> I would take a blown engine over flying into an intersection any day of the week.
And this is why we need to build experience. Young drivers very often are confronted with decisions like this but their mind phrases it as "Blown engine that I do not have to funds to pay for in Dad's car, or just hold this pedal firmly and everything will be all right".
Unfortunately, the problem with experience is that the lesson comes only after the test.
And most older engine will float the valves and, assuming nothing collides or comes apart (floating valves isn't good for the rest of the valvetrain), self limit that way.
But almost any engine with electronic ignition (so early 80s or later for a standard car or motorcycle, with plenty earlier having that feature) will cut spark to control RPM as needed. Unless you just start getting ignition breakup at RPM (not enough dwell time for the coil).
I actually saw a small block Chevrolet or Mopar (don't remember which) dent the hood this way. I suppose the rocker rotated when the valves floated, when the valve broke the stem went right through the valve cover. Funniest thing I'd ever seen at a drag strip.
Most modern ECUs won't cut fuel intermittently but will instead just hold RPM steady at some defined max speed. However, I guess you'd have to be pretty unlucky to have this happen with a drive by wire setup...
You don't need an ECU to act as a rev limiter. Gasoline engines have had rev limiters in all different kinds and types for over 100 years. Some cut fuel, some cut spark, some cut both.
Even my push mower has a rev limiter, it just gets called a governor on that engine.
The majority of large American engines used the valves as the rev limiter. The valve springs were so weak that past a certain RPM the performance of the engine falls off so fast it isn't going to rev anymore, even in neutral. The valves never fully close, so performance is very poor. This is well below the mechanical limitations of the crankshaft, so nothing is really going to happen. Once interference engines showed up as common place in the market, it became mandatory to have a rev limiter. This happened as electronic ignition and fuel injection became more common, so it was logically incorporated into the ECU as time went on.
Not sure, but you might still have power steering if you leave it on but in neutral. If you turn it off, you'll definitely lose hydraulic steering assistance.
I have dealt with 1 modern-ish/heavy car that stalled its engine on a downhill slope and my braking ability in this case was reduced to a mere suggestion. If you are strong enough to bring down an unpowered 4000lb+ vehicle to a complete stop on a downslope, more power to you but it is a bit unfeeling to assume that everyone shares your extraordinary pedal-pounding strength. Edit:s/freakish/extraordinary.
You have a tiny master cylinder compared to a vehicle with power brakes, so it should work fine... this is different than having a big master cylinder + power brakes disabled.
At any respectable speed in a well constructed car with a mechanical steering linkage, power steering is basically unnecessary. My old car used to have glitchy power steering— at 35mph, I could generally tell when it wasn’t working, but it wasn’t very obvious. At 5 mph it was quite obvious when it wasn’t working.
It’s really dependent on the car. I was driving a C7 Z06 and the power steering cut (it overheated—car warned me well ahead of time). Let me assure you it was not trivial at all to steer the thing. It was shocking how heavy the steering became. I could turn the wheel—barely. Would not really call it control.
The next day my friends e90 BMW m3 power steering boiled over. And another friends F80 M4 had multiple power steering failures. They weren’t exactly happy about it either.
If it's only an issue at stop lights, it might just be a very high idle for whatever reason, and putting it in neutral wouldn't necessarily redline.
For throttle stuck fully open, going very fast on the highway, yeah you're gonna redline, but it's probably better to redline in neutral while you pull over than to turn the key off while you're still driving.
> Maybe turning it off might be a safer alternative.
Young drivers might not understand the difference between the powered-down and the pull-the-key-out positions. There is a real danger of locking the steering wheel in this case.
If replacing an engine would not be economically sensible in whatever you're driving you should probably chance it running the intersection or whatever. If you fail you're buying a new car, but if you blow up an engine you're buying a new car too. But you might not fail so the relative expected value is greater. I hope your horn works...