75ZT Community

I use my cruise control quite a lot. What would be nice is to have a few buttons enabling set speeds to be selected, i.e. 50, 60, 70 without having to bring the car up to speed and then pull the lever.

I am assuming that it is using the pulses that drive the speedo so these will be constant or am I wrong

How about it Paul and Duncan

That would be a nice feature indeed, Paul.

I've seen something similar on a BMW once. One push on a button increases (or decreases) the speed by 10 km/h (or mph). Quite comfortable.

Jürgen wrote:That would be a nice feature indeed, Paul.

I've seen something similar on a BMW once. One push on a button increases (or decreases) the speed by 10 km/h (or mph). Quite comfortable.

I was thinking of an array of, say, 4 buttons set to differing speeds.

Initially, drive the car to the desired speed, and it would remember the number of pulses. Drive to another speed, press another button and it would remember the pulses.

Having set the buttons, in future pressing a button would take the car to the speed that was originally set on the button.

If one button was set to, say, 50 mph/kph and another to 60 mph / kph then if you had pushed the 50 button and wanted to go to 60 you would then press the 60 button.

For example, in France where there are 4 main speeds, 50 kph, 90 kph, 110 kph and 130 kph you could set the buttons to these speeds and then not need to brake to slow down and then flick the lever when at the desired speed of to accelerate and then flick the lever you would simply use the buttons and the car would either slow or accelerate to the new set speed.

It's a feature I like too.

The two versions (V6 and diesel) are quite different, but they do both use the signal from the ABS (Antilock Braking System), though in a different way. As far as I know, the diesel get's it speed signal over CAN (Bus Controller Area Network) so intercepting it isn't a question of a pulse but A CAN node. I'm not sure about the V6, I'd have to check.

On the diesel, the cruise is built into the engine control module, and there's an interface unit. On the V6 it has a separate unit that drives the pump system, and again another interface unit.

In both cases the set speed is controlled by software, and short of trying to rewrite that software I'm not sure how it would be achieved. I suppose you could intercept the speed signal to make the cruise system think it's travelling at a different speed than it is, but to be honest I'd be worried about what happened if there was a glicth with the system. Wouldn't want a Toyota would we?

On the diesel you can increase and decrease the set cruise speed by either lifting the "set" button on the steering wheel and holding it till the required speed is reached, or pressing it downward to reduce speed in the same manner.. personally I think that's about as simple as it can get.

Having said that, I rarely ever use my cruise control. Too much traffic these days.
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James.uk wrote:[....] I rarely ever use my cruise control. Too much traffic these days.
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You want to get yourself a tank for that little problem