# Do You Ever Use the Emergency Brakes on Your Car? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 10, 2013, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172 "2013-07-10T20:18:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Otara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/a88e4f/32.png) [@Otara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otara)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172/41 "2013-07-11T05:17:34Z")
Always. I don’t however always remember to take it off, and it haradly makes a difference when driving off in our last couple of cars. Luckily my new car saw a nice little red brake light on the dashboard to let me know before the smell reaches my nose. Otara ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172/42 "2013-07-11T13:45:39Z")
I use the parking brakes when parking on my automatic transmission pickup; it’s totally a muscle-memory holdover from my last vehicle, which was a manual transmission pickup. The only changes I really made were that my left foot doesn’t need to push the clutch in (I did this spastic left-leg kicking thing for months after getting the automatic, BTW), otherwise the other hands and foot do basically the same exact thing. When I’m driving a car with a handbrake (my wife’s), I rarely remember to put it on- it’s not part of the routine. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172/43 "2013-07-11T13:51:19Z")
Every time I park. ---
**Author:** ![Sahirrnee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sahirrnee/32/13937_2.png) [@Sahirrnee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sahirrnee)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172/44 "2013-07-11T14:05:12Z")
Every time I park I set the parking brake. I learned on this board to set it before putting it into park. I had used the parking/emergency brake with my old truck when I had no brakes. I wish I had done that first before throwing the transmission into park, which only slowed me down. The parking brake brought me to a sideways screeching stop. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172/45 "2013-07-11T14:17:59Z")
If it was an _emergency_ brake, there wouldn’t be a one-way ratchet on the lever; it would release as soon as you stopped pulling/pushing on it. The ratchet is a clue that this device is designed to remain applied while you are absent. IOW, it’s a _parking_ brake. On automatic-transmission vehicles, I’ve never seen a parking pawl break due to being loaded while parked on a steep hill - but I have driven some that were very difficult to get out of “P” because the parking brake had been set _after_ the previous driver put it in “P” and released the driving brake. I don’t generally bother with the parking brake when parking an automatic on flat or gently-sloping ground, but on anything with a significant slope, I will set the p-brake before releasing the driving brake. When starting the car up again, I set the driving brake and take it out of park before releasing the p-brake. on my manual-transmission car, I use the p-brake every time I park, regardless of slope. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2013, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172/46 "2013-07-11T14:47:19Z")
Heh, here in everyday colloquial speech the Mechanically Actuated Secondary Brake is simply referred to as _“la emergencia”_. **Saintly Loser** , many American cars still use the pedal-operated parking brake, only that rather than a hand-pulled release they now have a design by which you release by pressing it again all the way down. Myself I prefer the handbrake lever – if you \*hold down \*the ratchet button it becomes a continuous control so you can do controlled release/reapplication as emergency brake, while the pedal operation restricts you to all-or-nothing use. I have done empty-lot test-drives of using it as emergency brake (just so I know) and the verdict is _“beats nothing, but to to have to do this at full traffic speed on a busy stretch of freeway, or on a twisting mountain road, would be an experience I can live without”_. I always set it as parking brake, to me it’s matter of establishing a habit so I do it automatically in case the circumstance requires it. In my car (automatic) it prevents the start of motion in gear at idle or near-idle. That tends to be my tell – if on level ground I put the car in reverse to get out of my parking space and it does not start crawling backward as I release the regular brakes, I probably still have the parking brake set. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-ever-use-the-emergency-brakes-on-your-car/663172.md?page=2)