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What is going on with Toyota?

6K views 90 replies 26 participants last post by  brkf 
#1 ·
First accelerators, then brakes, now power steering (Corolla)? This used to be the brand of quality...is that no longer the case?

We have had Toyotas for years...my daily driver is a 94 Corolla with 206k miles on it, and it still runs like new! Its been to the shop less than my 330cic...

I wonder how much of this is being blown out of proportion by the gov't since they are now in the car business :dunno: Bad news for Toyota is good news for GM/Chrysler.
 
#74 ·
NO CATALOGUE of this sort would be complete without an account of 60 Minutes's 1986 attack on the Audi 5000--perhaps the best-known and best-refuted auto-safety scare of recent years. The Audi, it seemed, was a car possessed by demons. It would back into garages, dart into swimming pools, plow into bank teller lines, everything but fly on broomsticks, all while its hapless drivers were standing on the brake -- or at least so they said.

"Sudden acceleration" had been alleged in many makes of car other than the Audi, and from the start many automotive observers were inclined to view it skeptically. A working set of brakes, they pointed out, can easily overpower any car's accelerator, even one stuck at full throttle. After accidents of this sort, the brakes were always found to be working fine. Such mishaps happened most often when the car was taking off from rest, and they happened disproportionately to short or elderly drivers who were novices to the Audi.

The Audi's pedals were placed farther to the left, and closer together, than those in many American cars. This may well offer a net safety advantage, by making it easier to switch to the brake in high-speed emergencies. (The Audi had, and has, one of the best safety records on the road.) But it might also allow inattentive drivers to hit the wrong pedal.

60 Minutes was having none of the theory that drivers were hitting the wrong pedal. It found, and interviewed on camera, some experienced drivers who reported the problem. And it showed a filmed demonstration of how an Audi, as fixed up by, yes, an expert witness testifying against the carmaker, could take off from rest at mounting speed. The expert, William Rosenbluth, was quoted as saying that "unusually high transmission pressure" could build up and cause problems. "Again, watch the pedal go down by itself," said Ed Bradley.

Bradley did not, however, tell viewers why that remarkable thing was happening. As Audi lawyers finally managed to establish, Rosenbluth had drilled a hole in the poor car's transmission and attached a hose leading to a tank of compressed air or fluid.

The tank with its attached hose was apparently sitting right on the front passenger seat of the doctored Audi, but the 60 Minutes cameras managed not to pick it up. It might have been for the same reason the Jeep weights were tucked away in the wheel wells, rather than being placed visibly on top. Or why the Dateline rockets were strapped out of sight underneath the truck rather than conspicuously on its side, and were detonated by remote control rather than by a visible wire. Doing it otherwise would only have gotten viewers confused.
Sound familiar?
 
#76 ·
You don't remember right. If GM did have a 49% stake in Toyota, it would not have ended up where it did when it did... You may be confusing GM's holding in the the now defunct NUMMI joint venture between them and Toyota with a stake in the parent corporation.
 
#77 ·
5-gen Camry with 4-cyl engine has catastrophic head gasket failure, often leading to engine replacement. Toy quotes 6K in repairs.

I sold my 02 Camry not waiting for it to show up, I had 115K mis and that's the mileage when it shows. There is a flood of complaints and no recall. IMO, this is far worse than the (maybe imaginary) acceleration issue.

Toy quality is a myth.

Read here more on head gasket issue, a design defect that's becoming obvious as 5th gen hits 100K miles.

http://www.camryforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4801
 
#79 ·
That is perhaps the best article I've seen on this issue. It is indeed a witch hunt, and Wallace makes some very reasonable points and asks some very pertinent questions.
 
#82 ·
...And the hits (and lies) just keep on coming from Toyota. I'm sure their mothers are so proud of the right now: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35713831/ns/business-autos

Veil of secrecy covers Toyota cars' 'black boxes'
Automaker won't release information that could help crash investigations

Toyota has for years blocked access to data stored in devices similar to airline "black boxes" that could explain crashes blamed on sudden unintended acceleration, according to an Associated Press review of lawsuits nationwide and interviews with auto crash experts.

The AP investigation found that Toyota has been inconsistent ***8212; and sometimes even contradictory ***8212; in revealing exactly what the devices record and don't record, including critical data about whether the brake or accelerator pedals were depressed at the time of a crash.

By contrast, most other automakers routinely allow much more open access to information from their event data recorders, commonly known as EDRs.
AP also found that Toyota:

* Has frequently refused to provide key information sought by crash victims and survivors.
* Uses proprietary software in its EDRs. Until this week, there was only a single laptop in the U.S. containing the software needed to read the data following a crash.
* In some lawsuits, when pressed to provide recorder information Toyota either settled or provided printouts with the key columns blank.

Toyota's "black box" information is emerging as a critical legal issue amid the recall of 8 million vehicles by the world's largest automaker. The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration said this week that 52 people have died in crashes linked to accelerator problems, triggering an avalanche of lawsuits.

When Toyota was asked by the AP to explain what exactly its recorders do collect, a company statement said Thursday that the devices record data from five seconds before until two seconds after an air bag is deployed in a crash.

The statement said information is captured about vehicle speed, the accelerator's angle, gear shift position, whether the seat belt was used and the angle of the driver's seat.

There was no initial mention of brakes ***8212; a key point in the sudden acceleration problem. When AP went back to Toyota to ask specifically about brake information, Toyota responded that its EDRs do, in fact, record "data on the brake's position and the antilock brake system."

Toyota is facing the biggest recalls in its history after uncovering widespread problems with several aspects of its vehicles.
But that does not square with information obtained by attorneys in a deadly crash last year in Southlake, Texas, and in a 2004 accident in Indiana that killed an elderly woman.
 
#83 ·
...But that does not square with information obtained by attorneys in a deadly crash last year in Southlake, Texas, and in a 2004 accident in Indiana that killed an elderly woman.
The only thing it does not square with is these self-same attorneys wishing to capitalize on these incidents. Ed Wallace's articles in Business Week hit the nail on the head in relation to the witnesses in the Congressional hearing who passionately explained the symptoms she said she experienced in her Lexus, yet her car, upon NHTSA inspection, showed no signs of the steps that she claimed she took, including the application of the parking brake.

As tragic as these accidents are, I maintain that in due course they will generally be found to be attributable to driver error.
 
#88 ·
Here is some more information about the latest event in San Diego.

-snip-
Sikes, a real estate agent, said he was passing another car when the accelerator stuck and eventually reached 94 mph.

During the two 911 calls, Sikes ignored many of the dispatcher's questions, saying later that he had to put his phone on the seat to keep his hands on the wheel.


Leighann Parks, a 24-year-old dispatcher, repeatedly told him to throw the car into neutral but got no answers.

"He was very emotional, you could tell on the line he was panicked," Parks told reporters outside the CHP's El Cajon office. "I could only imagine being in his shoes and being that stressed."

Neibert told Sikes after the CHP caught up with him to shift to neutral but the driver shook his head no. Sikes told reporters he didn't go into neutral because he worried the car would flip.
-snip-
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100310/ap_on_bi_ge/us_runaway_prius

I am going to call this one a hoax or a hugely panicked driver, Why on earth would a car "flip" if you put it into neutral?
 
#89 · (Edited)
Here is some more information about the latest event in San Diego.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100310/ap_on_bi_ge/us_runaway_prius

I am going to call this one a hoax or a hugely panicked driver, Why on earth would a car "flip" if you put it into neutral?
He had both hands on the wheel trying to control the car on a winding highway while dodging cars at 90MPH. He was afraid if he took a hand off the wheel he would lose control.

Remember the Prius is quite a dangerous car a 90MPH, not easy to control at those speeds even when things are working normal
 
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