Traction control is definitely annoying and would love to eliminate it completely.

 

Ditto.^^^^

 

I feel like you guys have little understanding of how it works. On the one hand, all of you guys seem to want a locker, but nobody wants traction control. Well, traction control "simulates" a locker.

For example, lets say you are parked on a street, facing uphill, with your right wheels against the curb. Because of water running in the curb / gutter area, both your right wheels are parked on ice, and as you continue uphill, they will continue to be on ice. Your left wheels, however, are on pavement.

You hop in, engage 4x4, and attempt to take off. Of course, only the right front and right rear wheels spin, because of the open differentials in your Super Duty, and you go nowhere. Unfortunately, your truck did not come fitted with the selectable rear locker, so this is not an option.

Nevertheless, traction control will get you going and up the hill. While applying steady part throttle, the system detects a major wheel speed difference between left and right wheels. If you are too hard on the throttle, the PCM will reduce throttle input to a reasonable level, and begin pulsing the brakes only on the right wheels. As the brakes are applied to the right wheels, traction is forced by law of the open differential to the left side, which has good traction, and so you begin to creep up the hill. The pulsing rapidly causes a brief wheel turn on the traction side and then a brief turn on the slippery side, so the wheels are "almost" turning together. Throttle is limited for several reasons - it keep the system functioning longer by not overheating your brakes as quickly, and it prevents severe "shocking" of your differentials and axle half shafts by the rapid switching of traction sides.

There may be times when it is not helpful, such as mud or sand; that is why they let you shut it off. But it is a valuable feature which I would be unhappy if it did not exist.

 

After I start my truck the first thing I do is shut off traction control. I find annoying especially when plowing snow or off road.

 

I know exactly how it works and don't care for it at all. You are correct in how traction control works up to a point. It works nothing like a locker. A locker applies 100% of torque to each wheel. Exactly the opposite of traction control. This is America. Land of the free. I, for one, would prefer to be free to choose if I want traction control, ABS or tire monitors on my vehicle. It appears most of the people using their trucks in a less urban areas also prefer this. I don't use mine as an urban station wagon and would prefer it react like a truck. I'm glad you like traction control. I just don't want to have big brother tell me what I have installed on my truck. Luckily, since I know how it operates and I also know how to defeat it 100% without using the dash button.

 

It applies 0% torque to no wheels?

Regardless, he's 100% correct. The result of the locker is to divert 50% of incoming torque in the differential to each axle shaft. The result of traction control is to reduce the speed of whichever tire is spinning too fast, so that the most possible torque is provided to whichever tire has a little bit better grip, and it's recalculating continually, many times per second. In some scenarios that's preferable to a locker, in fact. The end result is the essentially the same. Maybe you could look into how differentials work.

Not sure what "big brother" has to do with it.

 

Traction control reduces power, torque, to operate. You should check this out.

http://www.offroaders.com/tech/locking-differential.htm

 

That's one function of traction control, yes, to reduce throttle input when you're pushing it harder than can be turned into traction. I know well how a differential works and the workings and effects and ideal applications for the different mechanical and electronic traction aids, including differential locking mechanisms. Are you familiar with cutting brakes, for example? How and why they work, not just for turning but for arresting a free-spinning wheel? If you think all traction control does is shut down the throttle, then you're misinformed.

 

In some cases, its not true at all. My background in off-road driving is with Land Rovers, for many years, and on many challenging trails. The Discovery II from 1999 - 2004 utilized 4-wheel traction control. It did not intervene with the throttle control at all. Never was power reduced. Only the brake pulsing occurred which could be tremendously successful at moving the vehicle forward.

Personally, I prefer a mechanical means to lock front and rear axles together, but I like traction control. The reduction of power is not always a negative thing - most people think spinning wheels somehow gets them unstuck. Typically, it gets them more stuck. There are some cases when momentum will carry you forward, and then the tire spinning is important. That is why there is almost always an "off" button.

 

If any of you differential and TC experts had any sense at all you would know the true problem does not lie with big brother, little sister, pulsing brakes, throttle reduction, 100% of traction applied to 0% of the wheels on the 3rd Thursday after the 2nd Tuesday on every 6th month. The problem is that other driver on the road

Traction control was designed to help prevent vehicle related deaths, just like the seatbelt and the airbags, and as long as they continue to show statistically that these aids make any sort of positive impact, then not only will they stick, they will continue to develop.

I'm not the biggest fan myself of traction control, transmission control modules, auto-braking, automatic transmissions, or even OBD II for my personal use, subsequently I'm glad they're standard option on all new vehicles because it improves my safety for Mamaw to be in a new 2016 Cadillac that will hit the brakes for her to prevent her from T-boning my Super Duty that she somehow didn't see vs 1995 model Mamaw plowing through me in her Fleetwood that didn't know how to hit the brakes on it's own. It's better for my wife and 2 kids to be in that vehicle that meticulously cuts power and applies the brake to the front right tire at 65 mph on the highway while she was eating breakfast, putting a paci in the baby's mouth, and touching up her makeup, in order to keep the vehicle moving in a straight line and get them home safely.

WFO338, DKF, and the rest of ya'll....not everybody enjoys "DRIVING" like we do, the average American seeks pleasure at point A and point B, and the vehicle is just a tool to get them there. Those of us that enjoy what's in between Point A and Point B are rare.

So let them have their big brother mandated mods, and we will much better be able to enjoy our drives............did ya'll go down to the barber shop and complain about big brother when seat belts became mandatory too?

 

Hey coach, sounds like the one confused is you. Traction control doesn't prevent deaths at all, it just gets you unstuck (sometimes).

I believe what you are trying to describe is electronic stability control. Although it uses the same "hardware pieces" as traction control, what it does is completely different.

 

.......so you're telling me that the Traction Control systems on modern vehicles are defined as a system that "gets you unstuck sometimes?" Or is it "A traction control system, is typically a secondary function of the electronic stability control on production motor vehicles, designed to prevent loss of traction of driven road wheels."

In which case cutting power to prevent loss of traction helps prevent wrecks, which helps prevent deaths.


Newsflash......no Ford engineer is working on developing a system to put on all Ford vehicles to "get you unstuck sometimes"

 

The issue isn't the issue. It's operator selectability. So long as it can be turned OFF or ON there isn't a total fail/problem. In a similar way, there are 40 gazillion defective air bags being recalled right now due to shrapnel killing drivers in a crash.

The goddamn thing is hardwired in, no way to turn it off. That's nuts. This is a dramatic example but the principle is the same.

 

Here's the order of operations by invention: ABS, traction control, stability control. Traction Control and Stability Control are both adaptations of the ABS system, but both perform, once again, completely different functions. Traction Control has the sole purpose of helping you to get unstuck or to not get stuck in slippery or off-road conditions. For quite a while, vehicles would come equipped with traction control but not stability control. Finally, technology progressed to the invention of the Stability Control system (by the Germans).

Eventually, the government mandated Stability Control, and that is why we see it everywhere. Traction Control was never mandated, but with Stability Control a requirement, traction control could be added for essentially a few lines of programming and no extra hardware.

Stability Control cuts engine power and applies selective brakes to prevent oversteer or understeer based upon a steering angle sensor located in the column, a yaw sensor located in the roof, and sometimes other sensor or calculated data. So Stability Control does not attempt to maintain "traction," but rather it attempts to prevent a spin-out, roll-over, or slide off the road from taking a corner to hot.

 

Good to know my ex wife's 01 accord came with traction control to help her take it mud riding

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.