Toyota electronics not cause of unintended acceleration

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It seems the most likely causes were sticky gas pedals, floor mats, and driver error. Thoughts?

I had heard much the same. I'm wondering how much money they lost or wasted trying to fix driver error.

I've also heard that whatever the cause of the malfunctioning gas pedal, they should have included some sort of safety measure that would have the brake pedal override the gas if both were pressed at the same time.

No, as I have a Vibe, which is basically a matrix, which is basically an overgrown Corolla. Electronic throttle on a 1.8-liter I4, and I can press the gas a bit while holding the brake - helps launch the car off the line a bit better, as I've pre-loaded the torque convertor more. That or get tire spin...

...I only wish I had the 2ZZ-GE engine - more horsepower and a higher redline. Still 140 ain't bad out of the 1ZZ-FE.

I just find the whole Toyota cars kill you thing had suspect timing during a automotive trade dispute between US and Japan. A dispute heats up, suddenly Toyota's cars are unsafe.

Yes, brakes should override gas. And it would preferably kick the gas peddle back.

And eventually all our cars will have fully electronic brakes so that this failure could become a reality.

I haven't heard anything that this was related to the trade dispute.

Breadloaf:...uh...I don't think fully electronic brakes will work. Brakes are just huge disks that clamp onto the rim of the car to slow it down through friction, can't make that electric. Unless you just mean make the pedal electric.

Mellon/Deboss: No. That would make doing any type of track run much slower. You should be able to administer gas and brake at the same time.

This problem wouldn't be so bad if Americans could actually fucking drive.

I just mean the control system, afterall, that was the thought-to-be original cause of the Toyota brake failures.

Also, don't mind my comment about the trade dispute. It's just a personal opinion.

@American driving skill

It's surprising how much driving culture changes as you move around in America, from super polite upstate New York to crazy ass Florida drivers.

edited 8th Feb '11 6:11:32 PM by breadloaf

@ Chagen: Then maybe the normal cars intended for normal people should have the brake-override feature.

They can have the "override gas if brake is pressed" function, but they better let tuner's mod the car's computer to get rid of it if we want.

Actually, it would work better as a mechanical feature.

What's this bullshit about electric brakes taking over?

They're cheaper to make and maintain. So far the only ones out there have a fail-safe that falls back on a mechanical system if the electronic brake system fails.

Still prefer the hydraulic ones for some reason.

edited 8th Feb '11 6:52:18 PM by Deboss

Perhaps you prefer it because "if it isn't broke don't fix it"?

Most likely.

@breadloaf: What part of upstate New York are you talking about? Western, or northern? Western New York, in my experience, has some of the nastiest drivers on earth. Of course, the snow doesn't help...

Well usually I-90 if I'm going through NY and then otherwise, I'd be cutting through Ohio/Michigan on I-75. The roads are fairly sparse overall so maybe I'm just not experiencing the true love of the drivers there.

I'm not surprised by this, I remember reading an article in a car magazine about a similar case made against a different brand in the...70's, and concluding that the electronic breaking system wasn't at fault.

They also broke down the entire structure of the electronic break and how it was a completely ludicrous assumption that there were "electronic gremlins" in the works (one popular theory was that electronics were affecting the breaks' electronics via induction. Not nearly enough power, sorry. It'd take something crazy like a microwave to have even a noticeable effect, and the system has a redundant backup at a different voltage or something like that.)

Yes, this is really vague. Sorry.

Ooo! Electric brakes! I read some Pop Sci article about it once. It's a solenoid mounted to some wedge of metal, so that as the solenoid extends, it pushes against the wedge and that ends up being brought to bear against the brake rotor. All you need to power it is voltage. Remove voltage and the solenoid retracts. Now you have no more hydraulic fluid to worry about leaking, or power brake boosters to pop a vacuum leak on, or any of that stuff. Promising technology, I think Audi was working on it, or something.

However, you had better over-engineer it so that the possibility of it failing is about a zillion to one.

And I'm not liking the brakes killing the gas - yes, make the brakes more powerful than what the engine can deliver to the wheels, but if you make it so that the brake pedal actually removes the gas, what are you supposed to do if you get stuck in the mud or snow and have to prevent wheel spin? The theory is this: with an open differential, if one wheel is up in the air or in a no-traction condition and you try to give the car some gas to move, all the power is transferred to the wheel with the least resistance. Solution is to press the brake a little bit and give it some gas. You've locked up the free wheel so that power can be transferred to the wheel that has traction, and hopefully, extricate yourself from the situation. Limited-slip diffs kind of prevent that, but not every car comes with one.

All of the cars in question had brakes that were quite capable of overriding a floored throttle pedal and bringing the car to a halt regardless. They also all had transmissions that could be shifted into neutral and keys that could be turned to off.

Sounds like quite enough to me.

Actually that was the big thing that confused me. If you're accelerating uncontrollably and then your brakes don't work, I might panic for a few seconds before going "turn off car?" or "neutral gear?". I can only understand if it happened too fast to react (like under a few seconds).