Loved Ones - Toyota

[Bird]

Bird if you go to Vietnam you can again try out your pioneering urge. A company is making an electric Isetta.

An electric one might not be a bad idea at all. I'd like to have that for local use. I make a lot of 5 to 10 mile round trips in this area. One of the things I remember about that Isetta was that it was supposed to get 50-60 mpg on gas. There was no gas gauge, but a very large gas cap and you could see the bottom of the tank. It appeared to have no gas in it on the dealer's lot. It was 37 miles to my Dad's service station so the salesman put one gallon in it and we figured that would be plenty. Well, I ran out of gas on the farm-to-market road about 4 miles short of where I was going. And elderly couple in a full sized Ford sedan stopped and gave me a ride. He jokingly asked if I wanted to just put that Isetta in his trunk.

 

[jinman]

I know I've posted this before, but a Pizza Hut in Denton had an Isetta as a delivery vehicle. Both sides of it were scratched up due to the delivery guys going around corners too fast and tipping it over. They said it was much easier to tip over in right-hand turns because of left-hand drive. I'm sure the insides of that Isetta smelled pretty much like a smashed pizza.

 

[firefighter jim]

There's no statute of limitations for Simca owners. They get 10 years of solitary confinement in an Isetta.

Those late 50's BMW Isetta's were pretty cool! I'd like to have one!

 

[firefighter jim]

The rumours I've heard is that all the older Simca cars simply disappeared while sitting in the garage or driveway. In the garage there was usually a red pile of dust but outside this blew away. The real lucky owners were able to graduate to one of these.

Those are pretty neat also!

 

[BobRip]

I saw the testimony of a woman on TV in front of the investigation committee whose Lexus went to 100 MPH and putting it in neutral or reverse would not slow the car. I wonder if the shift lever goes through the same computer as the throttle. If there is a computer problem, you may loose more that just the throttle control. Very scary.

 

[jinman]

I saw the testimony of a woman on TV in front of the investigation committee whose Lexus went to 100 MPH and putting it in neutral or reverse would not slow the car. I wonder if the shift lever goes through the same computer as the throttle. If there is a computer problem, you may loose more that just the throttle control. Very scary.

Bob, I saw that woman's testimony and I thought she said that she shifted to PARK. Later, somebody else said REVERSE. Now, I think you probably heard NEUTRAL. I know this woman must have had a scary ride, but the teary drama of her saying she called her husband on her cell phone to say goodbye has no proper place in this testimony. What she "thought" is obviously not true because she is still with us. I have all the sympathy in the world for her and her scary ride, but I just think she was brought to testify before the committee to inject as much emotion as possible. Anyone who tries to answer her or question her response is going to be the big bad guy.

On the same thought, I've seen pictures of that Toyota upside down in the pond in Southlake, TX many, many times in the news. They always use that to talk about the problems, but only in a buried news story have I read that an eye witness said they could not see a driver as the car came by them. They also fail to mention that the male driver suffered from seizures. Isn't it possible that the driver had a seizure and slumped down with his foot on the accelerator? My guess is that if the news media mentioned his problem with seizures, there would be people sending them hate mail because of their "insensitivity" to the families. I don't ever think you'll see that in a headline splashed across the front page of the paper. "Toyotas are Dangerous" makes a much safer story.

Of course, I don't know what happened in either of these instances. I am only sure of how these people are used and how the stories seem to be one-sided against Toyota. Asking the news media to be objective is a bit of a stretch. I'm sure all of us can agree to that.

 

[firefighter jim]

I saw that testimony also. Your car is out of control going 100 mph and you're going to call someone on your cell phone. I don't think so!

 

[riptides]

...she called her husband on her cell phone to say goodbye has no proper place in this testimony....

It is a testimony. People are human. She said she called and took an oath before congress. She is re-living a terrifying moment in her life.

I saw that testimony also. Your car is out of control going 100 mph and you're going to call someone on your cell phone. I don't think so!

Did you hear the recorded 911 calls of the Lexus crash that people died in? They had time to call, right before they died.

 

[patrick_g]

I thought it was Fiats that did that? Had a few of these at one time, never looked this good though.
FIAT - Fix It Again Tony!

Decades ago I had a secretary who was looking for an inexpensive economical commute car and showed me an ad in the paper for what she called a FLAT and wondered if I was familiar with that make. NOTE: in much news print the lower case of L and I are the same.

I have had two used Fiat 124 station wagons and I give them mixed reviews even if at the time Remy Julienne (then the world's most famous living stunt driver, since killed in a driving mishap) preferred them, at least the sedan version.

Pat

 

[BobRip]

Bob, I saw that woman's testimony and I thought she said that she shifted to PARK. Later, somebody else said REVERSE. Now, I think you probably heard NEUTRAL. .

Of course, I don't know what happened in either of these instances. I am only sure of how these people are used and how the stories seem to be one-sided against Toyota. Asking the news media to be objective is a bit of a stretch. I'm sure all of us can agree to that.

Jinman, I heard both neutral and reverse.

I have worked (designed, specificed, tested) a lot of electronics in my 30 year career as an electrical engineer. I always found it very helpful to listen to customers experiences. I had coworkers who would doubt the customer experience because it was difficult to replicate. I almost always found that after we made larger quantities of the item, that we would find the customer was right. People like to deny that these things occur, expecially if their jobs depend on it. Electronics and software can do some unexpected things and bugs can hide for years. I have seen that you find some problems when you build one item, additional problems when you build a 100, and so forth. Toyotoa has millions of these cars out there and problems will crop up that they have never seen and will not want to believe. I am not trying to be critical of Toyotoa (I have a 2005 Tundra and it has been very good) I just know how companies tend to react to problems. The gas pedal problem is a rare event and the electrical/software problem may be even rarer. Soon they will have electrical brakes and steering. These really scare me, not just from Toyotoa but from any company.

You are right about the news media. They don't give any perspective. They don't show that Toyotoa has a certain failure rate and others have X failure rate. Show the emotions and not the facts. This bugs me to no end and makes rational decisions impossible.