Feds Investigate Hot-Selling Toyota Hybrid

any owners in hawaii that experienced this problem?

any other prius forums that are hawaii-centric?

thanks!

 

I would have thought taking it in for service to have the issue fixed would be enough. I didn't realize I'd have to take it to the gov't. But it's for a good cause so no harm in doing so.

 

We purchased our Prius in February of 2005. Do we have to wait til it dies to find out if we need the software fixed?

Another question: this afternoon, when starting to move the car, the "Master Warning Light" came on in the display along with a warning buzzer and a message saying "Please press "P" to engage Park; the batteries will not be charged if the transaxle is in Neutral N." We were in Drive and ready to go forward when this came on. Turning the car off and on did not make it go away. Finally held P for an extended period of time and it disappeared and was no problem the rest of the day.

There is no explanation in the book for this "Master Warning Light".....it just directs you to another page which never says what the warning light is for. Anyone know what it is for and what we might have done to cause this to come on? Why did we have to press P when we were in D and ready to move?

Thanks.

 

Was your door open? This all happens when you are in gear and the door is open. I've seen it several times, and it quits when I close the door, or when I push "park", or when I turn off the car.

Beth

 

For a good cause? Why, so you can scare the general public by way of the overblown media hype?

And wasting tax dollars for an investigation that isn't even necessary since it's FIXED now?

I don't know if I'd call it "for a good cause."

 

Anything that makes Toyota become a little more proactive with the issue... a RECALL instead of a TSB. They've been lucky so far, it won't take many "someone had the gas cut out at 70mph on a major highway in traffic" incidents before Toyota has an Audi 5000 on it's hands...

 

I just don't see the need to fuel the fire on hybrid fear induced by mass media feeding on a minor problem to make it a big one. You see how there are a number of people who have brand new Prii that are scared? Even though articles mention that it's a problem in 2004s and early 2005s?

People skim the news.

"Prius Fails On Highway."
That's all they see. Why scare people and spend all that tax money if your car was taken care of by Toyota and there haven't been problems since?

Sure, they could send letters to owners of 2004 and early 2005 Prius owners and half of them woudl ignore the letter. And nothing would be accomplished. And we'd be right back where we started with the government wasting MY tax money.

 

i fail to see how losing power on the freeway is dangerous... sure there may be an enhanced risk in certain situations... but take it from someone who has driven some of the junkiest POS's ever to be licensed and ran out of gas several times... losing power on the freeway isnt that life threatening as long as your brakes dont lock up when you lose power, you just coast gently to the shoulder and that is that.

i be willing to bet that hundreds of cars do it every day somewhere. next time you are on a drive of more than say 20 miles, count how many cars you see on the side of the road. its a rare day when i can drive that far on the freeway and not see at least one.

 

Thank you Dave. I fully agree and I think that's why Toyota has not issued a full-scale recall.

You'll notice there haven't even been any injuries reported. Sure, some stress, but that's what happens when a car does something weird. All cars are susceptible to acting a little off. At least the Prius doesn't come screeching to a halt on the freeway like some Fords would. And it has a backup power supply that will get you off the road.

And funny enough, you can in most cases restart it and drive off. What other car will do that when the engine stops?

 

They are obligated to not only send letters, but to CONTACT people if the car could die. This isn't a minor problem ya know... this is pretty serious. If they took a proactive approach with this, like they did with the brake lights, this issue wouldn't be blowing up all over the place.

 

No. It IS pretty minor. The brake lights issue WAS serious. If the brake lights won't come on there are serious consequences. Brake lights are federally required safety equipment.

Slowing to a stop on the side of the highway happens to thousands of people every day. Ever run out of gas? Or get a flat tire? Or see an oil pressure or temp light come on?

So maybe we should recall ALL cars since they have THOSE vulnerabilities. Right? That's the same logic.

And where I'm from, sending a letter is a way of contacting someone....

 

I'll make a deal with you. You drive on the NJ Parkway, in the left lane. The 5th one over. Or even for giggles, the 4th one over. Or how about in the middle of the 12 lane merge for the toll booth. Then we'll disable your gas engine. We'll see how minor you think it is, 'kay?

That's what could happen. And it is pretty serious.

 

I was terrified the first time this happened to me as it occured after I received minor damage (from a friggin cone!). I thought a wire got torn out or something... (btw does it seem a little overkill to show the red triangle of death for a door ajar situation?)

Anyway, back on topic: I'm wondering if we can get a voting thing going on this issue. I have a 2005 prius (purchased in October) so I'm wondering if it's the TSB that was discussed and all the newer cars have been fixed.

It'd be nice to see a vote from '04 and '05 owners on who has experienced the stall.

 

It is worrisome that so many Prius owners on this forum are so eager to blame driver error and refuse to consider that there might be an actual design or manufacture problem.

I don't think there would be an investigation if all these people just had empty gas tanks. Let's not be blinded by our enthusiasm for our cars.

Maybe we can do something a bit more useful and document the production date of each car where this has happened, mileage, whether there have ever been repeat cases in a single vehicle or how Toyota addressed the problem for those vehicles which experienced it.

I've only got 1400km on my 2005 (January-February production) and this has never happened to me. anyone else?

 

What a great posting site. I will continue to watch. I see points on both sides and I particularly like the post above suggesting exactly how to document when this problem was solved for those cars that have been recently put on the road. When I first read about this weeks ago, I looked on a TSB site (forget how I got it) and satisfied myself that my vin# was safe as I had bought my car in April. I would like reassurance, etc. Could john1701 or Randy or somebody who knows post an update?

 

I don't think I ever owned a car that hasn't shut down on the highway, at least since they added computers to them. In fact it has happened to me ever since we got fuel injection, sometimes from just bad fuel at a gas station! Seems to me that is what they are supposed to do once they sense many kinds of problems.

Would you folks all rather have the car try to keep going with say no oil pressure just on the chance that it is really just a bad sensor or connector?

Case of the Prius, this could all be made better than all the other cars on the road if they just get the EV mode working at a reasonable speed as a back up system. Then we'd at least be like an airplane with 2 or more engines. We're already partly there: We're like the 2 engine planes that can land with one engine but not hold altitude.

 

Who knows what happened to the 33 cars. My own guess is this:

The ratio of cars stalling to total cars out there is roughly in the same order of magnitude as the ratio of drivers that drive w/ two feet constantly on the pedals. We all know that things happen w/ the car when you step on each pedal. This type of driving can cause the computer to be "confused" and perhaps shut things down. Like our PCs, you'll have to reset/reboot and then all will be normal again.

My 2 cents.

 

I assure you, my foot was only on the gas when mine died...

And like another poster mentioned above... why are people so eager to blame the driver rather than consider that there might be a problem with the car??

 

I looked at the list of complaints on the NHTSA website. Sure, most of them were legit I'm sure. But some were so OVER-DRAMATIZED they were almost not credible. "OMG, OMG" does not belong in some government complaint.

And I love how everyone thinks they know better than Toyota how their car works. "Computer problem? I don't THINK so. Replace something or I won't be happy."

This is how cars work now. Everything else in the world is controlled by computers. Why not your car? And it's not "voodoo" as some complaints have stipulated.

Jonnycat, your situation could have happened in ANY car. That is what I'm saying. Really this is just a huge media hype thing. But ALL cars stall, let's face it. My old Buick would stall daily upwards of 70 mph. And I didn't have a battery pack to get me off the road, I had to throw the thing in neutral, turn the key and hope it started again. And usually it didn't start again. I know what it's like to stall in traffic and I think some people just freaked out about it and made it sound much more like a big deal than it really was. Heck, I made it sound like a big deal the first time my Buick stalled. But after the third or 4th time, I didn't really care.

With my prius(produced Feb 05), no problems. I am reiterating, this is a problem in 04 and EARLY 05 vehicles. But there are people out there reading the media hype and thinking their BRAND NEW car is at risk. When it probably isn't.

The media is scaring people and there's no reason to fuel their fire.

 

Can someone link me to the article that says this problem only exists for early 05 vehicles? Thanks.