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Ah So! Coincidence You Say?
Toyota's gas pedal woes have pushed Afghanistan and the economy off the front pages. One would think the entire free world is threatened by a sticky accelerator. ABC News has dug up 2000 accidents and 16 deaths over many years, supposedly attributed to runaway acceleration of Toyota automobiles. Unfortunately, none of these are confirmed by official accident investigations. A highly-publicised four-car accident in Florida blamed on a sticky Toyota gas pedal turned out to be caused by improperly-installed homemade floor mats. Other reports are anecdotal without identification of a specific cause.
Reports of runaway acceleration have been around for years, ever since automobile engines have been controlled by computers. Pressing on your accelerator pedal no longer opens a throttle plate in the carburetor via a mechanical cable. In most modern cars, it merely creates an electrical input to the car's computer which then controls the fuel injection system to increase fuel and air flow. Audi and VW have been accused for years through anecdotal reports of electrical defects causing runaway acceleration. No defect has ever been found.
Now for the coincidence. Last year, Toyota announced it was closing its Fremont, CA, auto assembly plant, called NUMMI for New United Motors Manufacturing, because they say GM pulled out of a joint venture agreement. About 5,000 union jobs are involved. Some have speculated that this only UAW-organized Toyota plant proved too expensive to operate in sunny Taxifornia. Regardless, the UAW is highly incensed, especially since shortly thereafter Toyota announced it was building a new plant in non-union Mississippi. So, about a week ago about 100 UAW demonstrators gathered in front of the Japanese embassy in Washington and delivered a nasty letter of protest to the ambassador.
This took place shortly after Toyota's gas pedal woes burst upon the national scene. Since then, Congress and the Feds have piled on poor Toyota, threatening all sorts of investigations, making outrageous allegations and even issuing veiled suggestions that Toyota's flagship Prius hybrid, by far the best of the hybrids, has brake and acceleration problems caused by "electrical glitches." Again, no hard evidence. The fact that the Chevy Volt priority-electric vehicle is due for release this year is just a coincidence--right?
O.K., what are the facts. Toyota's floor mats are quite thick (I know, I have them in my Camry) and are held in place by tricky little floor clips that are rather difficult to re-attach if the mats are removed, say for cleaning. If these clips, admittedly not the best design I've ever seen, are not re-attached properly, the mats could shift and interfere with accelerator pedal movement. Toyota claims the major problem is slow pedal return caused by floor mat interference, which can be quite disconcerting. Their fix is a shim which raises the back of the pedal to provide additional clearance. They deny any electrical problems, and in truth there is no evidence to support that allegation.
So, are we seeing an attempt by the Feds to strike a blow at largely non-union Toyota as another payoff to the UAW? Or perhaps this is an attempt to boost sales of Government Motors at Toyota's expense. Or both. Ford, a major Democratic supporter, is licking their chops in anticipation. Toyota's stock has taken a half-gainer off the high board.
Look for the appearance of ads sticking it to Toyota. Look for this attack to continue and be blown into a huge safety issue, including Democratic Congressional hearings and investigations, as though no other car company ever had a safety-related recall. This appears to me to be more about politics than safety.
Meanwhile, I'll continue to drive my Camry, enjoying the best car I have ever owned.
Al - You've hit the nail on the head. My husband and I were discussing this very thing a few days ago. It is amazing how the Main Stream Media will grab on to any story that will take our minds off of what is really happening in Washington.
We also owned a Toyota for many years. It was one of the most trouble free cars we've ever bought.
Will be interesting to to see what kind of an impact this has on their sales vs. Ford and GM. Of course, neither of those manufacturers have ever had a mechanical problem that has led to injury or death. Or so it seems. How soon we forget....
Have a great week!
veiled suggestions?
"Mr. Yokoyama, the quality control executive, said Toyota had found a problem in the vehicle’s regenerative brakes, a complex system that draws energy from the spinning wheel to help recharge the battery."
"The Japanese Transport Ministry said at least 14 cases had been reported in Japan, with drivers complaining of brakes momentarily failing at low speeds, especially on slippery surfaces."
I'm going with the coincidence theory, that is, until you offer some hard evidence for the conspiracy theory.
The more global the economy becomes, the more tangled the web we live in. I sometimes long for Henry Ford's edict, you can have it in any color you want, as long as it's black.
jmark: The problem is with the design of the antilock braking system. When the car hits a sharp bump or large pothole while braking, a wheel may momentarily leave the road surface and lose traction. The ABS tries to compensate for the traction loss by relaxing braking action. This is not actually a defect but rather an unanticipated consequence. The problem has been fixed in production but about 200,000 Prius on the road in Japan, the U.S. and Europe will be recalled.
I still don't believe in coincidences.
Ref: Henry also specified the size and construction of the wooden packing cases in which certain parts were shipped to his factory so he could break them down and use the boards for floorboards. That sounds a little overboard to me. (Groan!)
Al- I do think the government is piling on a bit and that very well could be due to the gov being owner of government motors. However if you follow all of the reports over the last year or two I don't think Toyota acted properly in this case. There have been many reports of acceleration in Toyota vehicles and Toyota tried to hide the severity of the problem first by claiming it was the mats, then it was the gas pedal had to be cut down and now they are adding a shim into the pedal mechanism to reduce the friction in the pedal mechanism (not just moving the pedal). If they would have simply admitted the mistake/problem that all complex machines can run into and fixed it properly rather than blaming it on everything under the sun to defer blame they would have been better off in my opinion. The way this has played out 1 recall has turned into 3-4. Besides it isn't just the gas pedals, they also have spare tires falling off of trucks because of premature rust and now the brake issue on the prius. It seems to me that Toyota is undergoing some growing pains that it needs to work out.
I agree with you frustrated about how Toyotas image damage control exasperated their problem . And I agree with you Al about this being a bogus headline bombbardment item.
Drive by wire and regenrative braking are new features for Toyotas and new technology always has bugs to work out after implementing them into production.
This is a typical media feast,possibly an act of corporate revenge for Toyota stealing the show in the Cash for Clunkers program. Toyota dealership mechanics must be enjoying the overtime pay so there is a silverlining.
The opportunity of coincindence is needed to create conspiracy.
Is it coincidental that the newspaper with the world's largest circulation is editorializing about Toyota's problems in today's (or is it tomorrow's) newspaper? Are they in on the media/government conspiracy as well?
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/editorial/20100206TDY02309.htm
The media loves to run with a story when it's hot. Toyota sales have been high for years so they have a big potential audience. In my opinion The government investigations to me at least just looks like the typical attempt to make us think they are aware and doing something about a problem.
I, too, find the media hype over the recalls to be suspicious. I read about recalls all the time, including a recent brake related recall by Ford for it's Mercury Milan and Ford Fusion hybrids, but somehow they don't make headline news for weeks?
While I agree that it's a good idea for Toyota to fix the issue, I don't understand why they are getting way more publicity than any other manufacturer. My family has had a lot of Toyotas and they've all been great cars.
Yep, even the fair and balanced media is in on the conspiracy.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,584894,00.html
Toyota is doing something about the problem(s), albeit rather clumsily. Congress and the administration, filled as they are with automotive engineers, are piling on for political reasons. The media, fair and balanced or not, can't resist a juicy story, even one artificially inflated for ulterior motives.
Al and Tami...we too discussed this very situation because our oldest is 19 and my youngest is just about to get behind the wheel even though we own all American vehicles. However, I'm worried that this can happen while my kids are driving with friends or even in one of our vehicles. I heard the best thing to do if this happens is to put the vehicle in neutral and try turning of the engine. Emergency brake should work while in neutral. FYI
Jim: If you turn off the engine doesn't your steering wheel lock in place? Also you lose your power braking. Placing the transmission in neutral or pushing in the clutch and getting out of traffic is best. Perhaps engaging the cruise control and throttling down that way might work.
This type of thing is quite typical for a company in Toyotas current situation. Economy is slow so they had trimmed their workforce, along comes a sudden surge in sales so the reduced work force get pushed to do more. Toyotas success is in part thanks to American auto company problems,self inflicted by poor management. They were living off the big SUV and not putting out any decent small cars. I wonder if any of Toyotas recalls have affected the models built for other nametags.Lexus ,Scion or the Poniac Vibe = Toyota Matrix and a few other GMs....Porsche : Boxster and Cayenne
if you have a runaway accelerator you should .first push the clutch or hit nuetral then,with a keyed ignition on the column turn the key to off ..NOT LOCK..then yes power brakes and steering will be lost and if you feel you need more braking apply the parking brake slowly, if you jam it on all the way you will be sideways on your way to spinning out real fast, on an older cable/linkage car kick down on the pedal a few times to unstick it before you try to restart it and get it looked at right away..The Toyotas in this recall are push buttons on the dash I believe as most everyone went keyless now, so I don't know what happens to steering when you turn those off.
ref33...you should have two positions for the key and usually most new cars I don't think can go into lock unless in park and the brake is depressed.
Maybe the best thing to do is open the door and jump out!
According to Toyota, the real experts on their cars and I don't think they'd dare lie at this point, the "sticking accelerator pedal" problem is rare and does NOT occur without warning. If the pedal becomes noticeably harder to depress or returns slowly, get thee to a dealer post haste. If it sticks on you, try getting under the pedal with the side of your shoe and pulling it up. If you haven't floored it, there should be a gap under the pedal.
If it's working O.K., not to worry. It will not suddenly stick all the way down or go down by itself. There are no verified instances of Toyota cars suddenly accelerating by themselves--so-called "sudden acceleration." This is strictly an accelerator pedal binding problem.
Boys and girls, can you say "overwrought reaction?"
Or we could all support the 'green' way of life and go back to riding a bicycle! Sorry, couldn't resist...
Old college drinking song: "I was going down the hill doing 90, when the chain on my bicycle broke. [...]" The rest won't get by the blog obscenity filter.
Horse and buggy, anyone? Ooops, methane emission!
All...send me an email with the rest. I never heard that one!!
Al: We can live with the methane emission, but one of the complaints of residents in Amish land (Marquette and Green Lake county), is the exhaust left on the road, as well as the wear and tear caused by steel rims.
Tags: National Issues : Politics
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