Yet another question about the brakes...

without driving your car, i can't really say. i have never felt that they were different except for the slight change from regen to real braking at low speed on rough surfaces. i would take a test drive in a new one to compare or have a dealer test drive yours.

 

What car did you upgrade from? When I bought my 2010 prius I upgraded from an sv21 camry (1987) model. the Prius brakes certainly felt far more sensetive/responsive than the camry even though the camry had power brakes and they were in good condition.

 

I'm guessing it IS something that you need to get used to. I went through the same thing when switching from my '07 Exploder to the Prius - the Prius has much more "sensitive" (as in - better ) brakes. When I switch back and forth between the vehicles , I just have to remember that little item.

 

I see you are on the wet coast. Could be rust buildup on the rotors overnight. Just sensitive on the first few applications?

They are pretty quick brakes, with "brake assist". You need to be gentle with them. This also helps you to use regeneration more. No more last second braking!

 

Please describe what you mean by "sensitive". Is it during high speed braking, low speed braking, panic stops, or something else? We can't help much without details.

Tom

 

I let a coworker drive my Prius once to test it and she could not get the hang of the brakes. I never noticed this myself as I bounce around in all my cars alot with no problem. Every time she put on the brakes it was like she was slamming them. Whiplash city.

Plus since you just bought it , it may have sat on the lot for a while and got buildup of rust on the brake rotors like David said. Look at the front rotors closely and see how corroded they are. Made much worse if you do not garage it every night.
Since regen braking does most of the work the actual brakes themselves don't work very hard so with little use the rotors gets rusty.
You will really notice really grabby brakes after it has sat in a rain storm as it then has a fresh coat of abrasive rust on the rotors.

Easy to fix. With no traffic in front of you just get up to 60-70 miles an hour...put the car in nuetral and press firmly on the brakes. Pump them a little with firm pushes. Not fast. When in neutral no regen brake assist is applied and you force the car to use its mechanical brakes only. This pumping will clean the rotors off.
Put the car back in "D" and drive it away. I do it all the time.

And btw, this is when you will notice the Prius brakes without regen are not that good.

 

try rotating cars every couple of days...I really can't get used to the prius because I'll drive it for 2-3 days straight, then I'll get bored or wifey will want it or the day will be too nice to turn down driving my Legend. Drive that for a couple days straight then go back to prius....

It's very hard driving two completely different cars. The Prius brakes are very touchy though, IMO

 

^^ my household is the opposite, the wifey's Acura has the sensitive, touchy brakes.

This is apart from the Prius' emergency Brake Assist. Trigger that by accident, and this car stops faster than anything else we have ever had. But a couple times I was really glad to have it.

 

I noticed on my Gen III that after I did a linear valve offset calibration, the brakes became slightly less sensitive but more linear. But there's no reason for you to do that.

The Prius brakes, as the others have mentioned, are simply more sensitive.