Prius V Cruise Control Problem

You have the infamous Steve Wozniak cruise control problem that isn't a problem. Don't worry about it, he couldn't figure it out either till the dealer explained how it worked. If you look in the manual, you'll see an explanation. Sorry, I don't have it in front of me, but basically, if you hold it up for the long periods you are describing, it starts going up in bigger chunks, and it treats it as several individual inputs. Since there's a delay between the input and the response, you are suddenly going great guns when you finally let go, because that's in essence what you told it to do. The solution is of course to step on the brakes. You avoid the problem by going up in increments (don't hold the stalk up for so long), or by using the pedal to accelerate to speed and then reset.

Someone else can chime in with he details, and/or to correct me.

 

Tap it once up/down and the CC increase/decrease by 1 unit; hold it 2+ seconds (up/down) and it increase/decrease by 5 units; hold it continuously changes the CC speed settings to the extreme max/min jumping by 5 units.

You should watch the CC set speed display to see what speed you're actually setting it. Don't just set it blindly.

It's similar to setting your alarm clock, hold the button and it goes all the way untill you stop. You might be impatient to feel that the Prius is not responding to your change of CC setting so you keep holding the CC stick thinking it will respond faster. Well your wish is the Prius' command, except that you just wanted the Prius to change speed incrementally, while the Prius received your command as extreme change in the speed setting.

Now if you didn't HOLD the CC stick for more than 2 seconds and it still goes extreme, go visit the dealership.

 

When I use DRCC, pressing ACC/DEC once will increase/decrease the set speed by 1 mph. I've always adjusted my speed by tapping up/down on the stalk, resulting in 1 mph increments.

I've witnessed what the OP described before I figured out the display. I ended up holding ACC until the car responded, by then it started taking off and I immediately turned off cruise control. But once I figured out the display, it all made sense.

 

I did this once or twice myself before figuring out what was going on. It's doubly surprising when you are messing with it while still obstructed by another car and then the obstruction goes away when one or the other cars changes lanes. Now that I know, it's not a problem. However, I agree with cobra's suggestion in the other thread that the speed being set could somehow be made more obvious (i.e., idiot proof), perhaps on the speedometer (as cobra suggested).

 

try not to HOLD the lever, but to tap it.