Toyota Throttle Electronics Easily Confused

"in your opinion"? are you a software engineer? are you an electrical engineer? are you /any/ form of engineer?

and we can find "witnesses" that will stand up and allege that their vehicle's throttle, brakes, transmission and ignition all failed simultaneously. but not as simultaneously as their credibility.

He can swap a hard drive while blindfolded, and he knows some geologists.

Look again. You're talking about the wrong person.

Gee, you've NEVER been wrong before!!!

Oops.

That's OK. You'll get me next time...

I thought it was 70% of complaints lodged going back to 02 or near, not 70% of affected cars.

Im sure they know the reason why it happens, toyotas beancounters just figure its cheaper to ignore it and too hard to prove.

============== That attitude must be taught in business schools. It closely matches the attitude of airlines & aircraft manufacturers.

Right. There will be no problem with your gas pedal binding up due to corrosion.

The reported problem is that the area around the spring corrodes, and keeps the spring from returning the pedal to idle position. The shim keeps the spring from binding.

Since your pedal was sourced from Japan, and not CTS in the US, it does not have this problem.

But here's a hint: turn your cruise control OFF when you're not using it. OFF, not just Cancel, or hitting the brakes. OFF.

My attitude is logic, yours ignorance.

My attitude is logic, yours ignorance.

================= I was referring to the attitude of the bean counters, you knucklehead. That being the case, the only way you could possibly disagree with me is to have read NOTHING in the past 20 years about how airlines & aircraft manufacturers view risk vs safety.

Steve Wozniak says his prius has problems, he said he thinks it is software. Oh course you heard of Wozniak.

Toyota knows whats wrong, you wouldnt want them to shoot themselves in the foot by telling us, would you.

They wont even let the boxes that record the accidents be independantly taken and analyzed.

And the CEO today said he didnt know what was in the memo about beating NHTSA and saving millions, because it was in english or some other bull s*it reason.

Made in Japan only applies to the accelerator fix. If it is a software problem, all bets are off. Could be in cars no matter where made since they do noit know the cause. How can they say which cars are not affected?

Vito

My attitude is logic, yours ignorance.

dude, it it were a software problem, /all/ their vehicles would be exhibiting the exact same problem all the time. that may be a hard concept for a paid congressional "witness" to grasp, but it's a logical test you can apply and understand easily.

Not really. But if you're desperate to appear correct, you can continue to believe that.

I see no indication that any expert claims to have proven anything. Maybe you're interpreting something differently than I am. Please highlight the words you read and surround them with five asterisks on either end of the phrase, *****like this*****.

So you believe that they use exactly the same software build in every vehicle?

ROTFL!!!

As I understand the explanation, the problem with the CTS pedal assemblies is not "corrosion." It is moisture condensing on the plastic components. This changes the frictional characteristics of the assembly (possibly becasue they are using some form of nylon which absorbs moisture and swells). One thing that did catch my eye was the fact that both sides of the assembly used the same plastic material. I was taught this is a no-no when designing bearings (rotational and linear). When you use two identical plastics on opposite sides of the same frictional assembly, there is a tendency for the two plastics to "stick" together with age. I have a chart (a very old chart now) from Machine Design that lists compatible plastics for these type of assemblies. They never recommend using the same plastic on both sides of such an assembly. It seems to me as these pedal assemblies wear, the plastic surfaces become very smooth, and therefore even more likely to stick becasue of the plastic "compatibility." If the parts are nylon, moisture would likely make the problem worse. Adding the metal shims, would fix this, since plastic sliding friction on hard metal surfaces is much more predictable that plastic on plastic.

This is not the explantion I read. The shims actually change the frictional surfaces from plastic on plastic to plastic on steel. The original plastic on plastic rubbing acted as a damper / drag to give good pedal feel. I don't beleive the problem was related to corrosion at all (see above). There are interesting pictures at:

Are you sure this is true? I haven't been able to find a decent description of the Denso pedal assembly. Are you sure it is that much different? Got a link to pictures?

Since most current cruise controls (and by most I am including manufacturers other than Toyota) use soft switches (i.e., switches that send a signal, they don't actually disconnect the circuit), I doubt if this makes any difference. Both "cancel" and "off" just send a signal to the computer telling the computer to initiate a function. Off is just a different signal than cancel. In the old days "off" actually cut the power to the cruise control. Now for many autos, off only means, "don't pay attention to other cruice control inputs." Ford got tired of people blaming the cruise controls for UA, so they added the stupid brake line switch to physically cut power to the cruise control actuator when the brakes were pressed. And then this screwed up. Fix a bug, add a bug.... I'd be tempted to go back to vaccum operated cruise controls!

Ed

In 40+ years of hiking, I have never found the need for a trail lawyer.