 00:19:31.118 --> 00:19:36.837 Couldn’t be any plainer, if it’s not the service brakes then the brake lights don’t matter. 00:19:36.837 --> 00:19:39.357 However, they went on to say that 00:19:39.357 --> 00:19:44.733 “We note, consistent with past interpretations, that FMVSS No. 108 00:19:44.733 --> 00:19:53.634 does not prohibit the activation of the stop lamps when the HLA system is retarding the speed of the vehicle after the accelerator has been released. 00:19:53.634 --> 00:20:06.237 The SAE Recommended Practices on stop lamps that are incorporated by reference into Standard No. 108, SAE J586 and SAE J1398, define stop lamps as 00:20:06.237 --> 00:20:12.808 lamps which indicate the intention of the operator of a vehicle to stop or diminish speed by braking. 00:20:12.808 --> 00:20:18.313 If the vehicle is designed so that release of the accelerator results in braking action from the HLA, 00:20:18.313 --> 00:20:23.743 we believe this condition can be viewed as an intention by the operator to diminish speed by braking.” 00:20:24.611 --> 00:20:26.007 So, in other words: 00:20:26.007 --> 00:20:29.725 you can turn on the brake lights, but you don’t have to. 00:20:29.725 --> 00:20:35.830 Clearly the SAE has a much more reasonable understanding of what the stop lamps are for - 00:20:35.830 --> 00:20:42.617 they warn other drivers that you’re slowing down, and not that “you’ve applied the vehicle’s service brake system”. 00:20:42.617 --> 00:20:47.147 But the problem here is that the SAE isn’t a regulatory body. 00:20:47.147 --> 00:20:51.282 They’re just, like, some society of engineers or something 00:20:51.282 --> 00:20:55.475 and they can make recommendations but not law. 00:20:55.475 --> 00:21:03.665 So whether and how the brake lights work when using a one-pedal driving mode is entirely up to automakers right now, 00:21:03.665 --> 00:21:06.316 and that should not be a decision left up to automakers 00:21:06.316 --> 00:21:08.690 because apparently they suck at it. 00:21:08.690 --> 00:21:11.841 They might really overcomplicate things like GM did, 00:21:11.841 --> 00:21:15.337 or they might completely forget about it like Hyundai did. 00:21:15.337 --> 00:21:17.938 There’s even a third option! 00:21:17.938 --> 00:21:21.868 We now have a bit of a “boy who cried wolf” problem on our hands. 00:21:21.868 --> 00:21:28.055 I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but some electric cars activate their brake lights way too frequently. 00:21:28.055 --> 00:21:35.044 My presumption is that these cars are simply too sensitive and kick them on with the tiniest amounts of deceleration. 00:21:35.044 --> 00:21:42.648 That is arguably just as bad at not having brake lights at all because that diminishes the urgency and importance of the signal. 00:21:43.656 --> 00:21:45.736 You know what would really clear this up? 00:21:45.736 --> 00:21:50.106 A regulation based on the vehicle’s actual rate of deceleration. 00:21:50.106 --> 00:21:54.767 And here’s, after digging through all these regulations, where my mind was blown. 00:21:54.767 --> 00:22:00.960 I thought to myself, “surely Europe, the land of the amber turn signal, will have thought of this.” 00:22:00.960 --> 00:22:03.494 Guess what? You haven’t either! 00:22:03.494 --> 00:22:06.450 As a matter of fact, your regulations are even worse than ours 00:22:06.450 --> 00:22:15.848 because they actually FORBID activation of the brake lights specifically(!) when slowing down an electric vehicle with regenerative braking. 00:22:15.848 --> 00:22:18.350 Look, Regulation No. 13-H, 00:22:18.350 --> 00:22:22.226 Uniform provisions concerning the approval of passenger cars with regard to braking 00:22:22.226 --> 00:22:27.652 section 5.2.22, Generation of a braking signal to illuminate stop lamps. 00:22:27.652 --> 00:22:29.408 Things were looking good here with 00:22:29.408 --> 00:22:35.115 “Activation of the service braking system by ‘automatically commanded braking’ shall generate the signal mentioned above. 00:22:35.115 --> 00:22:41.418 However, when the retardation generated is less than 0.7 m/s2, the signal may be suppressed.” 00:22:41.418 --> 00:22:45.792 You specifically mentioned .7 meters per second squared, great job! 00:22:45.792 --> 00:22:48.525 But then you spoiled it with 00:22:48.525 --> 00:22:57.365 “Electric regenerative braking systems, which produce a retarding force upon release of the throttle pedal, shall not generate a signal mentioned above.” 00:22:58.597 --> 00:23:00.106 WHYYYY??? 00:23:00.610 --> 00:23:06.247 I can only presume that whoever wrote that sentence as well as all of the members involved in approving that regulation 00:23:06.247 --> 00:23:10.930 had never driven an electric car because this is beyond absurd. 00:23:10.930 --> 00:23:18.552 Regenerative braking is quite strong with modern EVs and absolutely warrants activating the brake lights - 00:23:18.552 --> 00:23:22.668 may I remind you I was able to stop my car from 60 miles an hour 00:23:22.668 --> 00:23:25.025 (that’s 96 and a half kilometers an hour) 00:23:25.025 --> 00:23:26.458 in 13 seconds 00:23:26.458 --> 00:23:28.361 (or 13 seconds). 00:23:28.361 --> 00:23:36.401 It is absolutely astounding that anyone would FORBID the generation of a signal to activate the brake lights in that situation 00:23:36.401 --> 00:23:39.497 merely because it was throttle-lift-off regen, 00:23:39.497 --> 00:23:46.997 especially when my car’s average rate of deceleration was about .25G, or about 2.4 meters per second squared 00:23:46.997 --> 00:23:57.212 which is a lot higher than the 0.7 m/s2 you just mentioned as the threshold by which that signal may be suppressed by an “automatically commanded braking” occurrence. 00:23:57.212 --> 00:23:59.565 This is just bonkers! 00:23:59.565 --> 00:24:02.885 And wouldn’t ya know it, I’m not the only one who thinks so. 00:24:02.885 --> 00:24:07.713 A proposed update to UN regulation 13-H wants to clear this up. 00:24:07.713 --> 00:24:15.890 In this lovely powerpoint I found, it is very correctly pointed out that “The stop lamp signal should reflect the intention to decelerate.” 00:24:15.890 --> 00:24:21.576 and that “The driver of a following vehicle does not care about the kind of braking!” 00:24:21.576 --> 00:24:24.981 I mean, yeah! I thought that was obvious! 00:24:24.981 --> 00:24:33.691 So, they’d like to eliminate all this gobbledygook and simply make it such that if the car is slowing down by more than 1.3 meters per second squared, 00:24:33.691 --> 00:24:40.791 the signal SHALL be generated regardless of what propels the vehicle or why it might be slowing. 00:24:40.791 --> 00:24:43.116 Hopefully this proposed change gets adopt - 00:24:43.116 --> 00:24:44.218 What? Excuse me? 00:24:45.366 --> 00:24:46.731 It did? 00:24:46.731 --> 00:24:48.294 Ju. jus.. just back in March? 00:24:48.294 --> 00:24:49.693 Really? 00:24:49.693 --> 00:24:53.168 Why did I get this document then when I was looking for... 00:24:53.168 --> 00:24:55.424 Ah, Google, being screwy again. 00:24:55.424 --> 00:24:56.571 OK, um... 00:24:56.571 --> 00:24:57.378 Hm. 00:24:57.378 --> 00:25:00.973 Well I guess I got a little overly animated just now. 00:25:00.973 --> 00:25:03.320 But it did take you quite a while - 00:25:03.320 --> 00:25:09.667 EVs with serious regen braking abilities and one-pedal drive modes have been around for about a decade now. 00:25:09.667 --> 00:25:12.466 But at least you got around to fixing it. 00:25:12.466 --> 00:25:15.946 Ah, but did you fix the boy who cried wolf problem? 00:25:15.946 --> 00:25:17.530 I’m not sure you did. 00:25:17.530 --> 00:25:22.866 Yeah, the brake lights shall come on when exceeding 1.3 m/s/s deceleration, 00:25:22.866 --> 00:25:26.549 but you said they “may” come on at rates below. 00:25:26.549 --> 00:25:32.312 I see you thought to make sure there are methods to prevent the lights from flashing erratically or flickering or whatever, 00:25:32.312 --> 00:25:36.719 but honestly I think you should have defined a minimum deceleration value. 00:25:36.719 --> 00:25:40.009 We don’t need them coming on when people are just coasting. 00:25:40.009 --> 00:25:43.545 Still, this is much much better - and good job! 00:25:43.545 --> 00:25:47.555 We here in the U S of A still have a lot of work to do. 00:25:47.555 --> 00:25:56.037 If any of you watching happen to know someone who works at NHTSA, the US DOT, or otherwise has sway over the federal motor vehicle safety standards, 00:25:56.037 --> 00:25:58.158 please send this video to them. 00:25:58.158 --> 00:26:05.166 And maybe also the one on the combined stop and turn signals - removing signal ambiguity decreases reaction time 00:26:05.166 --> 00:26:09.922 which is actually important when operating a two ton machine at 70 miles an hour. 00:26:10.286 --> 00:26:14.890 I do not understand how we still find this arrangement acceptable. 00:26:14.890 --> 00:26:18.484 Also, if you are one of the people in charge of this stuff, 00:26:18.484 --> 00:26:20.635 please for the love of god get to work. 00:26:20.635 --> 00:26:24.176 My car should frankly not be allowed on the road as it is, 00:26:24.176 --> 00:26:26.958 yet there’s nothing on the books to say otherwise. 00:26:26.958 --> 00:26:29.086 And that’s not OK. 00:26:29.086 --> 00:26:30.756 And to circle back to the beginning, 00:26:30.756 --> 00:26:36.055 I said I think Hyundai should recall this car - and I still think that. 00:26:36.055 --> 00:26:42.330 But based on what I’ve uncovered there’s technically no reason Hyundai would have to. 00:26:42.330 --> 00:26:50.731 Still, that doesn’t mean it’s safe to drive this car in the i-Pedal mode, and I would urge Hyundai to voluntarily recall these vehicles 00:26:50.731 --> 00:26:56.967 and perform a software update to make the brake lights actually work in a sensible fashion. 00:26:56.967 --> 00:27:01.364 I think we urgently need regulations similar to the ones Europe just adopted. 00:27:01.364 --> 00:27:04.426 That way nobody will make a car like this again. 00:27:04.426 --> 00:27:09.429 But until that happens, if you’re an automaker producing cars for people to drive, 00:27:09.429 --> 00:27:13.975 please think a little harder about what brake lights are for. 00:27:13.975 --> 00:27:18.874 It’s frankly inexcusable, Hyundai, that you would release this product as is. 00:27:18.874 --> 00:27:23.233 I mean, if GM could figure it out back in 2016… 00:27:23.233 --> 00:27:30.030 Now, I do want to reiterate that although my car is an EV, and I expect lots more to be sold in the coming years, 00:27:30.030 --> 00:27:34.598 there’s more than just the one-pedal driving mode that we need to be thinking about. 00:27:34.598 --> 00:27:40.683 The first time I drove a car with adaptive cruise control I really didn’t think about the brake lights at all, 00:27:40.683 --> 00:27:44.112 and in hindsight I probably should have. 00:27:44.112 --> 00:27:50.965 As technology changes, we can no longer rely on a simple switch on the brake pedal for brake light activation, 00:27:50.965 --> 00:27:58.308 and as we’ve seen regulatory bodies are a little slow to respond - if they do at all. 00:27:58.308 --> 00:28:02.360 To anyone out there who drives any kind of car that does its own braking, 00:28:02.360 --> 00:28:07.278 I would encourage you to figure out what the brake lights do as it slows down. 00:28:07.278 --> 00:28:09.693 Maybe have a friend follow you in another car, 00:28:09.693 --> 00:28:15.456 or perhaps go out at night (when it’s safe) and see what you can see in the rearview mirror. 00:28:15.456 --> 00:28:18.853 Nissan, as it turns out, put in a little display in their new Ariya 00:28:18.853 --> 00:28:21.319 that will show you what the brake lights are doing - 00:28:21.319 --> 00:28:25.605 and I’m the type of guy to think that’s a pretty useful idea actually. 00:28:25.605 --> 00:28:30.254 You may want to adjust your driving style depending on what you find out. 00:28:30.254 --> 00:28:31.969 I know I did. 00:28:31.969 --> 00:28:35.069 Thanks for watching, use your turn signals, 00:28:35.069 --> 00:28:36.885 and drive safely. 00:28:37.725 --> 00:28:40.325 ♫ ham-fistedly smooth jazz ♫ 00:28:41.836 --> 00:28:46.779 You could put it down a ways and make the top quarter or so of the paddle’s 00:28:46.779 --> 00:28:47.977 pedals... 00:28:47.977 --> 00:28:49.694 But the accelerator pedal... 00:28:49.694 --> 00:28:52.422 but the accelerator pedal yeahgrgrlbgrglyagabadaHH 00:28:52.422 --> 00:28:57.707 The standard does not require the stop lamps to be activated upon adivatiofehfehhfehha 00:28:57.707 --> 00:29:01.773 It’s not actually violating any federal motor vehicle safety standards 00:29:01.773 --> 00:29:04.660 thanks to a technicality and poorly warded… 00:29:04.660 --> 00:29:05.992 warded? 00:29:06.860 --> 00:29:08.235 Welp! 00:29:08.235 --> 00:29:14.486 The obviously better solution of separating those two signals into dedicated amber inder lights. 00:29:14.486 --> 00:29:16.384 Inderlights? OK. 00:29:16.384 --> 00:29:20.360 If the driver who hit you can prove your brake lights weren’t working. 00:29:20.360 --> 00:29:23.028 Which, with the perliferolphh. 00:29:23.952 --> 00:29:25.744 That’s, why did I write “proliferation?” 00:29:27.171 --> 00:29:30.569 When it comes to brake lights, these Hyundai's aren't too bright. 00:29:30.569 --> 00:29:31.882 Get it? 00:29:31.882 --> 00:29:36.126 Because, like, the rear of the car is dark but also it's not smart? 00:29:36.126 --> 00:29:40.000 But hey, our lighting regulations are also not that bright. 00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:44.106 In more ways than one.