The deluded statements about Prius brakes NOT being a safety issue

With all due respect to the CHP officer, there is nothing special about how the ES350 Lexus goes into neutral. It would have been exactly how whatever Lexus he owned went into neutral. Are you assuming he put it into neutral and it did nothing? So you are saying the throttle stuck AND the transmission failed to shift out of drive? You have any idea how small the chances of that happening would be?

Far more likely he panicked and failed to put it into neutral...people do funny things when they are panicked and their families are screaming and crying in the backseat.

A tragedy no doubt...but you will have to work pretty hard to convince me that bumping it out of gear wouldn't have solved the crisis.

Anybody have the accident report? They should have been able to tell what gear it was in...

You are incorrect. Have you ever driven a Lexus? Its a normal shifter...you just shift up...and its in Neutral. The Prius? Just hold the shifter over...and its in neutral. Nothing unique or unusual or difficult about it at all.

 

Exactly, first hit the brakes, then panic, then crash.

No one should be so cocky to think they would react better in an emergency unless they have been through the situation before. Blaming the driver is extremely distasteful to me.

Solution for run away electronic accelerators on many cars, override the accelleration when the brake is hit. Year of the first NHTSA investigation where Toyota and NHTSA decided not to look at acceleration reports long enough for the brakes to be hit - 2004.

 

I got that from the earlier link: "In addition, shifting a car into neutral to try to disengage the engine from the transmission isn't easy either in an emergency situation. The Times story says, '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.'"

Here is one of the comments from the IEEE article, that I thought was enlightening: "As an electronics engineer I would never buy an automobile that puts a computer between me and any critical system in an automobile. Just too scary in my opinion to be depending on software that has not been exhaustively tested in real life scenarios. ... I'd bet dollars to donuts that a software glitch was the trigger for the whole thing."

Back to the 2010 Prius. We know it was a software glitch. What really gets people is that this "glitch" in a mission critical system was actually allowed to be released by a company that hyped itself on safety. So if this one got through it could be a leading indicator of carelessness in general in other life-and-death systems. We already know Toyota has managed its problems with a communications campaign of omissions, denials and revisionism.

What's next? That's the big question. I believe I've seen the answer in other documented reports that I've read, and it sucks.

 

You forgot about, take time to make a phone call to 911....

That incident is not related to the problem associated with the 2010 Prius so why bother talking about it?

 

right. shouldn't have responded, it was totally off topic of prius when I got here (and it seems like people were busy while I was at a sb party). I just didn't like all of the criticism of the driving skills.

 

I hear ya. I don't think anyone want's to say bad things about the officer or his skills but it is a very odd situation which even the reports agree with.

 

From what you have heard and read the braking issue is clear cut, but have you ever experienced it? I haven't in 3 years and 93,000 km in my Gen II.

 

First off, I will say that I am glad that Toyota will be fixing this issue. I had a feeling they would at some point. I have experienced this braking issue a few times and I never felt like it would cause an accident.

I thought perhaps it could if someone was driving too close to a vehicle in front of them. But I always keep a nice safe distance.

I was watching the CBS Early Show the other day and there was this drama queen on there boohooing about how his 2010 Prius braking problem made him go through a stop sign. Really, how far could he have gone into the intersection. Me thinks he was planning on doing a rolling stop anyway.

When I have experienced this, I just brake harder. No issue. No crash.

 

I have had this happen. It is so instantaneous that you hardly notice it. I've seen a post somewhere else that sums it up perfectly. As a motorcycle rider I know the feeling of hitting the front brake first as it is your "power" brake. Once you start losing momentum you hit the rear brake and the bike levels from it's "nose dive" and it "appears" like a loss of power when in effect it is an illusion.
Tony Renier

 

While the solution may be a reflashing of the software, this is in fact why Toyota is going the all-electronic route, your conclusion is faulty and superficial. Toyota intentionally is designing its vehicles to be increasingly more electronic. It's more dependable, they're lighter and simpler mechanically and when the inevitable adjustments do need to be made no new parts need to be manufactured, shipped, lost, broken, etc, etc. The whole solution is transmitted from Japan to the US or Canada or the UK instantaneously; then the solution is distributed to every store on the continent on demand, instantaneously.

Every vehicle maker knows and understands this. Every vehicle maker is going the route of making every vehicle a rolling computer with multiple ECM's and ECU's. It's the future. Some will latch onto it and some will be dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st Century.

Your faulty conclusion in the statement above is the highlighted text, Here I'll fix your post...

I think that from the content and tenor of your posts that we can safely conclude that you are covered by this corrected statement. We can agree on this, amiright?

The software reflashing will be a customer satisfaction matter for the benefit of new first time owners who might not be as familiar with the feel and operation of the Prius as more experienced owners. It's simply to smooth out the 'bumps' in the road. No...Big...Deal, life moves on.

Since you're new here, the 2004/05 reflashing of the fuel flow algorithm in the fuel system was far more critical and more serious. It originally left people stranded all over the continent by surprise. After it was reflashed and fixed the problem disappeared forever, the country then took the Prius to its bosom and it became the darling of the industry. Except for certain people who don't want it to succeed.

Long view? This will be done efficiently and quickly and the few who are complaining will either return under the bridges from whence they came or they will receive the reflashing and continue on for 4, 5 or 10 more years happily getting 50 mpg day-in and day-out. I'm in that latter group after the reflashing was done on my '05, 142,000 miles and counting; another 140,000-ish to go.

 

I live in a town whose streets become "slip and slide," a popular kids toy that uses water covered plastic for sliding about, when it rains. The first time my 2003 Prius ABS brakes activated was at a stop sign just after a light rain had started. So I'm used to driving in such conditions all the time ... it is called defensive driving.

If you'll check the poll, only 50% of the hundred responders had even experienced it and only 20% considered it a severe problem. The earlier, 2004-09 Prius had a similar 50% having experienced it but no one listed it as severe. We've also found it is rare, intermittent but it exists.

Like every 2010 Prius owner, if Toyota has a fix, I look forward to getting and testing it. It is fair to say some are less concerned than others and I happen to be in the 'less concerned' because it is so difficult to recreate. Also, the mitigation is to mash the brakes and they come on FAST and HARD. But there is one silver lining about the wide-spread Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt:

• Many unsophisticated Prius owners are probably driving a little more cautiously, a bit slower with more following distance

This means our cars are likely to have an even lower accident rate in the future. I don't like that it might be fear based instead of self-interest in saving fuel but 'any port in a storm.'

Bob Wilson

 

Since you weren't in that vehicle, your God's-eye is clouded at best. In fact you know nothing about what happened there anymore than anyone else does who has not investigated the tragedy. Your statements above are pure speculation like so many from so many other people.

Your specific statements about the Lexus gated shifter are inaccurate. You apparently have never driven one or if you have you didn't pay attention to how they operate ( that can happen? ). Again the smoking gun is the older gentleman two days before in the same exact vehicle. He solved the problem and returned home safely.

That's all that you or I know about this incident, so that's all that I'm going to say so that the thread doesn't become hijacked with more irrelevant comments.

 

Along the same lines as DeadPhish's post below, this computerworld blogger makes some good points re automotive software.

Toyota's lesson: Software can be unsafe at any speed - Computerworld Blogs

I don't agree with everything he says, but definitely the main theme of there needing to be a greater recognition by the car companies and the public of how much their cars are now dependent on software. Personally, I'd like to see software updates and re-flashing start being recognized as a regular maintenance item. Kaizen has to apply after the sale, as well as before the sale. Any "software improvements" ought to be passed along to all owners, not just new ones, regardless of whether there's a safety issue. While they are at it, they can give me free or at least more reasonably priced map updates!

 

On the other hand, control software updates must be tested as rigorously as any other automotive safety system. Too fast of an update cycle can lead to the same mess we have with desktop computers, where an otherwise functioning computer is rendered useless by updates.

Airbus had some trouble with this during the early days of fly-by-wire. A new update would be released, fixing an existing problem but reintroducing old problems. One of my pilot friends used to laugh about extending the flaps and having the toilets flush.

Tom

 

. . . . maybe a lil' Hersheys Chocolate syrup too plese?

. . . . there we go, being all insensitive again. Believe it or not, I'm getting better. I resisted the temptation to post my favorite crying baby photo. It aint easy being me.

Yes ... but the sincere ones? After we flog 'em ... we stand 'em up & dust 'em off, and help 'em do cool mods on their new hybrid. And as for the accord? It's a fine ride.
.

 

The times story is wrong. Yes the Lexus has a gated shifter, but there is no gate between N and D. You just simply bump the shifter up one position from D to N. Nothing difficult about it at all.

Could be harder if you were in a lower gear, but not if you were in drive which is where the shifter is 99.9% of the time.

So we must pretend that he did not make any errors or mistakes and ignore any logic or evidence that he may have simply because he died? That doesn't make any sense.

Nobody is blaming him...but I do believe he made an error by not putting the transmission in neutral. Would I have done the same thing? I don't know.

 

Wow, "defensive driving", what a concept. Most drivers here in the U.S.A. seem to practice "offensive driving".

Keith :focus:

P.S. Bob, I think you and I had the same driving instructor many years ago...

 

I've now seen the 'anomaly' 5 times. The last one was the most alarming. If you haven't experienced it - fine. It is real. Depending on what you are doing and where you are, it may be nothing.

This weekend, while leaving Disneyland (parking garage, down a decent ramp - surface slightly wet), and I reached the bottom at around 20MPH (I know I know Disneyland is 14MPH), the brakes stopped briefly.

This was on a hill, going into a decent turn. Knowing about the issue from before, I pushed hard on the brakes - and the car started shimying (antilock brakes now started because I was more at a panic stop now). If a car was at the turn/bend in the road, I would have hit them.

Would it have been a hard hit - no. Would it have caused death - no. But to the nay-sayers, this is a real issue.

It's probably a much larger issue to the legal beings at Toyota - now if you get in an accident, there is doubt.

 

People, pull your heads out of the sand! Toyota is coming out in baby steps to admit problems. I'm pulling my sources from large circulation publications, and quotes from Toyota officials. There are published investigation results and 911 tapes.

When Toyota issues a recall, I'm sure many will dispute that also, "Oh, they had to do it for PR ..." (or some other excuse).

 

So sell your deathtrap. Do it! Now! You'll DIE in that Prius!

Or else just simply take care of business and go on with your life.