Toyota's runaway-car worries may not stop at floor

Status
Not open for further replies.
Originally Posted By: Duffman77
Well thats the obvious first answer, but geeze if N wasnt working or I couldnt find it I wouldnt hesitate to throw it into park, its better than a run away to top speed and then killing someone. Nothing good can come from a run away, how is blowing a tranny any more expensive?
i'm sorry ... but you can't find Neutral? Neutral isn't working? how does Neutral not work ... ? that's the whole point of "neutral." you're disengaging the transmission. throw it into park ... ? how fast are you going? are you strong enough? is park locked out? because reverse probably is, and you're gonna have to cross reverse to get to park. what are you going to do when the wheels and transmission lock up and you lose control of the car? ... how fast are you going again?
 
Originally Posted By: philobeddoe
Originally Posted By: Duffman77
Well thats the obvious first answer, but geeze if N wasnt working or I couldnt find it I wouldnt hesitate to throw it into park, its better than a run away to top speed and then killing someone. Nothing good can come from a run away, how is blowing a tranny any more expensive?
i'm sorry ... but you can't find Neutral? Neutral isn't working? how does Neutral not work ... ? that's the whole point of "neutral." you're disengaging the transmission. throw it into park ... ? how fast are you going? are you strong enough? is park locked out? because reverse probably is, and you're gonna have to cross reverse to get to park. what are you going to do when the wheels and transmission lock up and you lose control of the car? ... how fast are you going again?
the selector may be faulty so the transmission could not switch gear. but, unlikely for the two problems to combine.
 
Originally Posted By: philobeddoe
Originally Posted By: Duffman77
Well thats the obvious first answer, but geeze if N wasnt working or I couldnt find it I wouldnt hesitate to throw it into park, its better than a run away to top speed and then killing someone. Nothing good can come from a run away, how is blowing a tranny any more expensive?
i'm sorry ... but you can't find Neutral? Neutral isn't working? how does Neutral not work ... ? that's the whole point of "neutral." you're disengaging the transmission. throw it into park ... ? how fast are you going? are you strong enough? is park locked out? because reverse probably is, and you're gonna have to cross reverse to get to park. what are you going to do when the wheels and transmission lock up and you lose control of the car? ... how fast are you going again?
You seem to imply that my post was stupid yet you are saying well throw it in N, done deal, I think we have to assume that that was done. To do nothing after that did nothing would be stupid. Ther more I think about this I think the failure was probably at the motor contolling the throttle blade. With fly by wire, the computer will usually not let you do things like a WOT gear change from D to R etc. It should have gone out of WOT with the driver maddly flailing at controls. JMO.
 
I simply don't buy that fact that the car could not be put in Neutral. I think it is driver error. I've been alive for 45 years now and driven for almost 30 years in maybe a thousand vehicles. (worked in various car dealerships and worked on new and used vehicles) The driver likely paniced and failed to apply the brakes and shift the car into Neutral and pull safely off the road. It doesn't matter if the throttle was at WOT you can still stop a car with the brakes at WOT, and of course you can as a last resort use the E brake. This driver FAILED to do ANY of the above reasonable actions to control his car. Clearly a case of a driver who did not know how to operate and control his car. I hope Toyota fights this tooth and nail.
 
Originally Posted By: Duffman77
Originally Posted By: philobeddoe
Originally Posted By: Duffman77
Well thats the obvious first answer, but geeze if N wasnt working or I couldnt find it I wouldnt hesitate to throw it into park, its better than a run away to top speed and then killing someone. Nothing good can come from a run away, how is blowing a tranny any more expensive?
i'm sorry ... but you can't find Neutral? Neutral isn't working? how does Neutral not work ... ? that's the whole point of "neutral." you're disengaging the transmission. throw it into park ... ? how fast are you going? are you strong enough? is park locked out? because reverse probably is, and you're gonna have to cross reverse to get to park. what are you going to do when the wheels and transmission lock up and you lose control of the car? ... how fast are you going again?
You seem to imply that my post was stupid yet you are saying well throw it in N, done deal, I think we have to assume that that was done. To do nothing after that did nothing would be stupid. Ther more I think about this I think the failure was probably at the motor contolling the throttle blade. With fly by wire, the computer will usually not let you do things like a WOT gear change from D to R etc. It should have gone out of WOT with the driver maddly flailing at controls. JMO.
I am not implying that your post was stupid, and I hope that's not your inference. I listened to that fella's 911 call, and he most certainly did not put that car in neutral. The caller complained to 911 that the "brakes weren't working." The floor mat was OVER the accelerator, and UNDER the brake ... so applying the brakes also applied the throttle, and standing on the brakes was WOT. After this event, I tested my Prius out ... WOT starting at 30 MPH and increasing at 10 MPH increments I manually manipulated the shifter to Neutral ... not only did it disengage the transmission, but it disengaged the throttle as well. With the drive by wire system, shifting the car to Park achieves the very exact same result ... it's a push button "P" in the Prius, and it disengages the transmission without locking it (like a reverse or park lockout in a "normal" car). I checked the Lexus cockpit, looked at the shifter and controls ... THIS WAS PILOT ERROR. He could have stayed cool and shifted to Neutral, and then applied the brakes and steered the car to safety ... and he did not. You don't need to make any assumptions about whether or not Neutral was "working."
 
Originally Posted By: deven
This is what I saw last night and since my dad owns a 2007 Lexus ES350, it does concern me a bit.
I would say don't be concerned. 1. You know how to properly control the car should the gas pedal stick or something like that. Shift into Neutral, and brake. 2. People's memories, particularly during traumatizing situations become fogged. There are many psychological studies that suggest this. When the person claims "I absolutely 100% had my foot on the brake." And yet, his Camry drives off a cliff. It's quite possible his brain panic'd and told his foot "STEP ON THE BRAKE", then seized up, stepped on the wrong pedal. It doesn't help that his wife didn't survive. If indeed he stepped on the wrong pedal, it would be very hard for him to accept it, especially if his actions resulted in her death. 3. They are still investigating, the jury is still out. I'd say, enjoy your Toyota/Lexus 100%. If you have friends/family who happen to own a car, have a talk with them. A few minutes could save their life, if indeed there is some sort of ECU flaw, although I am skeptical at the moment. My condolences to the friends and family of the San Diego incident. Given any other situation I am sure the driver would have realized to keep calm and shift into Neutral. This just proves how dangerous 'tunnel vision' can be during a state of panic. In school we are engrained with safety such as "Stop Drop and Roll!", so we know precisely what to do during fire or earthquake emergencies. If people did this more often with car emergencies, our roads would be much safer.
 
Last edited:
Yes, it is very easy to pull a manual out of gear. With a little care, you can put it into gear. I practice that every time the #$%^&*&^%#$%^ hydrolic clutch fails on my truck.
 
This has nothing to do with the ECU, neutral, whatever, throttle plate, whatever. Why? Because this is not the first recall of floor mats. Here's a link to the first recall of floor mats. These were all-weather mats, accessories, so the recall didn't apply to all cars. http://money.cnn.com/2007/09/26/autos/floormat_recall/index.htm This is mostly driver error. Still, 3 seconds to hold a button seems pretty long to turn off an engine when you're traveling at 100 mph. With older key ignitions you can turn off the engine just with a flick.
 
Based on the video deven posted, it appears there might be an engine computer problem related to the drive-by-wire system that translates the position of the gas pedal to the response of the engine. Yes, the jury's still out but it is a strong possibility and cases of runaway Toyotas are not limited to Lexuses; Prius and Camry cars have also been involved. And I agree that every driver should know what to do when a car "runs away": hit the brake, shift into neutral while steering safely off the road. However, the fact remains: NO car should accelerate by itself without driver input!! There are many driving situations where sudden self-acceleration could cause a serious crash before the driver can react. IMO, we have become far too dependent on complicated electronic computer control systems in our vehicle. In critical safety functions, let's go back to more reliable mechanical systems!
 
Originally Posted By: deven
This is what I saw last night and since my dad owns a 2007 Lexus ES350, it does concern me a bit.
The news report is correct. There has been reports about runaway cars on various Toyota forums for a few years. This is one from the forum I frequent: http://rav4world.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=16073&postdays=0&postorder=asc&&start=0 One would think that it could be prevented but simple re-flash with added simple logic in programming canceling WOT when brakes are pressed. The fact that such re-flash was not being done suggests to me that the nature of the problem is that ECU freezes at WOT and stops accepting inputs from sensors. The above RAV4 driver was lucky to have a standard ignition key. I'm not sure the start/stop button would work when the software goes in a loop. What we need is another computer, say ABS or traction control computer to detect both WOT and hard braking state and disable WOT. Or a master kill switch disabling ECU (independent of the start button) such as an old fashioned keyed off switch.
 
It doesn't have to be the ECU. Maybe there's something wrong with the pedal position sensor. I'm assuming of course that most of these vehicles with the problem are drive-by-wire. Don't most new cars have some sort of black box?
 
I wanted to highlight some points about controlling a runaway vehicle. I couldn't go through all the posts yet so I don't know if they have been mentioned. This should be relevent for most all modern cars and Toyotas: -Placing a car in neutral will not over-rev the engine even at WOT. The PCM will shut down the injectors before redline. On some cars like GM the cut-off is even lower at around 4500 rpms in neutral. -Neutral is a mechanical linkage and not dependent on electrical power or power assist. -Neutral is designed to be able to be freely moved into for just the purpose of disconnecting from a runaway engine or to quickly restart a stalled car that is rolling. From D neutral is in the order NRP, and there is a detent to stop from going into reverse. If you press in the shifter button and you overshoot into R you will remain in neutral until speed is reduced in most cars and on others the transmission might burn out. If you overshoot into P you will basically be in neutral but you will probably ratchet the parking pawl. -The engine will not overpower the brakes but as the article mention at WOT you might lose assist and must press hard. Also breaking distance will increase so that's why you place car in neutral. If you ride the brakes they can overheat and fade. On many cars this can also make the Parking brake inoperative since many apply the rear service brake. Some have a rear drum near the rotor hat and brake shoe for the parking break but it will be hot too. the parking break is not really an emergency brake. -With a conventional key ignition most cars will not let you turn the ignition past OFF and lock the steering wheel unless the car is in Park. Bottom line is with a runaway vehicle press brake hard, flip it into neutral (will not over-rev), then steer it off the road then kill the ignition.
 
I have a Rav4, 4 Runner and ES350. All will shut down with the ignition. I know because I have tried all 3 to be sure. The 2 Toyotas are keyed and the Lexus has the push button. All 3 will also easily shift to N by pushing the lever forward. No detent needed. Just a click forward.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: PT1
I have a Rav4, 4 Runner and ES350. All will shut down with the ignition. I know because I have tried all 3 to be sure. The 2 Toyotas are keyed and the Lexus has the push button. All 3 will also easily shift to N by pushing the lever forward. No detent needed. Just a click forward.
Have you tried it at WOT?
 
Originally Posted By: friendly_jacek
suggests to me that the nature of the problem is that ECU freezes at WOT and stops accepting inputs from sensors.
One solution to the problem of a "freeze" is a watchdog timer circuit. The software must "pet the dog" a certain number of times per second. If the "dog" isn't petted (because the software has crashed) he "barks" and kills the power to the computer.
 
Originally Posted By: BuickGN
Originally Posted By: PT1
I have a Rav4, 4 Runner and ES350. All will shut down with the ignition. I know because I have tried all 3 to be sure. The 2 Toyotas are keyed and the Lexus has the push button. All 3 will also easily shift to N by pushing the lever forward. No detent needed. Just a click forward.
Have you tried it at WOT?
Yes. Shuts right down. I shut down the Lexus over 90mph on I-77 just because of this accident. Shut down in the 3 seconds. Hit nuetral...pulled to the berm, steering got tight but the brakes worked fine. Put it in park, hit the button and it started right up. I shut down the other 2 at about 50mph WOT...clicked right off (keys on both) Now the wife & kids all know the procedure. Even the 11 year old knows if the car takes off on Mom and she panics hit the button for 3 seconds. When quizzed they all know the answer. I still believe this is a software/firmware issue with the ETC that causes the runaway. But I also believe the police office was in an unfamiliar car and may have panicked. The first time you use a pushbutton ignition it is confusing. My thoughts: They need to pull the entire ETC system from at least 30 of these runaway effected vehicles and look at all the firmware, chips, circuits down to chip level and find the reason. It could be as simple as stray current in a micro chip. Or an opening on an algorythm in the firmware undetected by testing.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

M
First hand experience of Arcan or CAT floor jacks
Replies
6
Views
414
Nukeman7
E
A good daily driver
2
Replies
35
Views
2K
Tahoe4Life
GoOil97
Windshield Protection Options
Replies
8
Views
708
UG_Passat
Jackson_Slugger
Mercedes EV Owner Charged for Oil Change at Stealership
2
Replies
20
Views
808
JeffKeryk
Creekside
How much longer do I give the dealer?
2
Replies
31
Views
2K
ron17571
Top