Toyota Stops Sales on Unsafe Models; NY Streets Safer than Ever

AP/Zalubowski

NY traffic casualties are down to their lowest since 1910, but watch out if you drive a Toyota (or are walking near one). Sticky gas pedals are causing the cars to speed out of control—now, after two recalls in the past two months the car company says it will stop making and selling eight models including favorites like the Camry and Corolla. The world's top automaker will temporarily halt operations at five plants "to assess and coordinate activities." Meanwhile, there are 2.3 million vehicles that need to be recalled. Toyota's vice-president called the action "necessary," adding that he's "making every effort to address this situation for our customers as quickly as possible."

The Japanese giant will lose profits from the 65,000 Camrys and Corollas it sells every month, not to mention the RAV4, the Matrix, the Avalon, the Highlander, the Tundra and the Sequoia, reported AP. "That's huge if they can't sell these and they don't have a fix identified. They need to go and get a solution to this fast," said Aaron Bragman, an auto sales analyst. In an e-mail to employees, company officials wrote, "we don't know yet how long this pause will last but we will make every effort to resume production soon."

Toyota is on the skids, but the NY Times reported that our city's streets are safer than they have been for a century. That's back when traffic meant steetcars and horse-drawn carriages! According to our mayor there were just 256 auto-related fatalities in 2009, down by 12 percent from the previous year. However, deaths from collisions with pedestrians went up a bit from last year—for that we can probably blame those gas-happy Camrys.

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By Sabrina Jaszi in News on January 27, 2010 1:04 PM

Comments [rss]

NannyState

I just know I'm gonna win the Daytona 500 this year. I'm entering a Camry set in 'park'.

Armchair_warrior

all the problem cars come from the north american plants LOL. that teach em to let fine american workers work on their cars.

Politburo

The bad assemblies are from a Canadian company.

Politburo

I've since learned this statement is inaccurate. The company is based in Indiana.

sj

I think Ditlow is being slightly disingenuous. The speed at which the vehicle is traveling has no bearing on the physical difficulty of shifting the transmission into neutral. I think the real issue in the Saylor case was the unfamiliarity with the car's non-conventional controls (I.e. Push-button ignition instead of standard key switch and funky shift pattern). In most of the affected cars, switching to neutral takes nothing more than a forward slap on the lever. Don't even have to push the little button on the shifter. Wouldn't have to take your eyes off the road. The two controls that could have ended the problem were both non-conventional and the driver and others in the car were not familiar with them which conspired against them in what must have been a terrifying emergency situation.

I guess the takeaway from that is if you do have a car with unconventional controls, you should find out how to either get it in neutral or get it shut off while on the move.

A big red kill switch next to the start button like motorcycles have would do the trick.

MKenrich

NYC streets will never be safe with all the reckless yellow cabs and TLC's roaming everywhere....

whitecastlerock

Bring back cash for clunkers!

sj

This has to be a very real deal for Toyota to take such an unprecedented step. I don't know what's causing the issue but with software properly programmed it should not be possible. The standard method that the Euro makers do is to write software so that if the brake is applied, the drive-by-wire throttle is closed completely and the brake always overrides the throttle. It would appear that this isn't how Toyota did it.

However, should you ever experience this situation, a safe resolution is very simple: just bump the shift lever up from Drive to Neutral. The engine will rev harmlessly but power will not be transmitted to the drive wheels and you can stop normally with the brakes, then shut the car off.

You could simply turn the ignition off but in that case you would lose the power steering and brake assist. You could still steer and stop but with much greater effort. You also risk turning the key too far off and locking the steering lock, which would be a bad thing.

JenChungsBaby

That's exactly what I did when the accelerator stuck. It wasn't an automatic so I just stomped the clutch and put it in neutral.

You would think the California Highway Patrol officer who was driving that Camry in which four people were killed would have known that, right?

jaycjay

"You would think the California Highway Patrol officer who was driving that Camry in which four people were killed would have known that, right?"

That actually was a Lexus, not a Camry. It was a loaner from a dealer. That is, he was completely unfamiliar with it.

Likely that unfamiliarity with the keyless ignition (have to hold the button three seconds to shut it down) and Lexus' new "Direct Shift" transmission (have to switch to manual mode before you can try to put it in neutral) contributed to the crash.

JenChungsBaby

All very interesting, thanks. I've driven a Prius many times with that car's weird shifting system, and yeah, if you're not used to it then it probably would be hard to find neutral when the car is speeding out of control.

jaycjay

From now reading witness reports, another driver says that she passed the car and it was "bucking" like it was running out of gas, and had the emergency flashers on. After she passed, she saw it pull to the shoulder and she lost sight of it. Soon after, it flew past her at a high rate of speed.

The bucking was probably because he was braking heavily, and he pulled over to try to turn it off. But again, that requires holding the ignition button for three seconds like when shutting down some desktop computers. The brakes were hot and becoming ineffective (witnesses also said there were flames coming both front and rear wheels right before the crash) so probably couldn't hold the car stationary for long enough for him to manage to do that.

If that's what he was doing, he probably wasn't bothering with the gear shift at the time, but with the ignition button. Then the brakes failed and the car took off quickly and left him just trying to avoid hitting something.

Hard to imagine what it would be like in that situation, as driver or passenger.

jaycjay

Just found this:

"Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety in Washington, said shifting the car into neutral at that speed would be “difficult at best.”

Ditlow said the configuration of the gear shift panel, as outlined in a 2008 highway administration report, showed that the neutral position in the gear shift pattern was not immediately obvious, which led to unsuccessful attempts to disengage the engine.

A driver who is speeding down a crowded highway would have both hands on the wheel and would have to take his eyes off the road in order to see where neutral was, Ditlow said. He surmised that Saylor was trying not to hit anyone else on the crowded highway."

Excerpted from http://www3.signonsandiego.com/news/2009/oct/26/bn26saylor13229/

JenChungsBaby

Here's the gear shift of the 2009 Lexus ES 350:

http://l.yimg.com/dv/izp/lexus_es_350_2009_interior_gearshift.jpg

Definitely not intuitive.

Rocknrope

Waiting on the report from Japan about the first Toyota executive suicide.

NannyState

They outsourced seppuku to the chinese.

Rocknrope

Hello, my name is John (Rajhiv), how may I disembowel you today?

DarkGemini

This is far more serious than a pedal getting wedged beneath a floor mat. How about flawed ECU software causing the drive-by-wire throttle to remain wide open (WOT) regardless of the pedal position? Standing on the brakes once you get moving is pointless, especially in models with the more powerful engines. At highway speeds, the brakes will overheat and become completely useless long before you slow down appreciably.

Oh, and you forgot to mention that this cessation of production and sales wasn't Toyota having some moral epiphany and doing the right thing: they were legally required to (discussed at length here LINK - pic looks familiar btw).

Just waiting to see how deep the rabbit hole goes on this one...

Politburo

It's not the ECU, it's the pedal assembly.

silver

There is no such thing as a gas pedal sticking. Its called you having no personal responsibility and you wanting to retire rich in the court room.