"Remarkable doesn't begin to describe what's happening to Toyota Motor Corp.
Its reputation for delivering safe, reliable, quality-engineered vehicles is in tatters. Governments from Tokyo to Washington, clearly on the muscle, are pressuring the automaker to act openly and quickly. Toyota's executives, corporate culture and dealer body, each touted by apologists for their ability to do no wrong, are struggling to manage a crisis that is expanding faster than they can keep up."
Actually it isn't. I was listening to an interview today on NPR with an automotive safety expert. The Toyota recall for accelerator pedals is only the 5th largest recall, and unlike bigger recalls for other manufacturers (Ford and GM) it's going to be solved much more quickly. Ford has the honor of the biggest recall in history.
What's helping Toyota's reputation is their quick action to fix the problems. Dealers are staying open 24/7 to fix customer's cars.
All the experts agree that the damage to Toyota's reputation all depends on how quickly they fix customer's cars and how they treat the customers during the repair procedure. I don't know if it's the dealers themselves, or corporate Toyota that's paying for the perks that dealer are offering, but it's very reassuring to the owners. Most people are pretty reasonable when it comes to recalls. Tell them about the problem, fix it without a hassle, and they're happy. It's pretty rare for _any_ car to not have at least a couple of recalls with the increasing complexity of vehicles.
That last sentence is a hoot. When a GM, Ford, or Chrysler had a recall the "I love Toyota" crowd were all over them, there was no "It's pretty rare for _any_ car to not have at least a couple of recalls with the increasing complexity of vehicles." Now that it's Toyota getting a black eye suddenly a recall is no big deal. And similarly, even though Toyota has known about this problem for years, the Toyota loyalists are claiming how "up front" T is and how "quickly" they are addressing it.... my ass.
On Sun, 07 Feb 2010 09:30:47 -0500, Mike Hunter wrote:
Really? This is the 5th largest recall of all time.
Better google Ford Transmission Recall. THey got out of it by sending you an orange sticker to put on your dash that said "WARNING! This Motor Vehicle may go from Park to Reverse at anytime without warning. Do not leave vehicle idling."
Or some such BS. My roomate had a Country Squire Land Barge and that's what he got in the mail. We had a good laugh over it and he stuck it to the refrigerator. That was 1980 if I remember right.
Ford petitioned the government saying it would be too expensive to fix the millions of transmissions that were on the road.
On June 10, 1980, NHTSA made an initial determination of defect in Ford vehicles with C-3, C-4, C-6, FMX, and JATCO automatic transmissions. The alleged problem with the transmissions is that a safety defect permits them to slip accidentally from park to reverse. As of the date of determination, NHTSA had received 23,000 complaints about Ford transmissions, including reports of 6,000 accidents, 1,710 injuries, and 98 fatalities--primarily the young and old, unable to save themselves--directly attributable to transmission slippage. As detailed below, this defect finding eventually resulted in a pseudo-recall wherein Ford agreed to mail warning labels to 23 million owners of Fords with these transmissions rather than recall them for mechanical repair. The Center for Auto Safety first called NHTSA's attention to the problem in July 1977, and shortly thereafter NHTSA instituted an investigation into 1966-79 Ford vehicles with C-6 or FMX transmissions. In the face of apparent administrative inaction by NHTSA, CAS in July 1978, renewed its warnings and asked NHTSA for a recall. CAS produced evidence of 12 deaths and 100 accidents which occurred because of transmission slippage. CAS reminded NHTSA of the long established precedent of the Kelsey-Hayes wheel case (United States v. General Motors Corp., 171 App. D.C. 27, 518 F.2d 420 (1975)) that a significant number of failures alone in normal use is a sufficient legal basis for a recall without determination of a precise cause of failure. But in October 1978, NHTSA denied the Center's recall request. It did, however, term its investigation a "matter of extremely high priority." NHTSA realized the magnitude of the proposed recall put its investigation on politically sensitive ground. Hence, any action required concrete evidence of defective design. On August 29, 1978, NHTSA issued a "Consumer Advisory" warning drivers not to leave their vehicles unattended with the engine running for even a few moments. The following month NHTSA conducted an investigation to find out if complaints against Ford transmissions were disproportionately higher than those against other manufacturers or whether the problem was common for all automatic transmissions. The study revealed, contrary to Ford's contentions, that Ford transmissions were 12 times more likely than General Motors' and 14 times more likely than Chryslers' to jump from park-to-reverse when jarred.
98 Deaths. Far more than the deaths reported for Toyota's problem, and the problem may have been excaberated by people pressing the accelerator hoping to free it.
Moreover:
In August, 1980, in accordance with the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1966, as amended, NHTSA held hearings at which interested persons were given the opportunity to present data and views as to the existence of a safety-related defect in these transmissions. Two months later, NHTSA Administrator Claybrook sent a memorandum to Secretary of Transportation Goldschmidt announcing her intention to order the recall of
10 million Fords with C-3, C-4 and FMX automatic transmissions. With respect to the JATCO and C-6 transmissions, she stated her belief that a remedy, such as a warning device, might be negotiated with Ford. Contrary to Administrator Claybrook's findings, on December 31, 1980, Secretary Goldschmidt announced DOT's agreement to close its three and one-half year investigation of the Ford automatic transmissions in exchange for Ford's pledge to send notification and warning labels to owners of almost 23 million Fords. On March 6, 1981, the Center for Auto Safety filed suit to overturn the agreement between Ford and DOT on the grounds that a mere warning label recall was illegal under the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act which required mechanical remedy of defective vehicles and that there was no support in the record showing a label would reduce the number of accidents, deaths and injuries.
By 1984:
Despite findings by the agency that Ford "park-to-reverse" accidents had resulted in a total of at least 306 deaths, and that the death rate from the defect was higher in 1984 than in any other year in history except one (1980), NHTSA announced on July 12, 1985, that it would not reopen the case.
SIX YEARS and the problem was NEVER fixed! Over 300 deaths from faulty tranmissions, and Ford got out of it with a sticker.
Ford murdered a bunch of its customers by not recalling exploding Ford Pintos even though they knew about them, because on the accounting books it looked cheaper to absorb the cost of the burn lawsuits than to do a recall. Nice.
Wow. Talk about YABUTs. "If it were true..."?!?!?! You're kidding, right?
Who uses tha Parking Brake? Not many.
Ford refused to recall the vehicles that killed hundreds. See if you can find the video where a cop had to jump into a runaway Ford to stop it. It's hilarious. But not for the cop, the old woman that owned the car, and hundreds of people killed by faulty Ford transmissions.
That is completely false. The only "accounting" was in response to a request by the gvt and using gvt supplied dollar figures. The pintos were no more prone to exploding then any other car of the day. If Ford is guilty murdering their customers then so are ALL the other car markers of the time.
Bullshit. Despite what you'd like to think, customers weren't torching their pintos. The fires were due to fuel tank's location and the tendancy for the filler to rip out leaving a gaping hole.
How could you even forget about the Ford recall for transmissions? They talked it to death almost as much as the currect Toyota recall.
However, 'talked to death' is not a good phrase to use. Hundreds were killed and thousands injured thanks to Ford NOT fixing the transmissions, but issuing a sticker for the dash instead.
You want to make such a big deal about the Toyota recall. So far, I don't think anyone has died yet from the sticking pedal, and Toyota is fixing the problem.
You are tragically misinformed. There is a reason that this particular case is discussed in every Business Ethics college textbook written in the last 30 years. Ford was aware that rear-impact collisions could ignite the gas tank, and there are written and recorded meetings where they determined a re-design was too expensive, and there are documents showing quantitative analysis of cost of lawsuits versus redesign. Know what you're talking about before you dispute such well documented facts, at least do a little research before spouting off and making a fool of yourself.
Whether or not Ford has done something quite so evil since, I doubt it.. the publicity around that one was quite high.
there was nothing inherently dangerous about the pinto. It was statistically just as safe as any other average car on the road. ANY car can be made safer, that's a meaningless yardstick to apply. You can CHOOSE to believe whatever you want.
No that is not at all true. It was according to NHTSA no more dangerous than other cars in the same class. It was (also according to NHTSA) considerably more dangerous than the average car on the road. It has been estimated that
500 people were burned to death that would not have died if they had been in an an average car when the accident occurred. The average car on the road at that time was a tank and the occupants rarely suffered any injuries at all when another car plowed into the rear at 35 miles an hour.
The problem was that Detroit designed and built compact cars not with the goal of creating an enduring market for compact cars, but with an eye to destroying the market for small cars. As a result of this philosophy there was about a 20 year period where the compact cars Detroit built were just one disaster after another.
No, it has to do with "US content". The more US parts, the more they could say was US content. I think foreign manufacturers get tax breaks if they use US parts, so the more parts, the more the incentive. I'm not sure about that, but I believe it works that way.
They also avoid any tariffs imposed by the amount of Domestic content.
All I can say...glad I bought a Scion. They're ALL made in Japan...
Everything I have said is a fact that can be substantiated by you or anyone else. You are the one who is uninformed about the Pinto situation and has chosen your own belief over the truth.
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