NHTSA Finds No Evidence of Electronic Glitches in 58 Toyota Crashes

I am really beginning to get curious if the average Toyota buyer/owner has below average driver skill, statistically.

kevm14,

TheTruthAboutCars did a report that compared models/brands from 1999-2009. They say this:

"It [data] clearly shows that Toyota’s UA rate took a jump in the 2002 MY. Until we have some model specific info, we’ll have to guess as to why. It also shows that Ford’s average rate is almost as high as Toyota, but has dropped substantially in the last couple of years (we have a theory for that, coming in a later post). It’s also quite obvious that Toyota’s rate is not very high in comparison to the worst offenders."

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/nhtsa-data-dive-2-ua-rates-1990-2009-by-manufacturer-updated-with-new-charts/

TTAC is anything but the truth.

Surprise surprise...

Add another hardly surprised one to the list. Most of us here saw through all the hype and opportunistic douchebags, and surprise surprise, clueless drivers are to blame. And while I can understand older folks for making a mistake/getting confused more easily, there has to be a way that they can be tested without being mean/offensive about it.

Trying to blame drive by wire strikes me as odd. While I can understand a batch of components being faulty, that's about it. It's not like drive by wire is groundbreaking tech, planes have used (far more complex implementations of) it since the 70's and it's only become more widely adopted, and you don't hear reports of unintended acceleration in planes!

None of this is conclusive. The truth is that Toyota has some problems and they've even admitted (eventually) to some of them. The truth is that there are also idiots and opportunists.

Let's not jump to either extreme. The truth is in the middle.

And the sky is blue and clouds are white...

Of course they didn't. Toyota's PR spin machine is at work again. Not ALL crashes were a result of multiple defects, but some very public ones were. The number of defects have been rising over the past several years and everyone knows it. Something is very wrong with Toyota, so admitting it then and denying it now is not going to help their situation.

@ ne1butu2,

You are such a retard...

So, in a vehicle accelerating out of control, either because of a stuck throttle or floor mat trapping the accelerator, the brakes were not applied? Seriously? That's about as easy to swallow as invading iraq in search of WMD's.

I trust this company and their data about as far as I could pick up one of their boring cars and throw it. They would alter, stretch, and outright lie, if they thought it would save their hype-fueled and unearned reputation.

@ scorp76,

Toyota didn't come out with this report, NHTSA did.

Apparently you are a retard too...

All of this, and yet taxpayers are paying for all of it. Some glorious country we live in.

"The truth is that Toyota has some problems and they've even admitted (eventually) to some of them."

Search hard enough and you will find a problem with pretty much anything. No design is perfect. Yet we still haven't heard of a single incident or accident being linked to any of these so-called problems, months and months after all the ridiculous hype.

The fact here is that Toyota has failed to include standard safety systems that even chrysler has, if the car receives a brake and acceleration signal simultaneously, the acceleration signal is ignored. Even worse is that Toyota has removed safety systems from cars (from one model year to the next) without the appropriate documentation that is required. The UA cases might not have been anything, but what the investigation has uncovered is still frightening.

As with any UA case, the gross majority of the claims are made by oppurtunists that make it harder to tell if there actually is a problem somewhere. All I know is that a police officer and his family are dead because of some type of UA, whether it be floormat or not.

The truth is Toyota cars are the epitome of safety.
I once drove my Toyota off a bridge, and it landed in the lake without a scratch. Then I drove it out of the lake, around the shore, onto the road, then back on the bridge. And I was on my merry way again. What Toyotas are made of is the stuff of legends.

I don't know about this unintended acceleration. It must be a campaign paid for by Government Motors. The US Government's money's at stake after all, those damned evil foreigners.

" hollowtek says:

All of this, and yet taxpayers are paying for all of it. Some glorious country we live in."

I know. What a waste of money to investigate the validity of numerous claims that car with stuck throttle. Let those cars roam free and accelerate wildly, this is a free country!

"inlinesix says:

TheTruthAboutCars did a report that compared models/brands from 1999-2009. They say this..."

There are many factors which may contribute to the spike. Drivers' average age, mechanical defects, convenience (or necessity) of reporting unintended acceleration, etc etc. There are always multiple factors in play when something happens. Big difference between causation and correlation.

I think there have been tests that prove with the accelerator floored applying the brake will bring the car to a stop, but not as fast as if the accelerator was not activated.

So, regardless if Toyota has UA (and I have seen no official information that says it does), IF it does happen, stepping on the brake will stop the car, and you can put the transmission into neutral or shut off the ignition.

So, in the worst cases, some drivers may panic and miss the brake or just freeze, causing an accident. Or they may be pushing the accelerator and brake at the same time, causing an accident due to the longer stopping distance. But they are not shutting off the engine or putting the transmission into neutral.

That's the way I see it-- regardless of UA or not UA, you can always stop the car.

the case with the police officer and his family was the perfect storm. It was a loaner car, so he wasn't familiar with it, it had keyless ignition which most people don't know how to turn off while in motion, if you switch to neutral while moving the car forces it back into drive, and most people panic when their brakes don't work like they think and just assume that they are broken. Even if this case was just the floormat forcing the pedal in, there is enough mis-engineering to make the vehicle unsafe under a UA condition.

@lostboyz: Chrysler inherited the brake override system from its "merger of equals" era - the vast majority of automobiles sold in America, including GM and Honda products, are not programmed to have a brake override.

And where did you find the information concerning the inability to shift into neutral? I've never driven a car where it was impossible to go neutral, even at speed.

I don't understand the animosity toward Toyota. I don't own one and never have, but they are just a company trying to be number one. Is that so dastardly? Many carmakers have made cuts, in various ways, to save money. Cars today are so superior to the ones I grew up with, it is as if we are on another planet.

The real problem is that today more and more people refuse to take responsibility for their actions-- hence, our litigious society.

It isn't technology that is bringing us down-- it is ourselves, as usual.

bimmerjay, there were accidents linked to the floor mat issue and the throttle pedals that would physically stick in the down position. But yeah… no proof of accidents caused by electronics. What does surprise me is the failure rate on those black boxes.

According to the IIHS Death Rate documents, Toyota is the safest non-premium brand by quite a bit. Some of their numbers are incredible, like in the small SUV class. The Corolla does pretty well despite being lighter than much of the competition. In that aspect of car design they’re still doing a good job.

@brn "Let's not jump to either extreme. The truth is in the middle."

That's what they WANT you to think.

"The real problem is that today more and more people refuse to take responsibility for their actions-- hence, our litigious society.

It isn't technology that is bringing us down-- it is ourselves, as usual."

Cyril M. Kornbluth's short story "The Marching Morons" is proving to be eerily prophetic...