[randomfinn]

> braking much harder than I would have been able to

Any idea why you weren't able to apply full brakes? I remember reading that most people don't in an emergency and that's why the emergency brake boost was created, but haven't seen the reason for it.

[nucleardog]

This is just one of those suspicions I have had for many years and done nothing to verify, but I think part of it is probably that everyone sits too far back from the pedals.

I have my seat adjusted so that with my back and butt against the back of my seat (so I’m braced against something) I can push the brake pedal and have it hit the bottom of travel just a bit before my knee locks without having to take my heel off the floor and try and press it with my toes or something.

My wife is almost a half foot shorter than me and when I drive her car I don’t need to adjust the seat at all. I find a similar situation driving most people’s cars.

So, y’know, I think people literally can’t apply the brakes all the way… because they can’t reach the bottom of the pedal travel.

[m463]

I suspect it's more like people brake at first like a startle reflex, but they only brake really hard once their brain does the calculus and full panic sets in. Then they can bend the brake pedal.

[calvinmorrison]

On a motorcycle this is actually a lifesaver that's a very natural reflex because you want to load the front suspension and tire before you almost lock it up.

[arghnoname]

I'm not sure what the exact amount of force is, but I took a more performance oriented driving course that included some hard braking at highway speeds.

It's fairly violent. In normal driving we never do this, it would cause someone to rear end you and it's not necessary. So we have lots and lots and lots of practice braking at a moderate pace. Braking fast in normal day to day life is maybe a 70% force. We're used to trying to think how much pressure is the right amount of pressure.

What they told us is basically to try to break the pedal off. I think it's the easier way to remember, if the crap hits the fan, just put your foot through the floor and get stopped. The less thinking and modulating, the better.

[frankchn]

To add on, most people have never experienced what “full braking” is in any car since it is so uncommon to even use half of the ultimate braking power a car can deliver in a non-track day or non-emergency situation. Even a modern Toyota Camry can sustain on average >1 g of deceleration force from 70 mph to 0.

Thus, people think they have applied full brakes but in reality they are only 60-70% of the way there.

[ghostpepper]

Maybe people who learned to drive on pre-ABS cars?

[aziaziazi]

I can remember clearly my thoughts during before bumping into someone in front of me: it was quick alternates between “BREAK NOW” and “beware slipping”. Traffic was quite slow but but I was terrified to not being able to choose what voice to listen in my head, it was a very strange dissonance experience.

I braked too softly and ended up in the bumper of the car in front of me. The rental car did had ABS and I knew it but didn’t thought of it during the breaking.

[slt2021]

in panic mode brain doesnt work well