Posted on 02/23/2010 6:39:27 AM PST by mwilli20
Auto Professor (Dave Gilbert of Southern Illinois University) Says Defect in Toyota's 'Fail Safe' System for Acceleration Creates Dangerous Condition
Video demonstration at site
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
I drive a Lexus. Had a 1999 and now a 2009. There is a definite difference in the acceleration of the 2009, IMHO.
While on a recent trip to California I met a lady who’s Toyota Sequoia’s rapid acceleration wrecked her vehicle and her home. She said it was like a ghost was pressing on the accelerator while she was pressing on the brake. Toyota blaimed her for hitting the pedal. Her home and auto insurance increased. You can tell she is still alarmed by the accident.
When I saw the headline, I first checked to see if it was either CBS (bogus Audi unintended acceleration) or NBC (rigged pickup truck fire). ABC at least has *some* credibility.
I was watching GMA this AM because someone I know was on it, and I saw the segment with this Dave Gilbert, who is claiming an ECU problem caused by a sensor short. It was pretty convincing, but needs to be checked out by someone much more technically savvy than an ABC field reporter.
In my 1994 Camry, when cruise control is engaged and you step on the brake, the cruise control is disengaged.
Certainly all cars are designed so that when the brake is tapped, the engine is brought back to idle.
Proper design of electronic throttle and steering controls would dictate enough internal checking and redundancy so that no single component failure would cause dangerous things to happen.
I owned an Audi 5000, a diesel Jetta, and VW Rabbit.
I never for a moment thought the Audi problem was anything but people hitting the accelerator and thinking it was the brake.
The Audi was one of the best cars I ever had. Drove it for almost 10 years.
Look to the lawyers, in this case.
It is superior in many ways, the point is just that it was essentially mandated. I just refuse to let big government off the hook here, when they had a hand in this.
FWIW, I think Toyota’s problems have come from growing too rapidly, and predicted them some time ago.
But Toyota said it was the fault of the floor mats! Who to believe???
Toyota needs to fix whatever problem there is, and settle whatever lawsuits are forthcoming from people actually injured in crashes.
The federal gov’t, part owner of two of Toyota’s competitors, needs to stay out of it.
And, All, what's with all this "TIE OH DUH"(?)(sic), the Congressmen are spouting off with right now live on C-SPAN?. Its....TOE YOE DAH (or TOE YOE TAH).
The usual programmer practice after discovering a "bug" is to document it. Once documented it becomes a "feature". E.g. Place elbow on alt/space bar to gain access to "close" command.
Therefore, a bug is nothing more than an undocumented feature.
1. This morning's news said that Toyota was considering just that as a fix. Apparently their cars don't have any similar system today.
2. It's only been a week or so since the news was all about failure of push button ignitions to shut down when drivers tried to cut power. Seems in that case the various makers use several differing systems, all with different rites to make them work.
3. It is likely that most people who can pass the driver's test will forget or misapply the proper kabuki to "give the brakes priority and set the (electronic) throttle to idle" when their car starts to do the thinking for them.
4. Finally, and admitting to being an automotive neanderthal; you're driving a computer!
After decades living with these things the thought of handing my life over to a consumer level robot scares hell out of me...how many here have not listened to someone's car alarm going off at random when there is no apparent cause?
Today's cars, for all the reasons cited in this thread, are simply too complex to avoid run aways and a multitude of other failures totally independent of the driver.
Unless you are willing to pay for aircraft style safety systems (which have been known to fail), or someone comes up with a panic button and wire loom guillotine, this same thing can, at some time or another, happen to any car being sold today.
Sounds like a "spontaneous" shift from Reverse into Drive to me...
It is similar to the smear campaign against aspirin:
In the 1970s J&J sales reps began solemnly informing healthcare professionals that aspirin had been associated with "Reye's syndrome" (pronounced "Rise") a potentially fatal condition involving the liver and ultimately the brain of infants and children following viral illness. In 1982 the Surgeon General issued a warning to this effect. (Ralph Nader's Public Health Research Group received credit in the media for pressuring the government to act.) In 1986 the FDA required all aspirin products in the U.S. to carry a warning label stating "children and teenagers who have or are recovering from chicken pox, flu symptoms or flu should NOT use this product."J&J's competing product then was Tylenol (acetaminophen). They wanted the aspirin market. But tylenol destroys livers and has killed far more citizens than aspirin ever will, imo. According to eMedicine/WebMD: "In the United States, acetaminophen toxicity has replaced viral hepatitis as the most common cause of acute hepatic failure, and it is the second most common cause of liver failure requiring transplantation in the United States."A second sentence was added in 2003: "If nausea, vomiting, or fever occur, consult a doctor because these symptoms could be an early sign of Reye's Syndrome, a rare but serious illness."
It is a tribute to Johnson & Johnson's marketing effort that so many people have heard of Reye's and its association with aspirin, given how extremely rare it is. In '86 there were approximately 100 cases in the U.S. In the UK there were 172 cases reported between 1986 and 1999 -only 17 associated with aspirin use. Aspirin (an extract of willow bark) is not as benign as cannabis, but it, too, has been on the receiving end of a corporate disinformation campaign. J&J has whipped up exaggerated fears of lethality.
Stuck throttles are hardly new. Throttles have been getting impossibly stuck since there have been throttles.
Throttle cables and return springs are just as likely to stick, and can be impossible to get unstuck.
Kabuki? You don’t need to do anything to get the Chrysler DBW system to set the throttle to idle. It does so automatically if the throttle is open and the brake is pressed. No kabuki necessary. If the throttle sticks, press on the brake, and the engine returns to idle.
Same for the system on VW/Audi cars.
All push button start/stop systems work the same way, actually. Tap or hold to stop the engine. Tap if you are in park, hold if you are in gear.
Infiniti has gone a step further and programmed it’s system to recognize repeated tapping as an attempt to shut off the engine, which was a good idea.
I’m in my early forties, and I’m quite used to driving a computer. I love all the gadgets in my Jeep. They all work well.
Brake assist to recognize a panic stop attempt and apply maximum braking force for me. All speed traction control to help me keep control when it’s slippery. Hill descent control to prevent a downhill runaway. Hill start assist to hold the vehicle stationary on a hill until I press on the throttle. Electronic throttle that recalibrates itself in 4low to give me far better control of my engine speeds off road. Etc., Etc,. Etc.
All of it works and works well.
The hill descent control is flipping amazing. Put it in 4low and hit the button, and it will crawl slowly down the hill all by itself. All you gotta do is steer it.
Can’t do that sort of stuff with a carburetor and a cable.
Not an expert. He teaches mechanics how to fix cars.
Created the problem then claims it “might” happen. Problem has never been duplicated or found in an accident vehicle.
Reports by him and the other clown paid for (and probably authored, given how poorly they read them) by lawyers with current lawsuits against Toyota for all kinds of claims.
Man in beard sitting behind witnesses was lawyer who GM accused of ghost writing an expert report in a electronic stability case.
Sobbing victim said braked with both feet. Likeliest explanation - right foot caught under brake pedal while left foot mashed it down onto accelerator and kept full braking from happening. Restart of vehicle on side of road happened when wrecker driver moved fob (or second fob in husband’s pocket) moved close to keyless start car.
Total hatchet job.
same as all other companies...
they just happened to all come in a major cluster...
Im not a toy fan, but theyre nuts and bolts and lawyers like all the rest...
long story short, he drove one of the tire machines straight thru to the stock room, right out from under my buddy as he was mounting a tire...
the Explorer is a cable system, he simply applied the brake, and his foot was also resting on the throttle...the harder he pushed to 'stop', the more it torqued thru the wall...
no matter what tech toyota develops, it cant fix stupid drivers...
My understanding is that the plate is a band-aid fix to prevent a mechanical binding of the pedal mechanism. It all has to do with how much friction is built into the pedal. Too much friction and it binds. Too little friction, and it is harder to drive smoothly because you can't feel how far you've pushed the pedal. They're trying to keep it in the range where it feels good to the driver and isn't so tight that it binds.
In other words, it's a bad design. Augmenting this problem are software design issues, most importantly the lack of a brake override of the throttle.
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