Toyota's runaway-car worries may not stop at floor mats

"A 2007 study by federal highway safety officials showed that braking distance and force on a Lexus ES 350 increased fivefold when the throttle was wide open" I took that from the article, so why are people speculating and saying you won't be able to stop the car when the throttle is wide open.

 

I suppose at some point while holding the brakes too long they fade ,heat up then are on fire, imo,I have no real world experience there . Once again if people say you cant stop the car it sound conclusive, maybe we are just supposed to fall in line with what pople say without question.

 

How a car full of adults couldn't figure out to put a car in neutral is beyond me. It's an unfortunate accident that could have been easily prevented by not panicking.

 

Huh? Drivers who "don't know what the neutral position is for"? ???

I think he'd be surprised to know how many idiots out there shouldn't be on the road at all. I wouldn't. I see them on the road every day.

Anyhow, this bit of yellow journalism, slathered in hype, is the kind of irresponsible (and even vindictive) shite I expect from some newspapers these days.

 

If you guys read further - you'll notice:

One obvious line of defense is to simply shut off the engine, a step that may not be intuitive on the ES 350. The car has a push-button start system, activated by the combination of a wireless electronic fob carried by the driver and a button on the dashboard. But once the vehicle is moving, the engine will not shut off unless the button is held down for a full three seconds -- a period of time in which Saylor's car would have traveled 528 feet. A driver may push the button repeatedly, not knowing it requires a three-second hold.

The other common defense tactic advised by experts is to simply shift a runaway vehicle into neutral. But the ES 350 is equipped with an automatic transmission that can mimic manual shifting, and its shift lever on the console has a series of gates and detents that allow a driver to select any of at least four forward gears.

The arrangement of those gear selections could make it difficult to shift from a forward gear directly into neutral in a panic situation, Toyota spokesman Lyons acknowledged.

The most obvious impulse for any driver experiencing sudden acceleration is to apply the brakes. But when an engine goes to full throttle and is speeding at 120 mph, the brake might not stop the car.

The ES 350 and most other modern vehicles are equipped with power-assisted brakes, which operate by drawing vacuum power from the engine. But when an engine opens to full throttle, the vacuum drops, and after one or two pumps of the brake pedal the power assist feature disappears.

As a result, a driver would have to apply enormous pressure to the brake pedal to stop the car, and if the throttle was wide open might not be able to stop it at all, safety experts say. Indeed, a 2007 study by federal highway safety officials showed that braking distance and force on a Lexus ES 350 increased fivefold when the throttle was wide open. And evidence introduced in sudden acceleration trials suggests that it can take up to 225 pounds of pressure on a brake pedal to arrest a runaway vehicle, far more than most drivers can muster from a seated position, said Edgar "Hike" Heiskell, a Charleston, W.Va., attorney who is suing Toyota over a fatal acceleration accident in Flint, Mich.


And down near the last few paragraphs:

Drivers in other crashes also found it difficult to rein in a runaway Toyota. Guadalupe Gomez of Redwood City said he was held hostage for 20 miles on a Bay Area freeway by a 2007Camry traveling more than 100 mph.

Gomez was unable to turn off the engine or shift into neutral and then burned out his brakes before slamming into another car and killing that driver, said attorney Louis Franecke, who represented that victim's family.

The San Diego crash is still under investigation by the San Diego County Sheriff's Department and the CHP; until the probe is complete, neither agency is commenting.

 

Just like the exploding gas tanks on trucks before the Firestone thing.

 

A long time ago I owned a 88' Celica. It had a throttle cable that went through the firewall. One day while on the freeway the cable got stuck and the engine began accelerating. Luckily it was a manual transmission so I took it out of gear and pulled over. I had to reach down and pull up on the accelerator pedal.

 

well if my car wont stop, iwill hit something so i dont run out of controll...some of us are qucick thinkers..some of us look in the manual while going out of control...there are multiple ways to defend against this issue...ther is not right or wrong...and when the victim dies, no one will ever now what was tried. its a shitty thing but hey...we do what we can

 

and anything you read in the media is bullshit propaganda...mostly

 

That's why I just pointed out the 2007 study the Highway Officials did about open throttle braking. All the rest in the article is just speculation.

 

I can speak from experience. 2 months after I bought my 08 Tacoma I was involved in a rollover caused by "sudden acceleration". Toyota took the blame and paid for all the body repairs, replaced the ECU, acceleration controls and Throttle Body. Until you experience it you can't say how you would handle it.

 

auto or manual..can you give more into the situation....? knowledge is power

 

I have an auto. I was on the way to work one morning and I had slowed down to pass some elctrical guys doing work on the side of the road. I was going 15 mph at most. Once I hit the gas to speed up the pedal hit the floor and the ass come around. It happened so fast there wasn't much I could do. The truck 180ed into the on coming traffic and onto the median. Once I hit the culvert I rolled over and luckily hit a dirt pile, which prvented me from rolling any further. The scary part was that the truck was still accelerating even after it flipped, and I had to kick the gear shift into park, subsequently braking the handle.

 

Are you saying the gas pedal actually hit the floor ? Could have been your floormat. The "drive by wire" system uses a sensor to read pedal position. A malfunction with the sensor could happen causing it to read the throttle is fully open when the pedal isn't depressed, but it cannot move the actual pedal. Sorry about your accident though, are you still driving a Tacoma ?

 

I remember when Chevys were breaking motor mounts, which could cause the throttle to jamb open all the way. I remember when a buildup of ice caused my throttle to stick once. I can imagine several other things could cause it: all of them mechanical in nature.

But I will say that under certain circumstances I notice that my AC kicking on and off can cause unwanted speed or unwanted deceleration.

If the computer is set to kick the idle up a tad when the AC kicks in, and something causes the RPM to be misread, the system might kick it way up. I don't know if the Tacoma does this or not, but I really notice the change if I happen to be going very slow, or perhaps coasting down a slight incline, foot off the gas, and the truck surges unexpectedly.

 

Hoy Ve! Do you guys work for Toyota or something. They already took the blame for the malfunction and it's documented. I still have the same truck and have had no problems with it since they replaced everything. The final bill was well over $18,000 for the body damage and parts replacement. Once I explained to them I was not going to sue them, and that all I wanted was my truck back in the same condition it was when I bought it 2 months prior, they were more willing to work with me. They even sent out one of their investigators to check the acceleration stats before the rollover and came to the conclusion that there was something wrong with the system but they could not pin point the problem so they replaced everything.

 

If you cant figure out how to shift your car into neutral you probably shouldn't be driving. I don't give a damn what kind of transmission you have.

 

That statement screams immaturity.

 

Listen man, no need to get hostile, I'm just trying to get the facts straight. 1) Why would the ass end of the truck spin around if the pedal hit the floor (you weren't making a turn) ? 2) If the truck rolled over, it's totaled, buy a new one, $18,000 in repairs ? 3) If that happened to me I would not be driving the same truck. 4) Do you have the documentation ? 5) You also joined this forum in April and this happened two months ago, why are you just bringing it to our attention now ?

 

If you go to the NHTSA site you will find the official complaint and documentation.