Latest Toyota recall includes NO Prius models

Sorry for not being a technoid and getting the right thread, but thanks for the info.

 

It's unfortunate that this has happened (throttle mechanism failures), but really, it's not as big a deal as so many make it out to be. There are 2.3 -million- vehicles being recalled. There have been, what, 20 reported cases? That's a failure rate of about one in 100,000. Not too bad, but high for Toyota. So Toyota did the right thing, and recalled them all! Once they were convinced there WAS actually a problem. You won't find GM, Chrysler, or Ford doing that. Even Nissan and Honda might not. Don't have enough history with Hyundai/Kia to comment on what their response might be.

The thing I find funny is how so many other manufacturers are keeping quiet on this. Many of them are also involved, but this has not been well reported. So they are hiding "in the weeds". Others are keeping quiet "just in case" they have a similar situation in the near future.

Some dealers of other makes however, are acting like dealers. Slimey people of questionalble descent that they often are.

 

As you can imagine, forums on the local Detroit papers are going nuts with this. I posted a note last night pointing out around 300 died in the Exploder/Firestone mess and around 900 in the Pinto disaster.

The Detroit locals are hammering Toyota like the D3 have never had a recall, nobody has ever died in their cars, and they have always acted in the interests of the consumer.

BTW, I was Googling around on the Pinto mess and read that something like 37 of 40 crash tests resulted in ruptured gas tanks, and Ford knew this and went ahead with the car anyway.

If one were to look at the recall and death history of all the manufacturers, I suspect Toyota would look pretty good. I have no numbers, just a hunch.

 

After reading your post, I decided to take a look for myself. WOW, what an eye opener. I'm sure the Detroit Free Press is doing all it can to "fan the fire". But in the end, this too shall pass, and Toyota will continue to make products that people want, while Detroit will be still be playing the blame-game, and wondering why their market share still continues to decline.


Camry red flag raised in 2004 | freep.com | Detroit Free Press

"The Ultimate Ouestion is --WHY WOULD AN LOGICAL AMERICAN BUY A NIP MADE VEHICLE WHEN THE DISHONEST,GREEDY,DECEPTIVE,AND LYING JAPANESE OWNERS OF toyota have covered up their millions of UNSAFE AND DEFECTIVE toyotas RISKING,KILLING,AND INJURING HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT AMERICANS AND THEIR FAMILIES????????? Especially when You can purchase an AWARD-Winning,WORLD-Class,Highest in Quality,SAFETY,Performance,Styling,Fuel Efficency,and Technology American Owned,Engineered and produced vehicle like the FORD FUSION HYBRID---"


AND


"I am getting sick and tired of all this foreign junk. From poisoned toothpaste and lead based painted toys to complete junk TV's and tools and now the mighty toyota finally gets caught with making deathtraps. Covering it up since at least 2004! Not a word from C&D or consumer reports and the other bought off rags. All I can say they need to make an example out of them."




I might be wrong, but aren't most (not all) of the issues that this jingoistic poster is referring to, associated with American made Toyota's, and not "NIP made", to quote this person? Ironic, but sad.

 

Hi everyone,
I need some reassurrance. My daughter just purchased a Prius 2010 Gen III and I am worried. I have heard on Good Morning America 3 - 2010 Pruises have had problems with the accelerators. This is ridiculous. Has ANYONE had a problem with their car? My mind needs to be put at ease. She is riding around with my grandchildren and one more is on the way.

 

I have over 7K miles on my G3, and no problems with acceleration. A few have reported that under very specific conditions during regenerative braking, a feeling of temporary (sub-1 second) loss of braking can occur. Some have described this as a "sudden surge, or lurching", but more likely what they are feeling is a change in momentum. Last time I checked, there have been about 30 complaints (out of about 130,00 Prius sold last year) to the NHTSA. To my knowledge, no accidents have been reported. This phenomena does seem to be asociated with the regenertive braking on the Prius, and owners of older versions of the Prius have reported a similar phenomena. But with all this said, no determination has been made on whether there really is a problem, or whether this feeling, is just that - a unique and unfamiliar feeling that is associated with regenertive braking. Those that have reported this sensation have noted that when they press down harder on the brakes, and transition into the conventional frictional braking, the sensation goes away.

Right now, there is Sooooo much hype and hysteria going on, it's very hard to pull out truth, from hysteria, and to what degree any of these problems are - ie if the problems are real, does it happen 1 out of every 100,000 or is the frequency of occurance much less/more? If the frequency of occurance is significant, then that's when I get worried, but if the chances are small, then I don't worry. After all, we can assign a probablity to every life event, e.g., 1 out of every 10,000 people will develop some form of cancer, etc...probability that your tire will blow out going at highway speeds is 1 in a million. But everything has a likelihood. It's all about probabilities, and no car is perfect.

If you Google Prius and acceleration problems, there aren't too many relevant hits. But I did find this report regarding a 2007 Prius: Runaway Acceleration Problem Plagues Prius Owners


Here it is again: Toyota Prius: Unintended Acceleration - AutoSpies Auto News . You can see that this lady's story is making ALL the rounds in the news.

I have found nothing like this for the G3 prius. But given that there are people (my aging parents would probably be in this group) that really don't check things like floor mats, or who make other driving mistakes...as long as there are drivers like this, there will ALWAYS be reports of incidents like this. What % are actually due to a real problem is why they have "investigations".

I suspect that there are more "defective" drivers than there are defective Prii.

Driver error, or real? Unless we have a meaningful number of incidents, who can differentiate what's real, from what possibly have been driver error - in this case, (possibly) the lady didn't anchor her floor mat and it rode up on the accelerator.