Loved Ones - Toyota

[patrick_g]

Thanks Pat, I was not doing any "wishful thinking" just curios about this whole run away car scenario.
I was an auto mechanic for 12 years prior to getting my current job that I have been in for the last 20 years. I drive an old antiquated 07 3500 dodge ram. I have never driven the new fangled keyless push button remote vehicles.
The "fly-by-wire" has never appealed to me even when I had my 1995 powerstroke and could not find the throttle cable Later to my total amazement I had an electrical short in one of the valve cover gaskets :confused2: I am often glad I am out of that business..

You may not have been doing any wishful thinking but anyone pressing a button that is just an input device to a computer which is malfunctioned or malfunctioning and expects it to work normally is.

Where there is all this smoke there may be a little fire. There have been run away acceleration events for decades. Stuck mechanical throttle linkages were one cause. Another was someone who had their foot on the accelerator pedal but thought their foot to be on the brake and when they pushed down and didn't get what they wanted they pushed harder. This is well documented but does not account for all the recent cases.

I have (and really like) a '97 one ton 4x4 Dually Dodge/Cummins, the last year of the 12 valve NON-COMPUTER turbo diesels. When it was less than a year old it went to WOT on cruise once and tapping the brakes and pushing the steering wheel mounted button didn't switch off the cruise. Having a REAL key switch which interrupted the current to the fuel cutoff solenoid and a functional brain I just switched the engine off. It never happened again but once was enough. Note: the brakes would NOT stop the truck with the engine at full throttle when going 65MPH. The brakes would fade away first. Oh, I had a tad more than stock HP and torque (he he.)

At times in the past I have variously made a living doing electronic engineering design and then later software engineering and can appreciate the complexity of the electronic and electromechanical systems in modern automotive designs BUT I know very little about them from a practical or experiential standpoint and have little to no interest in trying to get into the nitty gritty so long as I can find a pro who is into that stuff to do my maint. My level of competence and interest is my early 60's air cooled VW powered street legal dune/beach buggy, a Myers Manx clone.

Pat

 

[turbo36]

Another theory


Toyota’s Recall Woes May Have Started in Space | Autopia | Wired.com

 

[Bird]

Another theory


Toyota痴 Recall Woes May Have Started in Space | Autopia | Wired.com

Would that let Toyota off the hook?:laughing: They could claim it was beyond their control.

 

[turbo36]

Would that let Toyota off the hook?:laughing: They could claim it was beyond their control.

Just like the insurance companies - it was an act of God!

 

[Egon]

SPACE.com -- The Great Storm: Solar Tempest of 1859 Revealed

It could be interesting what cosmic rays could do! They may not even have to originate from our sun.

Curious what it could do to our finalcial record's?

 

[SPYDERLK]

Wonder how many of our members remember the push shifting of the late 1950s (especially 1958), such as the Plymouths with the push buttons on the left end of the dash, or the Edsel with the push buttons in the center of the steering wheel?

Brakes failed on ours when I was a kid. My mother was helpless. I got us to the shop using the buttons for brakes; downgear to slow, hit reverse to stop, throw it in park. Worked very well. Can you imagine having to deal with a computer in a situation like that?
larry

 

[Egon]

The Tow truck may have been a better alternative.

 

[Bird]

The Tow truck may have been a better alternative.

When we were kids, who could afford a tow truck?

Brakes failed on ours when I was a kid.

I was 16 and had gone rabbit hunting in my first car, a 1946 Chevy, and was on my way back to town on dirt and gravel roads, when I approached an intersection, stepped on the brake pedal, and it went right to the floor without slowing me at all. Talk about a sinking feeling. Fortunately, both the intersecting roads were dirt/gravel country roads with no other vehicles in sight. Of course my Dad owned a service station in the little town, so I slowly drove on to the station in first and second gear, and learned to replace blown wheel cylinder kits.

 

[lostcause]

as some others have commented, over the years every manufacturer has had their share of time in the limelight due to a vehicle fault and whether there was inaction/delayed reaction in resolving the issue. in my recent memory, gm had the exploding saddle tanks on trucks, ford/firestone had the tire fiasco, and now toyota with the accelerator issue.

with gm, i have ridden in hundreds of these - many still in use on the road. never known of anyone personally who has had the problem, and i have seen more than one that has been in an accident with enough impact to drastically dent those tanks without rupturing them. i also remember hearing about how the reenactment for the court case had to be staged with incendiaries because they could not get the rupture and fire to happen from an accident. cost gm a pile of money and reputation over that problem.

i remember the mid 90's ford explorers with firestone tires that blew out and caused the drivers to lose control and get in accidents. i also seem to remember that the accidents i saw reported in the news were generally due to blowouts at 80+ mph on the highway. am i the only one who doesn't make a habit of driving ridiculous and criminal speeds in vehicles not designed for bonneville? on the flip side, due to the bad press that firestone got, a co-worker's wife refused to drive her vehicle anymore until she got replacement tires for her firestones. i bought all four nearly new for $100. guess the firestone fiasco worked well for me.

i confess i haven't paid too much attention to the toyota accelerator issue, but the first few days of it all had the media saying that the pedal stuck on the floor mats. if it's a mechanical sticking like this, then it's a no-brainer to pop the pedal up with your foot or shift for neutral. later i heard that it was an issue in the accelerator pedal design - still sounds mechanical to me. i would still think that a neutral shift would still save the day. since then i've heard that there is an acceleration issue. i can see where maybe there is no solution, where everything acceleration and gear related is computer and sensor controlled now, and not mechanical, so maybe you can't shift out if it's a computer issue. problem is, i've heard so many stories, it's hard to tell which (if any) is correct.

i certainly feel for anyone who has been injured or lost loved ones to these or other similar problems, but my gut says that every one of these has been blown out of proportion by the media, this is made even worse by the fact that in the rush not to get scooped by another media network, they publish stories before they even have any idea what the problem is. as lawsuit crazy as our world has become, i'm surprised that the auto manufacturers haven't been able to slap the media networks with defamation lawsuits when they publish inaccurate stories. it seems that media networks and politicians are the only ones in the country not held to high standards. it's a tough call which i hold in more contempt.

 

[SpringHollow]

In the late 70's, i was driving a car with used Firestone (i believe) tires that had very good tread. After the 3rd rear wheel blowout (two passing tractor trailers on the expressway but not speeding), i went back to the place i was getting them from. Found out i was being sold tires that were returned due to a recall because of a very high incident of blowouts. I told the guy i would have bought the more expensive ones if the had told me. My guess was that it was even illegal to sell them after they had been returned due to the recall. So sometimes the problems are real - i was not getting 1000 miles before a blow out.

Ken