Hi got 2019 Focus and every now and again Autohold turns itself off so when you park the car the electric parking brake doesn't apply. Anyone else had this and know a fix for it?

I've had this, and seen it on here a few times as well.

Could be due to low battery.  Though my personal thoughts are that it's just a bit glitchy.

Just now, TomsFocus said:

I've had this, and seen it on here a few times as well.

Could be due to low battery.  Though my personal thoughts are that it's just a bit glitchy.

It's driving me mad, keep thinking I must be catching the Autohold button when i get in and out of the car

If it always works during your journey but not at the very end then either you are switching it off or not applying the Footbrake hard enough when parking slowly.

Personally I just flick the switch up to apply the Handbrake when taking it out of gear at the end of a journey, I don't need to think about it, it's second nature now.

Im probably wrong but i always thought that the  auto hold button was done on the foot brakes only, for hill starts etc?

 

Just now, Ecosport2019 said:

Im probably wrong but i always thought that the  auto hold button was done on the foot brakes for hill starts etc?

 

You are correct, it does not operate the Electric Handbrake, but there is a failsafe built into the system so that if the car starts rolling because you are on a steep hill and Auto hold was on but you didn't press the Footbrake very hard then the Handbrake will be applied automatically if the car detects movement.

If Auto hold is on and you leave the car, doing things in a certain order then the Handbrake will apply also.

The Book says that you are meant to apply it with the switch but most people ignore that and think it automatically applies as well as releases.

Thats good to know 👍

If you switch the engine off with autohold active,  the EPB should apply despite what the handbook says. 

I can't understand why Ford say it shouldn't, must just be a backside-covering thing.  VAGs EPB also applies when you switch the engine off.

There is also a difference in how the various systems behave and operate depending on whether the car is manual or automatic.

Just for general information: The foot brake (service brake) operates the brakes on all 4 wheels. The Electric handbrake (electric parking brake) operates only on the rear wheels. The Hill Start Assist OR Auto Hold (the two things are quite different) operate only on the front wheels.

 

 

1 hour ago, Tizer said:

If it always works during your journey but not at the very end then either you are switching it off or not applying the Footbrake hard enough when parking slowly.

Personally I just flick the switch up to apply the Handbrake when taking it out of gear at the end of a journey, I don't need to think about it, it's second nature now.

Need to get in that routine

38 minutes ago, unofix said:

There is also a difference in how the various systems behave and operate depending on whether the car is manual or automatic.

Just for general information: The foot brake (service brake) operates the brakes on all 4 wheels. The Electric handbrake (electric parking brake) operates only on the rear wheels. The Hill Start Assist OR Auto Hold (the two things are quite different) operate only on the front wheels.

 

 

Agree, but if autohold is selected and the button is lit up, when i pull up on the drive and apply the foot brake, the parking brake is automatically applied when the ignition is switched off. When it doesn't work and I look at the autohold button it is not illuminated but i haven't pressed it to switch it off?

48 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

If you switch the engine off with autohold active,  the EPB should apply despite what the handbook says.

That's the point I was trying to make, if Auto hold is not active then the Handbrake will not apply.

If you coast to a halt or reverse with the door open then neither will apply. I've parallel parked in  tight spaces at slow speed  and Auto hold/Electronic Handbrake has not applied, hence why I do what I do.

The Handbook is correct, you apply it with the switch even though there are limited failsafes.

15 minutes ago, tomo2001 said:

Agree, but if autohold is selected and the button is lit up, when i pull up on the drive and apply the foot brake, the parking brake is automatically applied when the ignition is switched off. When it doesn't work and I look at the autohold button it is not illuminated but i haven't pressed it to switch it off?

Are you sure that it has not deactivated itself at some time during the journeys, it seems strange that it only happens at the end of a journey.

I didn't think the light stayed on when the Ignition was off, but I might be wrong about that. I think  the red on on the Dashboard does stay on though.

1 hour ago, tomo2001 said:

Agree, but if autohold is selected and the button is lit up, when i pull up on the drive and apply the foot brake, the parking brake is automatically applied when the ignition is switched off. When it doesn't work and I look at the autohold button it is not illuminated but i haven't pressed it to switch it off?

I really can't comment on the behavior of your EPB if your car is a manual as I have no experience with that model.

With the Automatic gearbox the EPB never automatically applies it's self no matter whether the Auto Hold is on or off. This is maybe because the car automatically selects Park as soon as the ignition is switched off.

I very rarely use the EPB other than when parking on a very steep hill, but as I discovered recently this is not with out it's own problems. While having to reverse out of a parking bay going up hill the EPB refused to automatically release, meaning I had to manually press the leaver down which then did remove the EPB. However the problem then was that Auto Hold (which was on) then refused to engage, and it was a hair raising moment trying to get the car to reverse uphill requiring me to use the foot brake with my left foot while applying the accelerator with my right foot. 😧

Back to your original post of Auto Hold randomly switching it's self off. Yes mine also does that. If on the rare occasion I do apply the EPB then I find that nearly always the Auto Hold will be off next time I come to use it. Also I've not counted it, but after about every 30 ignition cycles it turns off. I've not been able to find any reason for this behavior and I can say with absolute confidence that on my car at least it's not because of a low battery.

15 minutes ago, unofix said:

...it was a hair raising moment trying to get the car to reverse uphill requiring me to use the foot brake with my left foot while applying the accelerator with my right foot. 

Which autobox do you have?  Even without autohold it shouldn't roll forwards in reverse should it? 😮

I hated autohold with DSG for a similar reason though.  It wouldn't creep on the brake alone, had to tap the throttle to release autohold.  So to do a tight reverse manouvre I had to tap the throttle to release autohold and then immediately jump on the brake to reign in the clutches that wanted to fully select reverse.  Didn't feel in control at all.  I'm genuinely surprised there aren't more parking damages caused by them!

 

I have the 2.0 diesel with the rotary gear selector knob. Under normal conditions you are correct the car will not roll forward. The problem seemed to be that trying to get it to reverse up a steep hill from a standing start it wanted to roll downhill first. Maybe it would have eventually have held, but the distance between me and the car if front was getting less with each attempt to reverse.

I should find a hill to try it on again, but this time with nothing front of me and see what happens. Although I would be concerned that the car moving forward while in reverse gear could cause some damage.

Not too sure on the reverse with the car door open @Tizer I'm sure that prior to our test drive whilst I was in the drivers seat the car needed to be moved backwards to let another park up on the forecourt. The salesman was leaning on the drivers door at the time and asked me to reverse it back a couple of foot. He stood away from the car, car door open and it point blank refused to move. He says to me give some welly to to move it and it stalled ( lol). I closed the door and restarted the car and it moved backwards with no trouble.

So .....has anyone actually reversed with the drivers door open ? 

3 minutes ago, Wino said:

The salesman was leaning on the drivers door at the time and asked me to reverse it back a couple of foot. He stood away from the car, car door open and it point blank refused to move. He says to me give some welly to to move it and it stalled ( lol). I closed the door and restarted the car and it moved backwards with no trouble.

Maybe it neither activates or deactivates with the door open. I'm sure when I first got the car I did reverse with the door open at the end of a journey and either Auto hold or the Parking Brake did not operate, I can't remember whether it was one or both.

When servicing my car with the engine off and door open I'm sure you have to have your foot on the Footbrake to disengage the Parking Brake even with the Ignition on. 

3 hours ago, Tizer said:

That's the point I was trying to make, if Auto hold is not active then the Handbrake will not apply.

If you coast to a halt or reverse with the door open then neither will apply. I've parallel parked in  tight spaces at slow speed  and Auto hold/Electronic Handbrake has not applied, hence why I do what I do.

The Handbook is correct, you apply it with the switch even though there are limited failsafes.

Are you sure that it has not deactivated itself at some time during the journeys, it seems strange that it only happens at the end of a journey.

I didn't think the light stayed on when the Ignition was off, but I might be wrong about that. I think  the red on on the Dashboard does stay on though.

That is my thinking, it has deactivated itself. Not sure why that would happen though 🤔 

This all sounds horrendously complex and confusing. Give me a conventional handbrake which offers me full control at all times.

13 minutes ago, mjt said:

Give me a conventional handbrake which offers me full control at all times.

Until the cable snaps...  

Although saying that, I can't remember seeing any snapped handbrake cable threads on here for years!  Damn things were snapping all the time back in my 306 days. 😮  I even snapped one on a test drive once...needless to say I decided not to buy that particular car.  

I do like the idea of electric handbrakes as I've no longer got the strength to pull a manual one tight enough on a hill.  The problem seems to be the way they're setup though.  Different between manufacturers and currently not 100% reliable, particularly in the Mk4 Focus.

I had one snap once on a VW Fastback while camping in Northumbria. I poppoed into a VW dealer in Berwick, got a new cable, went back and fitted it at the campsite. It wouldn't be allowed nowadays by the H&S mafia. It meant using the car's own jack which wasn't ideal but if I remember I just pushed the rear wheel under as a backup.

The handbrake still worked, though, on just one wheel and that was good enough to get by.

And, by the way, you're assuming that an electrical parking brake will be more reliable than a cable. I'd say the jury's very much out on that one .

44 minutes ago, mjt said:

And, by the way, you're assuming that an electrical parking brake will be more reliable than a cable. I'd say the jury's very much out on that one .

Not at all, just suggesting that older methods aren't all that reliable either.

I'm guessing the fastback had drums?  Disc handbrakes generally won't hold effectively on just one side in my experience.  😬

It did indeed have rear drums.

The worst cars I've experienced for handbrake efficiency are ones which combine rear discs with drums. A Rover 75 we ran for a few years was particularly bad. Even after carefully adjusting in accordance with Rover specs it still wouldn't hold reliably on a slope. It was a dreadful design in the way the cable expanded the shoes with too much lost motion and this was exacerbated by the small diameter of the drum. At the time a lot of the 75 parts came out of BMW bins so presumably the same daft system was used on them.

I've generally found handbrakes operating directly onto the disc pads pretty good, very much on a par with pure drums.

I think that if you have Auto hold you need to have an Electric Parking Brake because there is not always enough pressure when auto held to stop the car rolling, especially if you have been sitting for a while.

There is a set of Traffic lights at the top of a 20 mph road near me and I often let gravity do its thing and almost coast to a halt with just a little bit of Footbrake. That is enough to trigger Auto hold but often after I've been sitting for a short time the Handbrake comes on itself as well, presumably because the car senses that there is not enough pressure to hold it or maybe senses a slight roll before I do.

Personally I do like Auto hold but hate the Electric Parking brake and would gladly do without the former if it meant getting rid of the latter. 

Between these things and not having a proper biting point on Clutches now I'm beginning to feel a bit brain dead when driving.

Modern cars seem to be increasingly designed for brain-dead drivers. I was taught to apply the handbrake whenever I came to a standstill and not hold it on the footbrake even if I didn't take it out of gear (and definitely not on the clutch), also to do hill starts using the handbrake. It becomes automatic so I almost don't have to think about it. I take a bit of pride in doing it properly but with all these so-called driver aids the de-skilling has made the cars utterly boring to drive.

As you commented earlier, Tom, with the complexity of these systems it's surprising there aren't more incidents caused by simple confusion about when and how they're going to operate. I've always believed in the simple K.I.S.S.