Reduced braking after car wash

[plongley]

I've read in the forum of cars having little to no brakes after washing/really wet. Tonight I experienced it and it was scary. I live on a steep hill 10% grade. It is -2C and snowy, started down the hill and had no breaks, nothing. The road was snowy but I was not sliding. As this is going on a F150 truck is coming up the hill, it's a residential street, parked cars on both sides, I start laying on my horn to let him know he steps on it, to get by the parked cars I swerve to avoid rear-ending the parked truck on one side, clipping the bumper and then side swipe a car on the other side. I know, I should have pumped the brakes, but in the moment, I didn't think to do it. The truck I hit has no damage, not so lucky for my car, the other car was a glancing blow. I know the conditions were bad, but if I could have slowed downslide a little I feel like it could have been avoided.
Just wondering if others have had experiences with no brakes and sharing a warning, guess I need to pump the brakes multiple times before leaving the driveway. Love my car, but this was not fun.

 

[SMSMD]

I've read in the forum of cars having little to no brakes after washing/really wet. Tonight I experienced it and it was scary. I live on a steep hill 10% grade. It is -2C and snowy, started down the hill and had no breaks, nothing. The road was snowy but I was not sliding. As this is going on a F150 truck is coming up the hill, it's a residential street, parked cars on both sides, I start laying on my horn to let him know he steps on it, to get by the parked cars I swerve to avoid rear-ending the parked truck on one side, clipping the bumper and then side swipe a car on the other side. I know, I should have pumped the brakes, but in the moment, I didn't think to do it. The truck I hit has no damage, not so lucky for my car, the other car was a glancing blow. I know the conditions were bad, but if I could have slowed downslide a little I feel like it could have been avoided.
Just wondering if others have had experiences with no brakes and sharing a warning, guess I need to pump the brakes multiple times before leaving the driveway. Love my car, but this was not fun.

Scary for sure...sorry for your damages. Thanks for sharing.. ...never experienced that.... will be careful henceforth

 

[Canuck]

I drove home in the same weather today as you (took me over an hour for a 20 minute commute because of all the accidents). You slid on snow and ice. My wife said a vehicle nearly slid into her when she was driving today. There was freezing rain and snow that hit frozen streets. It may have felt like you had no brakes but your tires were not moving and your brakes were working fine. You were sliding.

 

[plongley]

I drove home in the same weather today as you (took me over an hour for a 20 minute commute because of all the accidents). You slid on snow and ice. My wife said a vehicle nearly slid into her when she was driving today. There was freezing rain and snow that hit frozen streets. It may have felt like had no brakes but your tires were not moving and your brakes were working fine.

I know conditions were bad, but I was not sliding, the car was cold, i had just come out of the driveway and I had nothing.

 

[Canuck]

I know conditions were bad, but I was not sliding, the car was cold, i had just come out of the driveway and I had nothing.

You had brakes but the road was ice so when you pressed on the brake it felt like nothing happened. If you really had nothing, your foot would have hit the floor. That would have meant the brake lines were dry. They were not. You had brakes.

I've been here for 4 years and there's no reports of no brakes after washing vehicles. In fact, the opposite is true. The brakes stick due to rust but that's a different issue.

Trust me -- you slid on ice. You probably don't even have snow tires on the vehicle -- right?

 

[Electricious]

You had brakes but the road was ice so when you pressed on the brake it felt like nothing happened. If you really had nothing, your foot would have hit the floor. That would have meant the brake lines were dry. They were not. You had brakes.

I've been here for 4 years and there's no reports of no brakes after washing vehicles. In fact, the opposite is true. The brakes stick due to rust but that's a different issue.

Trust me -- you slid on ice. You probably don't even have snow tires on the vehicle -- right?

Plus the car has a redundant manual brake system as a fail safe. I agree with @Canuck and feel the title of this thread should be changes as it has more to do with the car not slowing down on ice than not having brakes.

 

[plongley]

I'll update as soon as i figure out how

 

[selfbp]

You had brakes but the road was ice so when you pressed on the brake it felt like nothing happened. If you really had nothing, your foot would have hit the floor. That would have meant the brake lines were dry. They were not. You had brakes.

I've been here for 4 years and there's no reports of no brakes after washing vehicles. In fact, the opposite is true. The brakes stick due to rust but that's a different issue.

Trust me -- you slid on ice. You probably don't even have snow tires on the vehicle -- right?

As I started reading this thread; It made me think of how my brakes were harder to push/ less effective right after I sprayed it off tonight... Didn't seem right to me but I figured it is the water on the pads. But I will check in and say I've felt it

 

[Canuck]

Look at it this way: What are the odds that his brakes failed on the same day we get a real cold spell (for our area) that first froze the streets solid, then a bit of warming, then freezing rain and snow, -- when we barely get any snow or ice on the wet coast of BC -- so most people don't even have snow tires -- we think "all-season" are snow tires -- until we get to the mountain passes where you need the snowflake symbol or can be sent back.

I have good snow tires on my RWD S but I still avoided a hill on my way home and took another route because I thought one person without proper snow tires might try it and hit me and I already had waiting months for the preferred body shop when someone changed lanes into me last year. Snow tires are designed to stay soft at low temperatures. All-season stay hard, plus put a bit of snow in them, add ice under that and voila -- the brakes on the car failed! Yeah right they did.

I'll update as soon as i figure out how

No need. We've done that. It's just too much of a coincidence to believe otherwise. But you can please tell us what tires you have.

 

[plongley]

I have all-seasons, save the lecture please.
I just having trouble getting over the fact that I was barely moving and the there was no slowing the car at all. I guess it was conditions.

 

[selfbp]

Look at it this way: What are the odds that his brakes failed on the same day we get a real cold spell (for our area) that first froze the streets solid, then a bit of warming, then freezing rain and snow, -- when we barely get any snow or ice on the wet coast of BC -- so most people don't even have snow tires -- we think "all-season" are snow tires -- until we get to the mountain passes where you need the snowflake symbol or can be sent back.

I have good snow tires on my RWD S but I still avoided a hill on my way home and took another route because I thought one person without proper snow tires might try it and hit me and I already had waiting months for the preferred body shop when someone changed lanes into me last year. Snow tires are designed to stay soft at low temperatures. All-season stay hard, plus put a bit of snow in them, add ice under that and voila -- the brakes on the car failed! Yeah right they did.



No need. We've done that. It's just too much of a coincidence to believe otherwise. But you can please tell us what tires you have.

I don't know.. I could see there may have been junk on the pads degrading their performance because he hadn't braked too hard in his general driving as a result of the weather conditions- adversely effecting the performance of the rotors and pads from not being cleaned off.

I could definitely jump to tires being the obvious cause if it were a similar situation and a ICE vehicle. Regen was the helper for this style of situation I would believe.

 

[Canuck]

I have all-seasons, save the lecture please.

Will do. But can I say "Bingo"?

 

[Canuck]

I could see there may have been junk on the pads degrading their performance because he hadn't braked too hard in his general driving as a result of the weather conditions- adversely effecting the performance of the rotors and pads from not being cleaned off.

Sure. There's a lot of possibilities. I'm dealing with probabilities.

 

[selfbp]

Sure. There's a lot of possibilities. I'm dealing with probabilities.

Maybe you should rethink your approach of opinion.

 

[Canuck]

To help save you time:

Subject: RE: Need Body Shop Referral

Here are our local Tesla certified body shops:

1. Korva World Class Collision, 231 West 2nd Ave, Vancouver. Tel: 604-877-0774

2. No. 1 Collision, 1520 West 3rd Ave, Vancouver. Tel: 604-732-6584

Hope this helps.

Thank you.

I went with Korva and was pleased with their work.

 

[Canuck]

Maybe you should rethink your approach of opinion.

Will do.

Maybe you should rethink if a bit thicker of skin is needed.

 

[plongley]

I don't know.. I could see there may have been junk on the pads degrading their performance because he hadn't braked too hard in his general driving as a result of the weather conditions- adversely effecting the performance of the rotors and pads from not being cleaned off.

I could definitely jump to tires being the obvious cause if it were a similar situation and a ICE vehicle. Regen was the helper for this style of situation I would believe.

I had very limited Regen, car was outside as the Leaf was charging in the garage.

 

[plongley]

To help save you time:



I went with Korva and was pleased with their work.

Thanks for the tip, that would be one of my next questions!
I know the conditions were a nightmare and I didn't have snow tires, it's just hard to get over being having the brake hammered and the car accelerating in a straight line towards an oncoming car with no where to go. It felt like even going sub 20kmh it couldn't slow it at all, sad and scary night.

 

[selfbp]

Will do.

Maybe you should rethink if a bit thicker of skin is needed.

SIR- YES SIR.​

 

[Canuck]

sad and scary night.

I do feel for you. Sorry for coming across as harsh. @selfbp is helping me with my attitude but I do have a lot of anx from my childhood that I like to take out on people here so he has his job cut out for him and I'm not sure he's up for the task given that he's so thin skinned...