Regenerative braking - revisited

[Donald Stanfield]

I've tried to debunk the 'I drove stick' thing in another reply - I've driven stick for > 30 yrs and currently own 3 stick shift cars (I think I said 4 earlier, but forgot that I traded my WRX STI in when I picked up the Rivian).

I've explained exactly why it happens to me - no amount of 'practice' is going to stop me from bouncing in my seat and having my foot move on the pedal. Sure, maybe I can practice 'girding' myself for the bumps and not have my foot move as much. Since I'm stuck with one pedal - I've described the corrective actions that I've come up with to mitigate the situation:
a) either use cruise control
b) use a mode where the throttle response is significantly turned down and the suspension is softer

I'm pretty sure most of us understand feathering / smooth on-smooth off for pedals. I learned to drive with a pendulum on the dash and I'm teaching my daughter that way. I'm personally totally fine in the Rivian except when I'm bouncing in the seat. Maybe I could 'practice' my way into not bouncing in the seat so foot doesn't move uncontrollably as much - more practically I just need to use a mode that reduces the bumps and throttle response in the conditions.

But back to first principles - my argument is basically: Having driven both, back and forth on a daily basis between the two models for half a year now - I much prefer / enjoy having separate controls for acceleration and deceleration, rather than a unitary control. And then I cited one negative effect of the unitary control that I've experienced.

So it is a bit ironic for the stick-shift folks to say: eh, I went from three controls to one, it's the same thing. Yes but no, learning how to feather a pedal - sure. Having discretionary control over the vehicle's functions, not the same at all. Why did you want a stick shift in the first place? Fuel economy or vehicle control?

Realistically - Rivian isn't going to change a thing and it isn't a deal breaker for 90%+ of us, certainly not me.

Summarizing the comment section so far - and I really appreciate that folks kept it pretty civil for a very binary like it / don't like it topic , we have:

50% Love it. "If you don't love it , then you must be doing it wrong."
50% Eh, it could be better. "I've had the car for 10K+ miles, and the car is still hard to drive as smoothly as my previous car and people are getting car sick."

I would posit that building a car where 50% of the people cannot get it right after a year of ownership is perhaps not ideal?

There are a lot of useful suggestions that folks contributed here, to summarize:
a) using cruise control is going to be very smooth (and it works well off highway)
b) using 'conserve' or other modes that dampen the throttle response also help.

And yes, I'm self admittedly a jack*ss for ripping around country roads that are under construction in sport / low mode and then whining that it is hard to control the throttle perfectly as my and my kids heads are bouncing off the roof. Maybe I need to see how Baja trophy truck drivers do it - though I'm pretty sure they don't go into a full regen braking if their foot lifts off the pedal on a bump...

I have never once had the problem of bouncing on the pedal and my truck lives in sport stiff. You need to set your heel on the ground and pivot Instead of riding the pedal.

Baja drivers could drive full regen just fine because they are never completely off the pedal unless applying brake. Its also nowhere near of 50% of year long owners not liking one pedal.

If I had to give a percentage I would say its more like 95-5 for one pedal. My wife managed it just fine after her first couple drives and everyone else I've had drive it did fine as well usually much sooner. My uncle was as good as me in 5 min. He calibrated himself in a couple stop starts and he was pushing my truck through corners easily.

He's 65 and never drove an EV before testing my truck. Granted if I was to list the number of super cars he has owned it would be an impressive list. Still I maintain its a skill issue not an issue with the truck. If others can do it with no problem over the same roads then its not the truck.

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[CommonSense]

I have never once had the problem of bouncing on the pedal and my truck lives in sport stiff. You need to set your heel on the ground and pivot Instead of riding the pedal.
....
If I had to give a percentage I would say its more like 95-5 for one pedal.

I wear a size 13 shoe, I don't think I could ride the pedal if I wanted to do so. My heel is always planted. Maybe you just aren't encountering roads as rough as I have to deal with. Or maybe you are just a super driver who can bounce off the their seat, but still keep their foot still on the pedal.

I personally don't have a problem with the one pedal outside of extreme bumps / steel plates in Stiff, and experimenting further I can get thru those bumps in Normal suspension without the problem.

95/5 - okay sure. I actually counted the replies each way in this thread to get to my number, but if you want to just make up a number, we can use that.

But I've been thinking about this a lot, I think one-pedal is inevitable and your 95/5 will be right:
Some of us liked three pedals (stick) better than two pedals, because it gives us more control over the vehicle.
Some of us like two pedals (regen on the brake), better than one pedal, because it gives us more control over the vehicle.

But in the long-run simplistic tends to win (at least in the US market)...

 

[jimmyb2]

So it appears that people who are in love with OPD, despite only being around 20-30% of people

I don’t know what the actual breakdown would be of those liking OPD vs those not liking it, but I suspect your numbers are significantly off.

If you are going to put numbers to this it would earn greater acceptance if you actually researched to get real numbers.

You called it “fact that most EVs use blended braking”. I don’t know if that is true or false. If it is true it would be interesting to know the real reason mfgs. have done that. Maybe they did it simply because they figured that most people’s experience is with ICE vehicles, and they would have difficulty adapting to a different mode of driving.

Prrsonally, I really enjoy OPD, but I certainly would not object to having a setting to turn regen off. I would likely never use it unless, thru experimentation, I found some benefit of using it.

However, I would not want “blended braking” unless it could be turned off. Why use brakes if not necessary in my view. With my standard transmission ICE vehicles I always downshifted using brakes only to complete the stop.

 

[CommonSense]

22,000mi and it's definitely the biggest complaint. ... It's fun for the driver in a challenge sort of way, but part of the ownership experience is complaints of carsickness. There is no good reason to not be able to turn off OPD, I couldn't care less about lost efficiency or range due to not having it.....

So turns out you're not alone.

recent Consumer Reports video on tiktok titled - "Least Favorite Cars we tested in 2023"

Host 1 - ... So For me , the Rivian R1S... very low overall score... oddly, owner satisfaction for this car is very high .... it's just undriveable for me, for comfort
Host 2 - "it's sort of nauseating almost"
Host 1 - "it's sort of nauseating as a driver..."

and it goes on from there. Who knows how long the hosts actually spent driving the R1S and learning how to OPD - but it's not a great look.
Here's the video


I'll use this as an opportunity for two other updates to this thread:

a) Not using Sport Mode definitely solved the 'bucking' problem I had on very rough roads. Now if only my township would finish the water main replacements...it's been over a year.

b) Cold weather - so I've now discovered that cold battery also limits regen, similar to a full battery. So that's another downside of OPD IMO: you have to pay attention to the battery status to have predictable braking behavior, whereas two pedal braking it does not matter.

 

[RedRiv]

What have others found the sweet spot is for regen when descending a long sustained grade in terms of maximizing regen? Put it in high with more throttle and presumably more regen, or standard and presumably less throttle?

 

[Riv303]

What have others found the sweet spot is for regen when descending a long sustained grade in terms of maximizing regen? Put it in high with more throttle and presumably more regen, or standard and presumably less throttle?

Generally I’ve found:

Long sustained, mostly straight = Standard or Snow (unlocks Low regen setting for easy coasting w long regen periods and relaxing drive)

Long descent w switchbacks (i.e. would require braking in an ICE) = High

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