Hey Scotty. How do you manually release the electronic parking brake on a 2025 Camry if it won't start?
I live in NY. This is my first new car. 2025 Toyota Camry LE. I bought it on July 29th 2025 and it broke down in PA on Aug 14th, 16 days later with about 350 miles on it.
While still in NY the key fob failed to be recognized by the car. I had to tap it to the start button to get it to recognize. Thought it was odd but figured maybe it was a bad battery. I drove home to PA to see family with no issues. A few times in PA I had to tap the fob to the start button still figuring I needed to replace the battery. On the day I was heading back to NY the car would not start. Remote start from fob and Toyota App also did NOT work. Door locks did. Dash showed images of open door icons but no other displays other than the notification to "Press Brake Pedal and Touch Power Switch with Key".
I called Toyota's road side assistance. They walked me through some trouble shooting steps and then called a tow truck to take me to the nearest dealer. We could not release the electronic parking brake. I was able to manually release the shift to get into neutral but could not release the EPB. The Camry was drug onto the tow truck bed across grass with plastic sleds under the locked back wheels and pushed off across concrete without sleds. The Back tires were dragging on concrete for about 7 feet as the car was pushed off the tow truck bed. It took a week to diagnose and fix the problem. Turns out the Smart Key ECU and the ID Unit failed. They replaced those units and had to give me 2 new keys as they are paired to those units. I've since set the car to never automatically turn on the EPB.
Given the complications that arose from not being able to disengage the EPB I'm wondering what happens if I'm in a single lane back up and put the car in park while I wait for the traffic jam to clear. What if a power failure happens while I'm in park. Am I just stuck there? Whats the manual solution for releasing EPB's? Do I just never activate the EPB? I always had cars with foot or lever parking brakes and I always engage them when I was parked. Never had a problem. These new cars are great in many ways but this EPB really feels like a step backwards. Seems like a bad design. Thanks for your time.
How did EPB's become so prolific? You can't release them without power?
Scotty usually doesn't answer follow-up questions. Electronic parking brakes are easier to design than mechanical ones, it saves tiny bit of weight so that they can pack more "technology" into the car, and it's cheaper to make. "Let the body control module handle it!" Engineers figured that 99% of the time, the car has power. It's only a headache if your car has no power, which was your case.
Personally, when I bought my 2013 Fusion that had an electric parking brake, I hated it. Luckily, my 2014 F-150 and my 2017 Mustang both have a manual parking brake. I won't buy cars with an electric parking brake, or those stupid knob-based automatic transmissions. Not everything needs to be ultra space-age.
I agree. It's too much complexity. And the only thing you can really do is what Toyota told you to try to release the thing. Car is going to become more and more of a pain in the ass with this kind of stuff for sure. That's why I drive old cars that have manual parking brakes that you either pull with your hand or step on the pedal with your foot. It's unfortunate but that's the way it's going these days. People should rebel against this crap and not buy them
@scottykilmer Camry had to go back in for another week. I turned out that the first Toyota dealer installed 2 new parts the work with the smart key but they forgot to reprogram the rest of the car to fully recognize them. I discovered this when I tested the remote start and it failed. I'm still waiting to hear back from Toyota about the buy back request. I don't think lemon law applies but this issue and discovering the issues with EPB's has soured me on this car and any car with smart keys or EPB's. How did EPB's become so prolific? You can't release them without power? That is insane. Just a fireable offense in my option. Yet every car I look at has them. What's next? The air is no longer included in the tires? Having the windows go up and down is part of a subscription?