Transcript
Explain it to me like I’m 80
Mom: What’s with these AIs escaping and hacking people? That sounds scary.
Me: You park your car at the top of a hill. You leave a note on the dashboard that says “please be good” and then you pull the parking brake. The car careens down the hill, smashes everything up, and you put out a press release saying “My car ignored my instructions! It hallucinated! It went rogue!” Your insurance company not only believes you, but invests a hundred million dollars in your company.
Mom: Jesus Fucking Christ
The electronic parking brake is a motor that turns a screw that directly compresses the piston into the brake pads. Most cars do this to the existing rear brake pads and it doesn’t require any hydraulic pressure to work.
Some have a separate small caliper with the motor and no hydraulic connection at all.
The motors self adjust by measuring the load from the motor as it clamps down. Then rewinding a set amount when the brake is released. This can make it a pain to replace rear pads, since the screw will be extended too much to fit the new thicker pads/rotor. (You can rewind the screw with a 12v drill battery though and save a lot of time).
If all your rear pads were missing then you’d be screwed though!