Toyota Safety Sense (TSS) - Can some/all features be disabled?

I am in the market to buy my wife a new or recent used vehicle - either a Highlander or 4Runner. We are considering model years 2020 - 2023, so any vehicle would have the newest TSS stuff. I am of course guessing the TSS on a Tacoma is the same as that on the Highlander and 4Runner....

My 2017 Tacoma doesn't have TSS, so I need to ask here - can some or all of the TSS features be disabled? Example: The automatic emergency braking feature. We do not want this nonsense, and would keep it disabled permanently if that is possible.

My 2017 Tacoma has Blind Spot and Backup monitoring/alerting functions (each is its own feature). Each function has its own on/off switch, and so can be disabled if desired.

Many thanks.

 

No. Well, yes and no. You can disable it, but only temporarily. It will automatically turn on again (some of the features) when the vehicle restarts. You cannot TOTALLY get rid of all the nanny's. Some features that can be disable are found via buttons on the dash or in the infotainment system under settings.

The auto-braking: There is no way to turn that off. I hate this feature and it locked my brakes up once for a car that wasn't even that close to me, nor was it braking.

If your wife wants a car without all this shit on it, look for a vehicle prior to 2014 or 2015.

 

I don't think the 'nonsense safety features' are as obtrusive as people think they are. My truck has braked for me 1 time in the 2.5 years I've had it, and in that situation I'm glad it did. The rest of the time it feels like any other vehicle I've had without the 'nanny features.'
If you and your wife are good drivers, you won't even notice those features are present.

 

I know most people either like such features, or at least don't mind them.

I'm a computer engineer, and I know to never, ever trust anything electronic not to fail at the worst possible moment - meaning it will decide to apply the brakes when it shouldn't and cause me to have an accident or otherwise lose control of my vehicle. And then good luck in court trying to prove the vehicle was at fault for the accident.

This is also why I always go with a manual transmission if I can, as I do not want my vehicle making choices for me - I am the driver, I make the choices.

This isn't going to be a deal breaker, as most vehicles today have these sorts of "helpful" safety features, and will only become more and more prevalent as time passes. We just wanted to know if it is an All or Nothing scenario with TSS.

 

the automatic braking has three settings you can choose from; low, medium, and high.

 

You can disable it permanently with a reflash at a dealer.
I’d say drive it for awhile before making that decision as it is not reversible.
I like the radar cruise personally.

 

I have the same sorts of questions. Does the remote tune option of any of the widely available tunes allow me to choose what stays and what goes? I'd love a list of the things that I have control over, before I commit $$ to a tune.

 

I hate nanny features as much as the next guy, but what sense does it make to disable something because it could potentially fail? Why not disable traction control, stability control and ABS whilst at it? I would be interested to see the statistics on nanny features failing and causing collisions compared to human error. All it takes is a moment of inattention or a glance in the rear view and you'll be thankful that feature did its job.

 

I’m afraid my A/C and furnace will fail, so I’ll disable them now.

 

TGIF

 

Nanny features are terrible, never had a problem with out them. I don't even like cruise control, as I believe that it's human nature to not pay as close attention to driving when you are not the one controlling the speed of the vehicle.

 

Didn't think I'd appreciate these features on my 2020 Tacoma. Once I got used to them and a few false positives at first I don't even really notice any of the features now. I'm actually glad there there.

 

To temporarily disable all of the TSS features, drive through a heavy, wet lake effect snowstorm in northern MI (or NY, or ONT). The front end of the truck gets so packed-up with snow, slush, and ice on the TSS garnish and upper part of the windshield that it blocks the signals / cameras / radars and disables all the features. The features get replaced with a lot of dancing lights and beeps from the instrument cluster, but it "disables" them. Given the nuisance of all the warnings when it happens, I've pulled over before to clean things off to drive in more relative peace (or as much peace as you get when driving through a heavy snow storm).

 

As far as automation,
I never ever use cruise control, and I never will.

I've disabled the LDA (Lane Departure Alert) function, but I leave it on in my wife's Subaru, because she's always micro-correcting and drifting (she doesn't look far enough down the road when she drives, and drives with one hand at the 6o'clock position)... both drives me nuts!!!

The BSM (Blind Spot Monitoring) is a decent feature, although I set my mirrors properly to minimize my blind spots, and I actively scan, and I do visually check the adjacent lane before changing lanes, I leave it enabled.

The best feature I think is the RCTA (Rear Cross Traffic Alert). I am not skilled at backing into parking spaces. There, I admit it. But it has also saved me more than once when some people have been walking in a parking lot heads down on their phones or as I pull out, someone comes zipping out of nowhere.

Parking Assist? Love it. I leave it like BSM enabled.

The pre-collision alert / braking - has alerted me nicely when someone has stopped abruptly in my lane, or if at a yield, on the few times I've forgotten to verify the car in front of me actually kept moving to merge...

I do not use the auto high-beam headlights (or whatever it is called) feature. I tried it once, and determined that is a button I'm likely to disconnect and use that switch spot for some other purpose. I consider that dumb / lazy automation worth about 0.

Hands-free calling and text messaging, including Android Auto maps/navigation with it's integrated spoken directions integrated with music / podcasts, I cannot say enough good things about it.

 

Tunes won't touch those options. It's meant for drivability improvements by re-flashing your ECU, not to select options to turn on and off. If you want to change options like that you need to go to the dealer or find a tuner with Techstream that can change those options for you while you are there for the tune. You can also buy an OBDII tool like the Carista adapter and app. Don't forget to check the settings area of your head unit for the options you can change there.

 

Who knew there were so many people who wore their tin foil hats around here.

 

Guessing Toyota techstream "could" disable some of the nanny features. I turn mine off, and set everything to off, or low intrusion. once I had it where I liked, I left it. no resetting after each start up, unlike Subaru. Ski

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/toyota-spyware.765676/

 

That shit is hilarious wow!

 

Got a SIM card in your phone to access a network? Ha ha ha ha ha.