Dodgy Toyota accelerator death
Discussion
The Toyota sticky accelerator thing's in the news. The thing that caught my eye was the bit about one of the deaths in the US;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8281981.stm
The car reached 120 miles per hour and the passenger had time to call 911 and report that the accelerator was stuck? Surely that's plenty of time for the driver to have taken some action that wouldn't have resulted in high speed crashing and death? Like putting the gearbox in neutral or killing the ignition for example.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8281981.stm
The car reached 120 miles per hour and the passenger had time to call 911 and report that the accelerator was stuck? Surely that's plenty of time for the driver to have taken some action that wouldn't have resulted in high speed crashing and death? Like putting the gearbox in neutral or killing the ignition for example.
Switchng off the engine using the key is actually a very bad option...steering lock is applied...as a yooth I did this at parking speed and got a gouged rim courtesy of a kerb
Travelling at usual driving speeds would be pretty scary at best.
Brakes, nuetral, the engine will rev to its limit but far safer.
Travelling at usual driving speeds would be pretty scary at best.
Brakes, nuetral, the engine will rev to its limit but far safer.
Edited by jeff m on Wednesday 3rd February 17:53
jeff m said:
Switchng off the engine using the key is actually a very bad option...steering lock is applied...as a yooth I did this at parking speed and got a gouged rim courtesy of a kerb
Travelling at usual driving speeds would be pretty scary at best.
Brakes, nuetral, the engine will rev to it's limit but far safer.
Steering lock is only applied if the key is removed from the ignition - not if its simply switched off... I think?!Travelling at usual driving speeds would be pretty scary at best.
Brakes, nuetral, the engine will rev to it's limit but far safer.
hornetrider said:
jeff m said:
Switchng off the engine using the key is actually a very bad option...steering lock is applied...as a yooth I did this at parking speed and got a gouged rim courtesy of a kerb
Travelling at usual driving speeds would be pretty scary at best.
Brakes, nuetral, the engine will rev to it's limit but far safer.
Steering lock is only applied if the key is removed from the ignition - not if its simply switched off... I think?!Travelling at usual driving speeds would be pretty scary at best.
Brakes, nuetral, the engine will rev to it's limit but far safer.
It is possible I pulled the key straight after switching off as that is normally what one would do.
I was returning home late at night, noisy car, thought I'd coast in, bad idea.
On most cars I think first position (far left) the steering lock is engaged, turn it to middle position (i.e pre engine start, electrics on) it disengages. I could be wrong though and it doesn't engage without removing the key. Either way there's definitely an option for ignition and lock off.
Neutral though. There's not something in new Toyotas that prevents neutral being engaged at speed is there? Can't think why there would be.
Neutral though. There's not something in new Toyotas that prevents neutral being engaged at speed is there? Can't think why there would be.
They were arguing about how to deal with this on CNN, what a load of idiots - first interviewer says: Car into neutral, turn off, brake and pull over. Next guy says neutral, brake, pull over, turn off. Can you imagine the din as it bounces off the rev limiter...
To fix it don't they just cut an inch off the pedels and throw out the rubber mats?
To fix it don't they just cut an inch off the pedels and throw out the rubber mats?
Problem is it's very easy saying all this, but I don't recall at any point during my driving lessons being taught how to deal with a jammed accelerator pedal.
My car's a manual (not a Toyota) and I freely admit I wouldn't have a f
king clue what would happen if I pulled the key out whilst doing 70mph down the dual carriageway, though of course I would like to think I'd have the sense to just knock it in neutral and brake.
My car's a manual (not a Toyota) and I freely admit I wouldn't have a f
king clue what would happen if I pulled the key out whilst doing 70mph down the dual carriageway, though of course I would like to think I'd have the sense to just knock it in neutral and brake.Surely the toyota in question wasn't more powerful than it's brakes???
I know they might boil, but you'd manage to stop an econobox I'm sure.
I had a scary "throttle stuck" moment in a V12 Etype once. The return springs are (were) strange devices round a central rotating wheel effort. This failed, and so I entered a roundabout with the throttle wide open in 4th, hard on the brakes and managed OK - and E types had horrible brakes at the best of times. The hardest part was actually stopping without lunching the engine, which was done by slowing to the point I could kill the ignition and cruise to a stop.
We subsequently fitted "extra" return springs to make it a little less iffy =)
I know they might boil, but you'd manage to stop an econobox I'm sure.
I had a scary "throttle stuck" moment in a V12 Etype once. The return springs are (were) strange devices round a central rotating wheel effort. This failed, and so I entered a roundabout with the throttle wide open in 4th, hard on the brakes and managed OK - and E types had horrible brakes at the best of times. The hardest part was actually stopping without lunching the engine, which was done by slowing to the point I could kill the ignition and cruise to a stop.
We subsequently fitted "extra" return springs to make it a little less iffy =)
andy_s said:
They were arguing about how to deal with this on CNN, what a load of idiots - first interviewer says: Car into neutral, turn off, brake and pull over. Next guy says neutral, brake, pull over, turn off. Can you imagine the din as it bounces off the rev limiter...
To fix it don't they just cut an inch off the pedels and throw out the rubber mats?
I've had a throttle stick wide open and yes it bounces off the limiter! I didn't switch mine off as I had time to think "do I know which position engaged the lock" and the answer at that moment was no! (Easy to say when you're sat on the sofa, not so easy when the amount of road is limited and there's bikes everywhere).To fix it don't they just cut an inch off the pedels and throw out the rubber mats?
With no servo (throttle wide open) the brakes struggle to overcome the engine so you have to dip the clutch and leave the engine bouncing off the limiter. It's far better to kill an engine than yourself!
El Guapo said:
This reminds me of a similar spate of problems with Audis in the US maybe 20 years ago. IIRC it turned out that people were pressing the accelerator rather than the brake.
A 100HP Toyota will have 400HP brakes so even if you were at full throttle the brakes will stop it easily.
A woman neighbour in an automatic once reversed at speed, through the side of my garage (brick wall, end garage in a block of about 6), straight through the next wall and came to a rest in garage 3. Then sheepishly pulled out in first gear. I ran over, baby was in back seat covered in brick dust but amazingly unharmed. A 100HP Toyota will have 400HP brakes so even if you were at full throttle the brakes will stop it easily.
A stupid mistake like that and she wrote off her car, endangered her child and myself (had been in garage moments before and would have been crushed), a whole block of privately owned garages and another car which was parked in garage block which promply collapsed. Not to mention other possessions inside.
All the woman could say was "I had my foot on the brake!!
This reminded me of one of the Civic DX auto loan cars we had at a dealers I worked for.
In the morning the car could, on full choke, pull away with you on the brakes. It was a fine line between the car creeping in D or running away with you hard on the brake fumbling for the choke.
Some people have the intelligence to figure out what to do. Others go to pieces and have no clue whatsoever, seeing as most Toyota drivers hate driving its not too much to expect them to fall into the latter category.
In the morning the car could, on full choke, pull away with you on the brakes. It was a fine line between the car creeping in D or running away with you hard on the brake fumbling for the choke.
Some people have the intelligence to figure out what to do. Others go to pieces and have no clue whatsoever, seeing as most Toyota drivers hate driving its not too much to expect them to fall into the latter category.
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