Quote:
Originally Posted by aigel
Reminder that most, if not all modern cars and trucks are throttle by wire. Nobody worried about that?
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Less of a worry than brakes and steering.
If the throttle stops working (goes to 0%), you slowly drift down in speed, but you're still able to steer or hit the brakes. If the throttle goes to 100%, you can still hit the brakes, steer, and put the car in neutral.
If the steering stops working and centers itself, whether you can still accelerate and brake, it is unlikely to be a comfort if you're in traffic on a multilane road or in the middle of a curve or driving down a narrow road through a forest or between a bunch of buildings.
If the steering stops working and goes full right or left, whether you can still accelerate or brake under a lot of situations it's going to suck.
Braking is similar. If you're toodling down the freeway or a street in a busy retail area or a residential area, and you suddenly find that you have no brakes, that's likely to suck. Hopefully, there would still be some sort of mechanical "emergency brake". At least you still probably have steering and the transmission (assuming it's a car where you can put the tranny in a lower gear than "D".
Brakes-by-wire without adequate redundancy in the system would suck.
Steering-by-wire without adequate redundancy in the system would likely be as bad or maybe even worse.
Throttle by wire failure would also suck, but likely not nearly as bad as either of the other two.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure I've had throttle-by-wire since about 2000 (I think our first may have been a '97 Pontiac Grand Am).