Under most driving conditions, I find that my e-tron's various driver assistance features, such as the brake lock and the brake assist when parking on a hill, to be sufficient.

However, there is one case where I just can't get the car to behave smoothly. When driving at slow speed, such as when pulling into my driveway, I'll be on the accelerator to "creep" up the slope of the driveway. When I reach the point I want to stop, I then have to take my foot off the accelerator and move it over to the brake. This causes the e-tron to roll-back and I end up with a "lurch" when coming to a stop.

Now, I've been driving manual-transmission vehicles exclusively since I was 15. So I'm quite used to a car that rolls freely in either direction. But with a MT, you can always feather the clutch a bit while you get your foot over to the brake pedal, to make for smooth transitions.

I haven't been able to figure out a good technique for doing the same thing in my e-tron.

I suppose being electric, that it's reasonably safe to just hold the accelerator at a position that makes the vehicle stop, and then tap the brake with my left foot, thus engaging the brake hold? I've done that a couple times and it seems to work OK, but it's not a maneuver I find particularly natural.

Anybody else have strategies for dealing with this?

 

I park up against a ramped parking curb in my garage. If I roll off it, the car gets too close to the door. I hold the car with the accelerator against the ramp and engage the parking brake, press park, and shutdown. Parking brake will engage if you charge anyway.

 

The auto hold usually works fine. However not in reverse when I back into my garage. I don't like to hold the car with the accelerator unless I have to. I sometimes engage the parking brake for a "hold feature" to make sure the car does not roll back down the driveway. This would be much easier if Audi engaged the auto hold in reverse as well.

 

Have you tried parking and then turning the e-tron off before letting off the brake. That seems to keep mine from rolling.

 

The roll-back I'm talking about isn't upon parking. It's when attempting to roll slowly and precisely up a hill, and stop in a precise position. The same problem manifests if I were approaching a stop sign while traveling uphill in heavy traffic. The car in front of me goes through the stop sign. Now I have to go from a dead stop, roll forward about 12 feet, come to a complete stop, without rolling backward, and then proceed. The e-tron's drive model doesn't really have this case covered very well -- the car wants to roll back as you get off the accelerator and onto the brake, which creates a natural and correct instinct to slam on the brake instead of coming to a smooth stop.

The suggestions in the thread to use the park brake are valid (and certainly something I would do frequently in my MT cars), but it just seems so awkward to do that with an electric parking brake. The electric e-brake has a delayed reaction, it's binary (on or off...no ability to apply "more" or "less" to suit the situation). The full sequence looks like:

• Feather the accelerator to come to a halt, and hold the accelerator there to prevent roll-back
• Set the e-brake
• Move right foot to the brake pedal and set the auto-hold brake
• Release the e-brake

OK yeah, that works, but it's a very complicated maneuver that is super touchy to get to work smoothly.
The one I've tried myself using my left foot is less complicated, but more foreign, as I'm used to my left foot doing clutch duty (or nothing) -- not being a brake assistant

• Feather the accelerator to come to a halt, and hold the accelerator there to prevent roll-back
• Press the brake pedal with the left foot to set the auto-hold brake
• Release the accelerator

This procedure isn't perfect either -- the auto-hold brake will deactivate if enough accelerator input is detected to cause the vehicle to start rolling forward. So unless your accelerator feel is dead-on, you can inadvertently disable the auto-hold brake immediately after tapping the brake pedal with the left foot (I've done it a couple times).

I've used both of these procedures at various times and I think the left-foot method is smoother if executed properly, but takes more effort to train your feet to behave.

 

This is not unique to the e-tron. The same issue exists in a car with a dual clutch transmission, or automated manual in general. If you creep up an incline and the rpms drop to low, the computer disengages the clutch and the car rolls backwards. Basically you have to feel your way with the accelerator pedal and step smoothly on the brake before the car starts rolling backwards. Essentially you have to feather the throttle pedal instead of the the clutch pedal and if you combine it with left foot braking then you can stop pretty smoothly. It takes some practice and you have to learn to apply the brake pedal smoothly with your left foot, but that's not much different from smoothly operating a clutch pedal.

 

Then someone will say they “hate auto hold.” So maybe it could be an option in the menu in the future.

 

Sure, you can already turn off auto-hold in the MMI for those who do not like it. I just do not get why it only is activated going forward but not in reverse.

 

I seem to recall that the manual states this is to make it easier to maneuver in snow, e.g. rocking back and forth out of a snowed-in parking spot.

 

I had not noticed the roll back problem before in the few weeks I had my e tron, so I paid some attention to this on my drive home tonight. It appears I am in the habit of maintaining enough speed so that there remains forward momentum when I lift off the accelerator and move my foot to the brake. I then come to a stop with the brake pedal. After that, the auto hold kicks in, and I can drive off smoothly with that.

There's probably some situations where this won't work, but it has been fine for me so far.