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Study shows Toyota's, "SUA" problem mostly due to driver error

And of course, let's not forget that lovely report that was given to the (then) newly appointed president of Toyota in the US. You know, the one where they outlined how they had avoided having to initiate recalls on anything related to sudden acceleration back in 2007 by just replacing some floor mats - and that they put off any recalls for frame rust on Tacoma & Tundra pickups. And how they delayed new safety rules. And in doing so, had saved the company hundreds of millions of dollars?

Toyota Memo Brags of Saving $100M with "Limited" Recall - US News & World Report

As Toyota officials head to Washington for a series of Congressional hearings this week, a potentially damaging internal document is grabbing headlines. All three TV news networks and hundreds of newspapers nationwide led with the story this weekend, adding to a public relations nightmare for the Japanese automaker.

The Detroit Free Press explains, “Toyota’s leading U.S. executive boasted to the automaker’s Washington staff last summer that they had saved the company more than $100 million by limited any regulatory action on sudden acceleration to a recall of equipment such as floor mats, according to documents turned over to a key U.S. House committee holding hearings on the issue Wednesday.” The News notes, “Earlier this month before the hybrid recall, Toyota executives estimated that the unintended acceleration recalls would cost $2 billion in lost sales and cost of extra parts for repairs.”

The company did not turn over the documents voluntarily. Reuters reports, “The company said on Monday it had received a federal grand jury subpoena for documents related to unintended acceleration that led to the recall of millions of cars in the United States.”

The claim, the Wall Street Journal notes, was made in a presentation for Toyota executives titled “Wins for Toyota Safety Group.” Among the “wins” the document lists are the savings claim, as well as a federal government “decision to close safety investigations of the Toyota Tacoma truck without ordering recalls, and delays to new safety rules that saved the company hundreds of millions of dollars.” The presentation, the Journal speculates, “By linking safety issues to corporate profits, could prompt difficult questions for company executives, including President Akio Toyoda, who is scheduled to testify Wednesday before the Oversight Panel.”
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Osahar said:
And of course, let's not forget that lovely report that was given to the (then) newly appointed president of Toyota in the US. You know, the one where they outlined how they had avoided having to initiate recalls on anything related to sudden acceleration back in 2007 by just replacing some floor mats - and that they put off any recalls for frame rust on Tacoma & Tundra pickups. And how they delayed new safety rules. And in doing so, had saved the company hundreds of millions of dollars?
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sorry, it's all a conspiracy.....lmao. i love that you are in the industry and actually KNOW what you're talking about.
 
*adjusts tin foil hat*
 
tcalloway1 said:
sorry, it's all a conspiracy.....lmao. i love that you are in the industry and actually KNOW what you're talking about.
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LOL, thanks man. I just can't believe how many people just refuse to believe that Toyota could make mistakes like these. It's hilarious. And I'm not saying that they're some demon-spawn company out to build vehicles that will kill you either. Every company has had recalls, some very bad, over the years. It can and does happen to everyone, and Toyota right now is finding out the results of the growth spurt they went through in the push to become the #1 volume automaker in the world. Too much, too fast, and some corners were cut along the way to get there.

One bad part in a critical component that comes in from one of your dozens of suppliers slips through QC and you're toast down the road.
 
Osahar said:
LOL, thanks man. I just can't believe how many people just refuse to believe that Toyota could make mistakes like these. It's hilarious.
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Especially when even the company is saying there are mistakes! That is the funny part today. The company is saying "we screwed up" and still certain fans are saying "never happened, just being proactive."

That is hysterical if you ask me. But we have seen it before with some people
 
JB said:
Especially when even the company is saying there are mistakes! That is the funny part today. The company is saying "we screwed up" and still certain fans are saying "never happened, just being proactive."
That is hysterical if you ask me. But we have seen it before with some people
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that's the part that cracks me up as well. i can tell you, b/c i work in the automotive division for Gannett, who happens to own about 200 newspapers across the country, that toyota national, is spending a tremendous amount of advertising dollars saying just that "we screwed up". no one wants to do that unless they have to. sure, you can think that they were pinned into this corner, but you wouldn't be spending your way out of it, if there truly wasn't ever a problem.
 
tcalloway1 said:
THANK YOU!!!!!

the massive sized toyota blinders that are worn in this thread is borderline obnoxious. there's no consipiracy here by the US gov,t. to get toyota, and if you think that ordering a recall is just easy and inexpensive then you're seriously mistaken. recalls happen b/c there is a problem with the vehicle that can, and will, affect the safety of the operator.

i guess what's really going on is that stupid, big footed, and elderly americans are the only ones who drive toyota's!!
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Whats also borderline obnoxious is the liberal media raking Toyota over the coals everytime something happens. In this period of time (The last 18 months) there have been 13 other recalls involving hundreds of thousands of cars each, including Ford, Honda,GM, etc. and are they ever in the news? Nope.

Look from the other side of the fence, americans and especially UAW workers like to act like this is just a foreign car problem and this kind of stuff would never happen to an "american" made car. (Which is a hilarious term in itself)
 
I drive a Honda...that is all. :eyepoke:
 
JRod said:
Whats also borderline obnoxious is the liberal media raking Toyota over the coals everytime something happens. In this period of time (The last 18 months) there have been 13 other recalls involving hundreds of thousands of cars each, including Ford, Honda,GM, etc. and are they ever in the news? Nope.

Look from the other side of the fence, americans and especially UAW workers like to act like this is just a foreign car problem and this kind of stuff would never happen to an "american" made car. (Which is a hilarious term in itself)
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I agree with that for the most part. But to deny teh problems is absurd if you ask me. The company itself is admitting that they are having them.
 
JRod said:
Whats also borderline obnoxious is the liberal media raking Toyota over the coals everytime something happens. In this period of time (The last 18 months) there have been 13 other recalls involving hundreds of thousands of cars each, including Ford, Honda,GM, etc. and are they ever in the news? Nope.

Look from the other side of the fence, americans and especially UAW workers like to act like this is just a foreign car problem and this kind of stuff would never happen to an "american" made car. (Which is a hilarious term in itself)
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yet again, looking for someone else to blame, this time the media. do you not read the reports that osahar posts here? is that from some liberal media source, just making stuff up? nope!! think whatever you want to, the complete blindness from the loyal toyota fans in this thread is ridiculous. i guess no one read the post where i said up until 2 years ago i was a devout toyota owner. i never had any problems and think that their products for the most part are fine, but to argue that they've had quality issues is ridiculous and not worth an ounce of my time.
 
Here's another article I found in USA Today on the scope of Toyota's recalls this year alone:

Drip, drip: Latest recalls make 12 for Toyota, Lexus

The latest Toyota recalls, announced yesterday, involving the certain older Avalons sedans and Lexus LX470 SUVs for unrelated steering problems underscore how the automaker's safety problems just aren't letting up. So maybe it's time we give you a summary of the Toyota Motor recalls of 2010.


So far this year, we count 12, equally divided between the Lexus and Toyota divisions. We list them all below. Over the past year, about 9.5 million Toyota and Lexus vehicles have been recalled in the U.S., by the Associated Press' count. It's hard to think of any other time in recent history that a single automaker has had so many recalls, although we suspect others have had higher totals of actual vehicles involved.

The drip-drip of recalls continues even as Toyota tries to fight back. It has an advertising campaign about its Star Safety System. It just took a bunch of journalists on an all-expenses-paid, unless they declined, junket to Japen to try to show how it is tackling its safety problems. As long as more cars are being recalled, it's going to be tough to get the upper hand on trying to emerge from its crisis. Comedian Jimmy Fallon, noting the two latest recalls on NBC's Late Night show last night, joked that Toyota's crisis manager must be saying, "It's good to be back!"

The Toyota spokesman assigned to talk about the latest recalls didn't return out phone call yesterday, but Toyota's new U.S. quality chief sent a letter to the New York Times this week that says Toyota is "making extraordinary efforts to service our recalled vehicles with effective and durable solutions for these issues." The chief, Steve St. Angelo adds, "All of our new cars and trucks are now being equipped with even more advanced safety technologies, including our Star Safety System, brake override and improved event data recorders that read both pre- and post-crash data."

Here's a listing of the separate recalls for both Toyota and Lexus so far this year. Some are for current models, others for older ones. Note how Lexus LS, HS 250h and Avalon were subject to more than one recall:



Lexus Division
LX470: steering problems
LS: valve springs
HS250h: fuel safety in a crash
LS: steering problems
GX460: stability software
HS250h: brakes

Toyota division
Avalon: steering problems
Sequoia: steering problems
Sienna: spare tire cable
Tacoma: Drive shaft
Prius: brakes
RAV4, Corolla, Matrix, Avalon, Camry, Highlander, Tundra, Sequoia: sticky accelerator pedals that could cause the car to become a runaway.

And this list doesn't include last year's pedal-jam recall, also aimed at keeping cars from becoming runaways.
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Clearly user error across the board, right? And that doesn't include the "Customer Satisfaction Issue" on the Corolla that Toyota decided isn't a safety issue and thus not part of a recall...yet.
 
I do agree with Jrod, seems like there's been many other automakers who at different times have had different safety/recall issues

I don't recall any automaker getting so much negative press though

it makes me wonder
are the problems that bad
are they handling the press that poorly
are they getting beaten up because the public holds them to a higher standard than other makers

I am anything but a toyota fan, I think toyota's down near the bottom of my list in terms of automakers that I'd consider buying a vehicle from, but it does seem to me like they're getting beat up more than some other automakers would be in similar situations
 
thanks1974 said:
I drive a Honda...that is all. :eyepoke:
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I do too - it's an '03 Acura TL. It's a great car - the best I've ever had, but it had a serious problem - its transmission (and thousands of other TLs) failed due to a 3rd gear clutchpack that was undersized. My tranny failed at 105k. The Acura dealer gave me a pretty good deal on the replacement tranny which has a re-designed case and has shown to be pretty reliable. Honda put the same tranny in their Odysseys and Accords, and extended the warranty to 100k on certain VIN ranges, which IMO is pretty cool. Too bad mine was just outside the VIN range, but I got a fair amount of goodwill. My point is that NO automaker makes perfect cars.

Like Osahar wrote, no automaker is immune from product defects. I too think that Toyota had some serious problems, but they're doing the right thing now which is good, regardless of who pushed them into it. The recalls are costing them a bundle, and it does seem like there's a new Toyota recall every week. I still think they make great cars - we've owned four myself (Corolla, Pickup, Sienna, 4runner, LX450) and my wife drives an '05 Camry. They've all been solid, reliable vehicles. I think they'll weather this just fine, but Toyota no longer has the reputation of being "bulletproof".
 
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lefty said:
I do agree with Jrod, seems like there's been many other automakers who at different times have had different safety/recall issues

I don't recall any automaker getting so much negative press though

it makes me wonder
are the problems that bad
are they handling the press that poorly
are they getting beaten up because the public holds them to a higher standard than other makers

I am anything but a toyota fan, I think toyota's down near the bottom of my list in terms of automakers that I'd consider buying a vehicle from, but it does seem to me like they're getting beat up more than some other automakers would be in similar situations
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I think the bad press is because of the attitude they have had for years. They have made statements in the past about how shoddy american cars are and have pointed out recalls of other makers. Basically saying that Toyotas don't have those issues. I sold Toyotas in the mid to late 90's and they have the same issues any other manufacturer has. Had they come out and tried to solve the problem in the first place instead of blaming it on floormats the problem wouldn't have gained steam. Now they are blaming it on the drivers saying the info is coming from a black box they CLAIM can tell exactly what happened. That makes whatever the owners say pretty much worthless. I don't believe the black box crap! If it works as they say then how come they are only going to them for information now? Just sounds like a bunch of smoke and mirrors to me.
 
JRod said:
Whats also borderline obnoxious is the liberal media raking Toyota over the coals everytime something happens. In this period of time (The last 18 months) there have been 13 other recalls involving hundreds of thousands of cars each, including Ford, Honda,GM, etc. and are they ever in the news? Nope.

Look from the other side of the fence, americans and especially UAW workers like to act like this is just a foreign car problem and this kind of stuff would never happen to an "american" made car. (Which is a hilarious term in itself)
Click to expand...
Thank you, glad to see someone else on here, "gets it". The American media is hell-bent on bringing down Toyota and every little problem Toyota has is front page news, yet when Ford or GM has a recall you dont hear a peep about it.
Whens the last time you saw an article in the paper talking about GM's ever-expanding problem with their windshield washer fluid warmer that causes fires or the reports of SUA on the Ford Fusion?
It is true that Toyota ignored some of their problems and put sales and profit over quality. That was under Watanabe's watch. Now that Akio Toyoda is in charge they are fixing the problems and will get back on track.
Im still waiting for the evidence that SUA was caused by anything more than driver error...
 
Bucky36 said:
Thank you, glad to see someone else on here, "gets it". The American media is hell-bent on bringing down Toyota and every little problem Toyota has is front page news, yet when Ford or GM has a recall you dont hear a peep about it.
Whens the last time you saw an article in the paper talking about GM's ever-expanding problem with their windshield washer fluid warmer that causes fires or the reports of SUA on the Ford Fusion?
It is true that Toyota ignored some of their problems and put sales and profit over quality. That was under Watanabe's watch. Now that Akio Toyoda is in charge they are fixing the problems and will get back on track.
Im still waiting for the evidence that SUA was caused by anything more than driver error...
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you don't remember GM getting blasted by the media for taking bail out money? i certainly am glad that i don't "get it" by your standards, cause i'd be seriously biased, completely uninformed, and way too brand loyal. i find it no coincidence that you ride the toyota bandwagon in the same regard you ride the mizuno bandwagon, oh wait, the titleist bandwagon, oh wait, the mizuno bandwagon.
 
Im still waiting for the media to bury Honda, Hyundai, and Nissan because apparently they only hate Toyota. OR, some people are just fans with blinders. Could be either one I guess.
 
JB said:
Im still waiting for the media to bury Honda, Hyundai, and Nissan because apparently they only hate Toyota. OR, some people are just fans with blinders. Could be either one I guess.
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didn't you know that the media gets money under the table from all the manufacturers to just bury toyota? some of the posts here just make me lmao!!
 
I'm gonna bow out of this, it has degenerated to insults and making fun of people. I like the people on here too much to get involved in this nonsense. We shall agree to disagree.
 
JRod said:
I'm gonna bow out of this, it has degenerated to insults and making fun of people. I like the people on here too much to get involved in this nonsense. We shall agree to disagree.
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not sure who's making fun of who here. of course there will be differences in opinions and it's clear that we all have our stances on the subject at hand, but everyone involved has made their opinions known and i wouldn't say that anyone is more guilty than another when it comes to arguing their thoughts on the matter. all i've done is argued my perspective, i never put anyone in a category of "who gets it", which i might add, you were in.
 
tcalloway1 said:
not sure who's making fun of who here. of course there will be differences in opinions and it's clear that we all have our stances on the subject at hand, but everyone involved has made their opinions known and i wouldn't say that anyone is more guilty than another when it comes to arguing their thoughts on the matter. all i've done is argued my perspective, i never put anyone in a category of "who gets it", which i might add, you were in.
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TC we need to hit the links. :D
 
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703999304575399523349443634.html
Senior officials at the U.S. Department of Transportation have at least temporarily blocked the release of findings by auto-safety regulators that could favor Toyota Motor Corp. in some crashes related to unintended acceleration, according to a recently retired agency official.

George Person, who retired July 3 after 27 years at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, said in an interview that the decision to not go public with the data for now was made over the objections of some officials at NHTSA.

"The information was compiled. The report was finished and submitted," Mr. Person said. "When I asked why it hadn't been published, I was told that the secretary's office didn't want to release it," he added, referring to Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.
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"The agency has for too long ignored what I believe is the root cause of these unintended acceleration cases," he said. "It's driver error. It's pedal misapplication and that's what this data shows."
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"It has become very political. There is a lot of anger towards Toyota," Mr. Person said. Transportation officials "are hoping against hope that they find something that points back to a flaw in Toyota vehicles."
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Hmmmm, very interesting...
 
Or how about this one. 12 recalls on over 9 million cars in just one year. Yeah, there are no problems.

http://content.usatoday.com/communi...test-make-12-toyota-lexus-recalls-this-year/1

The latest Toyota recalls, announced yesterday, involving the certain older Avalons sedans and Lexus LX470 SUVs for unrelated steering problems underscore how the automaker's safety problems just aren't letting up. So maybe it's time we give you a summary of the Toyota Motor recalls of 2010.

So far this year, we count 12, equally divided between the Lexus and Toyota divisions. We list them all below. Over the past year, about 9.5 million Toyota and Lexus vehicles have been recalled in the U.S., by the Associated Press' count. It's hard to think of any other time in recent history that a single automaker has had so many recalls, although we suspect others have had higher totals of actual vehicles involved.

The drip-drip of recalls continues even as Toyota tries to fight back. It has an advertising campaign about its Star Safety System. It just took a bunch of journalists on a junket to Japen to try to show how it is tackling its safety problems. As long as more cars are being recalled, it's going to be tough to get the upper hand on trying to emerge from its crisis. Comedian Jimmy Fallon, noting the two latest recalls on NBC's Late Night show last night, joked that Toyota's crisis manager must be saying, "It's good to be back!"

The Toyota spokesman assigned to talk about the latest recalls didn't return out phone call yesterday, but Toyota's new U.S. quality chief sent a letter to the New York Times this week that says Toyota is "making extraordinary efforts to service our recalled vehicles with effective and durable solutions for these issues." The chief, Steve St. Angelo adds, "All of our new cars and trucks are now being equipped with even more advanced safety technologies, including our Star Safety System, brake override and improved event data recorders that read both pre- and post-crash data."

Here's a listing of the separate recalls for both Toyota and Lexus so far this year. Some are for current models, others for older ones. Note how Lexus LS, HS 250h and Avalon were subject to more than one recall:

Lexus Division
LX470: steering problems
LS: valve springs
HS250h: fuel safety in a crash
LS: steering problems
GX460: stability software
HS250h: brakes

Toyota division
Avalon: steering problems
Sequoia: steering problems
Sienna: spare tire cable
Tacoma: Drive shaft
Prius: brakes
RAV4, Corolla, Matrix, Avalon, Camry, Highlander, Tundra, Sequoia: sticky accelerator pedals that could cause the car to become a runaway.

And this list doesn't include last year's pedal-jam recall, also aimed at keeping cars from becoming runaways.
 
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