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Created by : Shankar Ganesh G P, Team Leader -(Technical)-Product Design & Development  | 01 29 2010 09:07:08 +0000
Industry : AutomobileFunctional Area : Autos(Personal Interests)
Activity:  531 views;  last activity : 07 06 2010 20:18:09 +0000

Refusing to accept the explanation of Toyota and the federal government, hundreds Toyota owners are in rebellion after a series of accidents caused by what they call "runaway cars." 

Safety analysts found an estimated 2000 cases in which owners of Toyota cars including Camry, Prius and Lexus, reported that their cars surged without warning up to speeds of 100 miles per hour.

Toyota says the incidents are caused by floor mats becoming stuck under gas pedals, but owners say that's not what happened to them.

"I'm absolutely certain that in my situation, it was not the floor mats," Elizabeth James told ABC News. She was driving her Toyota Prius outside Denver, CO when she says it suddenly shot up to 90 miles an hour, even though her foot was on the brake and not the gas pedal.

"I kept going faster and faster," James said. "And all of a sudden… my foot was pressing on the brake super, super hard and I wasn't slowing down."

James and some other Toyota owners suspect the accidents have been caused by some kind of glitch in the electronic computer system used in Toyotas that controls the throttle.

Toyota officials refused to talk with ABC News about the incidents, but posted a statement from executive Bob Daly on its website last night that said: "Some news reports suggest there may be other causes of unintended acceleration, speculating about electronic engine control systems, braking performance or electro-magnetic interference among other theories. There is no evidence to support these theories."

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has done six separate investigations of such acceleration surges in Toyotas since 2003 and found no defect in Toyota's electronics.

The U.S. Department of Transportation released a statement Tuesday afternoon saying the matter "is not closed."

The full statement read: "Toyota has announced a safety recall involving 3.8 million vehicles in which the accelerator pedal may become stuck at high vehicle speeds due to interference by the driver's side floor mat, which is obviously a very dangerous situation. Toyota has written to vehicle owners stating that it has decided that a safety defect exists in their vehicles and asking owners to remove all floor mats while the company is developing a remedy. We believe consumers should follow Toyota's recommendation to address the most immediate safety risk. However, removal of the mats is simply an interim measure, not a remedy of the underlying defect in the vehicles. NHTSA is discussing with Toyota what the appropriate vehicle remedy or remedies will be. This matter is not closed until Toyota has effectively addressed the vehicle defect by providing a suitable remedy."

 
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I believe the new generation of automobiles are equipped with lots of electrinics lets say speeding-cruise controls,steering -esp, reverse- reverse sensors,with camera/without camera,sunroof operations,even central locking sysytem which is now adays common features .

I wants to say one more thing that i came across one new funda of manufacturer is that if a four wheel equipped with ESP and wants to operate the four wheel then you have to switch of the ESP,then i want to know that in offroad where you need more safety then why you are advising to switch off the ESP.the answer what i got was the output or torque is low when the ESP is on.

Lots of time the reverse sensor did not work and the reply was the gear was not engaged properly then how can the vehicle went in reverse smoothly without any trouble.

I have heard lots of problem thru customers where the electronic system has failed and with drivers consious the vehicle was controlled

Balaji


By balaji.gopalakrishnan , Team Leader, sbg  | 01 30 2010 17:27:32 +0000
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I believe that it is the cruise control. I have heard numerous storied and they all say the pedal went to the floor by itself. I don't believe they turned it on, its a glitch in either the software or a defect in the security system itself. Pressing the brakes, should overide the cruise control and turn it off. This says that there is a defect. Foormats and gas pedals are not the problem.


By Mridula Maity, Product Development Manager, Rugel  | 01 30 2010 08:55:22 +0000
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New technology in Automotive Industry is Drive by wire. Main contributors in this system are various sensors & 1 ECU. If 1 sensor fails realted to safty feature like break, Steering, Accelerator, The ECU has to calclulate the corrective measure & react within a nano second.Think if more no of sensors fail or giving flase input to ECU, ECU has to calculate all logics in exponential of Number of sensor inputs and react within a nano second.In this case all logics should be already feeded in ECU.If one logic is not  solved by ECU, It will lead to disaster which happened to Toytota owners in America & Canada.

How Toyota (the world leading brand for Quality)  writes note to customers to remove floor mates without study the actual root cause of the sudden accelaration.I am surprised How the Clearance & fixation of floor mates not satisfying the minmum standard of Toyota, Which is making cars for more than decades.

 


By Shankar Ganesh G P, Team Leader -(Technical)-Product Design & Development  | 01 29 2010 09:29:47 +0000
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Electronic systems in automobiles have improved their performance, comfort and convenience. Traction control, ESP, ABS, Airbag systems etc. are just some examples. So, electronics are an integral part of any modern vehicle, whether passenger or commercial. There are standards and processes to assure the quality of software used in such ECUs, which if followed assures a reliable product.

In the case of Toyota, this particular issue could be due to an undetected bug in the software (there is a very rare chance for this to happen) or, it could be some problem with the gas pedal (if it is fly-by-wire system) or , due to certain sensors sending out erronous values to the ECUs.


By Shameer Ali, Design Engineer, Tata Elxsi  | 01 30 2010 17:30:15 +0000
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