Saw a news report in China Post of a big Toyota recall due to accelerator pedal jamming on the floor mat. (Not a very difficult technical problem, surely?)
Apparently brought to a head by a fatal high speed Lexus crash, where the driver, a member of the California Highway Patrol (!?), had time to make a 911 call before crashing and burning, killing all four occupants.
Puzzled
I’ve had the throttle jam open in a Marina 1800 on the A9 in Scotland when my girlfriend was driving. Empty, fast road, plenty of time to decide what to do and explain it to her. I wasn’t sure (never having tried it) what the effect of the engine braking would be (at high speed on a wet road) of simply turning off the engine, so I told her to turn off the engine and de-clutch “simultaneously”. She de-clutched, but didn’t turn off the engine so I had to do it. Not good for the engine, which of course raced its nuts off (tappets came loose) but not dangerous. Coasted to a halt and fixed it (in a snowstorm, unfortunately)
I’ve also had the pedal jam on the carpet. Think I kicked it loose (can’t really remember) but if I hadn’t, given time, I’d have turned the engine off, declutched, perhaps stood on the brake.
A CHP guy is presumably an expert driver. With an automatic (presumably) you don’t have to worry about declutching/engine braking induced skids, IF that’s even an issue (still don’t know, still havn’t tried it) so what’s the problem? Have they incorporated some additional killing facility in modern cars that stops you turning the engine off?
This is just silly. Just step on the brakes and the car will stop, no matter how far down the accelerator is stuck and no matter what gear it is in. A properly functioning braking system can extract far more power than an engine can deliver. If it’s a manual, it will stall, if it’s an auto, knock it into N.
Yeah, it’s called a steering lock. Very easy to give the key that extra little turn in a stressful situation. I did it at 160kph and it took real presence of mind to not roll.
Neutral, 4 wheel disc brakes, killing the ignition, emergency brake…Too busy on the phone perhaps calling 911?
You can override any accelerating motor just by hitting the brakes hard enough, toss the tranny into neutral, and listen to the engine RPM’s bounce off the rev limiter as you leisurely coast to a stop under total control…Problem?
Newer experienced it myself, but I was in the pasenger seat once when I was 18 and my classmate at the same age with fresh driver license decided to do it flat out trough a green light.
It changed and when he let go the engine did not.
Did take him just 2-3 seconds to turn off the ignition and brake befour the white line.
We both just had the license for less than half a year and I can’t remember geting training about it in the driving school so how hard can it be?
It was a 205GTI quite quick.
Yeh, something doesn’t add up. (Weren’t newspapermen supposed to say that, once upon a time?).
Re-reading the wire article they also say the car had no brakes but theres no comment on that, and specifically they dont say if, or how that’s related to the killer carpet. 911 call seems to have been quite a long one.
Maybe the journo skipped his Critical Thinking 101 lectures. Maybe its complete bullshit.
I had the throttle stick open on a (manual) Rover SD1. Happened a few times. Turned the engine off and applied the brakes. Worth noting there is no servo assistance on the brake with the engine off, so when it happened again I let the engine race for a while in neutral whilst braking hard. Didn’t take long to stop. The culprit turned out to be having driven too hard through a large puddle some days before and water had got into the throttle cable. Solved with WD40. Crashed the thing into a central reservation a few days later accelerating off a roundabout at about 30mph in the wet with bald tyres. I forgot it was rear-wheel-drive and did exactly the wrong thing to “correct” the skid. Oops.
On a big powerful rear-wheel-drive car flooring the brakes and accelerator at the same time often results in interesting circular motion as the rear wheels spin like crazy and the front wheels act as a fulcrum before locking solid, resulting in a no-wheel-drive four-wheel pirouette. Can’t say I really recommend this on the open road.
I had a car for about three years – an old and much-loved short wheelbase Defender with large holes in the floor – in which the throttle would stick EVERY time you floored it. You just got used to reaching down and yanking the pedal up with your hand. Well, most people did. Well, I did. None of my friends really seemed to like that car very much, though.
While a general failure of a drive-by-wire control system is a more convincing explanation of this accident (as its reported, anyway) than a killer carpet, I’m having a little trouble seeing how its consistent with the reports of “flames” from the wheel arches.
If the brakes were locked on, and its true that the brakes can overcome the engine at full throttle, then the accident presumably couldn’t have happened, though the brakes would get hot.
If the brakes were off and inoperable, they wouldn’t get hot.
Would lightly (or intermittantly) applied brakes get hot enough for “flames” (or at least a lot of smoke) while still allowing the car to top 100mph? Maybe so. Only explanation I can think of, anyway.
Thats just an image problem. Of course its too early to say, but this could be a disaster for Toyota and for the industry generally. The Mercedes “Elk Test” fiasco would be a better comparison, but that only affected one product. IF this is a lethal failure of drive-by-wire software, its likely it potentially affects a big slice of the product range.
In the US, the product liability exposure is likely to be substatial. That could have been a plastic surgeon or a dentist in that Lexus. If thier trophy wife wasn’t in the car, they’d be wanting compensation for loss of earnings. I’ve heard such exposure pretty much killed the light plane industry in the US.
If public confidence in drive-by-wire technology is shaken generally, its likely it won’t only affect Toyota. I don’t know how prevasive the technology is, since I have no interest in new cars, but given that its cheap unrepairable proprietary shite, its likely to be very attractive to manufacturers, and very widely deployed in the industry.
Of course, as you point out, people may not care.
If it is a systems failure, and that becomes generally known, of course there’ll be a fix announced, but it seems possible people have had enough exposure to Microsoft operating systems to take promises of “an end to system crashes” with a large slice of cynicism.
Can we re-open that “Automative Technology Sucks” debate we had a while ago? Think I might have some more ammunition coming.[/quote]
It must be an absolute terror if its true that the car could not be put into NEUTRAL and the engine couldnt be shut OFF. And what if he had applied the handbrake or did he apply that and that didnt work either because it too is electronic (as on some cars now)??
Must be an abject terror to be speeding down out of control, with no way to stop the engine, apply the handbrake or put the car in neutral. Such a car should not exist if it is in fact the case.
We could assume a Highway Patrolman would know a few things about cars and know to apply the brakes, and put it in neutral, etc.
It killed him, his wife, his daughter and his brother in law. Tragic.
Cars should always be able to be put into NEUTRAL. I understand the latest Audi has the ability to switch off the engine by pressing the stop button (or the key) for three seconds. Also it remains very easy to put the car into Neutral with the lever. I cant imagine that Lexus and Toyota would chose a path where this was not possible?
My CRV has the same problem, but i dont come close to having accidents from it!.
Its obviouslly electronical, these cars have so many ecus that control everything its only a matter of time before 1 or 2 cause a terrible accident.
I cant see how the truth hasnt come out, obviously crash investigators are going to be discovering the true fault right?.
Then again if its an electronic fault, how can it be proven as theres no evidence of it is there… oh dear.
for the record i hate drive by wire, all my cars have had a mechanical linkage to the throttle body :discodance:
Can we re-open that “Automative Technology Sucks” debate we had a while ago? Think I might have some more ammunition coming.[/quote]
It must be an absolute terror if its true that the car could not be put into NEUTRAL and the engine couldnt be shut OFF. And what if he had applied the handbrake or did he apply that and that didnt work either because it too is electronic (as on some cars now)??
Must be an abject terror to be speeding down out of control, with no way to stop the engine, apply the handbrake or put the car in neutral. Such a car should not exist if it is in fact the case.
We could assume a Highway Patrolman would know a few things about cars and know to apply the brakes, and put it in neutral, etc.
It killed him, his wife, his daughter and his brother in law. Tragic.
Cars should always be able to be put into NEUTRAL. I understand the latest Audi has the ability to switch off the engine by pressing the stop button (or the key) for three seconds. Also it remains very easy to put the car into Neutral with the lever. I cant imagine that Lexus and Toyota would chose a path where this was not possible?[/quote]
This three seconds thing bothers me. I’d think three seconds would seem a long time at 120mph, plus the fact that there’s a delay (presumably a “do you really mean it” function?) suggests its not a simple mechanical switch, giving more possibilities for failure (though I assume they havn’t been dumb enough to integrate it into the general control system).
