unintended acceleration question

Ok, so I've heard of all of these "unintended acceleration" instances in the news. I've not looked too deeply into them, but the question I have is, why don't these people put the car in NEUTRAL, then use the brakes to slow the car down to a speed safe enough to shut off the engine?

And in the case of an all-electric vehicle, is it even possible to put it in neutral? (I'm believe there is no "transmission", per se.)

One story I read indicated that a Lexus had gone like 6 miles and 120 MPH before the terrible wreck. It would take me much less than 6 seconds to decide to jam the shifter into neutral and to hell with the runaway engine! (theirs was supposedly a loaner car anyway).

I agree.

I think people just panic and don't think.

Now, I know the engine will red-line if the accelerator is stuck and you shift into nuetral, but how long will it take to put a car in nuetral and put on the breaks? A couple seconds?

I heard an explanation by an auto engineer yesterday, and evidently you can't put one of those things in neutral.

In a Prius, when you put it into neutral, the engine stays in the state it was in when the car was put in neutral ie, if it was running it will stay running and if the engine is off, it will stay off, even if the battery runs low.

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Besides, hindsight is 20/20 when you are not barrelling down the highway at 90 plus miles an hour.....It's really great to armchair quarterback or backseat drive when it's NOT happening to you.

I had an issue with my Impalla at the first of the year, I was having computer issues, and even had it replaced, and was driving back from the garage when it kicked on the cruise control, at full acceleration, in a blizzard as I was trying to pass a fuel truck.

If you look at the video it was just like what happened with the prius, me trying to pass on the left. But instead of another car, it was a fuel tanker, there was limited visibilty and a lot of snow on the road.

Scariest few minutes of my life, I managed to get around an ahead of the fuel truck, and get it out of cruise control, and then promptly after that, going about 90, the car lost all power, and every code in my car went off, which was the original problem I was having anyway, total loss of power and coding, except brakes thank god, and I was able to get it to the side of the highway, but it was not easy, and not fun. I was glad I was alone, and there were no other distractions, like a screaming swambo or child to worry about.

I no longer have that car.

So honestly guys, it's great to hazard why someone else didn't do something, when it's not you, but until it is you.........

It's not like it was up to the 70's where YOU are in charge of your car....when you are dealing with an errant computer that controls everything, there is often little that you can do.

I think it's going to end up being a bigger problem than just with Toyota.

And besides, evidently HE DID try to put it in Neutral....and push the on off button several times, like other armchair quarterbacks have suggested.....

Putting Runaway Prius in Neutral Didn't Work: CHP

Years ago when I was working in TV news production, I went through a defensive driving course, the kind they taught to overseas execs to avoid kidnappers. And guess what, all that info is useless, when a computer is controlling your brakes, and acceleration, and everything else in your car...the idea that "I think people just panic and don't think," is BS when you try to do everything right, and STILL nothing happens.

There's all kinds of electronics on the prius that vary how much of the pedal's braking is done by the actual pads vs. the regenerative braking system. In other words, if the car knows you're feathering to slow down, it will just turn the motor into a generator. If you're stomping, it squeezes the pads. The emergency brake lever is the only thing directly connected to the physical brakes without any "evil" electronics in the way.

I get the impression he didn't try the Ebrake until the cops told him to. I don't think prius owners would normally use the Ebrake in daily life so it probably didn't occur to him.

Bobby_M said:

There's all kinds of electronics on the prius that vary how much of the pedal's braking is done by the actual pads vs. the regenerative braking system. In other words, if the car knows you're feathering to slow down, it will just turn the motor into a generator. If you're stomping, it squeezes the pads. The emergency brake lever is the only thing directly connected to the physical brakes without any "evil" electronics in the way.

I get the impression he didn't try the Ebrake until the cops told him to. I don't think prius owners would normally use the Ebrake in daily life so it probably didn't occur to him.

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I saw an interview with the cop last week and he said when he got next to it, he could smell burning brakes, so I don't know about the e brake, but I got the impression from the cop that the regular brakes were toast.

It was funny while I was going through the crap with my car's computer it was during the Det. auto show, and they were showing that 2012 ford concept with the in console touch screen, wireless access, and all that other crap, and I was thinking "oh great, some 14 year old hacker is going to be able to put a virus in a car's computer and start playing spyhunter with everyone's cars."

When the mechanic came up with his car hauler to get me from the side of the road, we were talking about it. He was saying mechanics don't want all this crap connected to computers, it could all come down to some tiny wire deep in the car having come lose, and spark- gapping in damp weather, f-ing with my computer, which then controls everything else. And it will be worse in the future.

I'm pretty freaked out about all this, that's why all the armchair quarterbacking get's on my nerves. Especially if Bill gates gets his way and we end up with microsoft operating systems running all that crap???

Well end up with this happening at some crucial moment;



I want to go back to a model t....or a horse, when it breaks down, you just have to shoe it, or shoot it.

I ended up getting a 95 ford contour with a stick, I know even it has a computer but it's bound to control a lot less than anything now adays, and with a stick I feel more in control.

I have been an Auto mechanic since 1991, I recall only one time there was a problem with the old fasioned gas pedal hooked directly to the throttle, it was my own car! an 83 Z-28, the throttle spring broke and it went wide open throttle while making a left turn in a snowy intersection in Chicago, after almost spinning the car into oncoming traffic I promptly shut the car off with the key, felt like it took forever to do though!

Now that most all cars have drive by wire, steer by wire, and dynamic braking/stability control.. all of these are controlled in some way by a computer, we make repairs to drive by wire throttle systems about every day- one or two cars per day, I replace throttle position sensors, stepper motor actuated throttle bodies, accelerator pedals, computers, and countless wire repairs due to corrosion and even rodents chewing into the harnesses. Aint technology grand?
my current car is not drive by wire, no ABS, no traction control or stability system, its just a basic no frills 40mpg 2000 civic HX. never felt I wasnt in control, not even once!

azscoob said:

my current car is not drive by wire, no ABS, no traction control or stability system, its just a basic no frills 40mpg 2000 civic HX. never felt I wasnt in control, not even once!

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Yep, that's exactly where I'm at now, with these things. I hope there ends up being a luddite backlash, from over computer controlled cars, and if not I hope there at least becomes sort of an underground, with mechanics like you and used late model cars and support for all this.

At this point I don't see myself EVER buying a "new" car ever again, or anything over the year 2,000. It's going to take a lot to woo be back, and if cars are going to cost more than my folks first house 60 years ago (35,000) then f-that.

I recently had a customer complain that his speedo was fast by 6mph, it would read 65 when he was doing 59 according to a gps unit. his big issue? his warranty would expire before the actual miles driven because of this error! it could not be fixed because his speedo is electronic and speed is based on transmission sensors, there is no calibration or adjustment.

90 MPH in a blizzard?

Having experienced 'unintended accleration' in a Camaro with big block chevy in it, it's not THAT hard to figure out to put it in neutral...and interestingly enough it WAS the floor mat that did it.

I can't see too many Toyota products reaching blazing speeds too quickly...not any quicker then a 3200 pound Camaro with a 500 horsepower motor, at least...

arturo7 said:

90 MPH in a blizzard?

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yeah, that's sorta the point here, it wasn't my intention. Only when I started to pass the semi I was accellerating from maybe 55 or 60, and trying to get around the truck, while it was throwing slush, so I gunned it- it has that acceleration package like in the impalla cop cars, next thing I know I'm going towards 90, and my cruise control light is on.

Joeywhat said:

I can't see too many Toyota products reaching blazing speeds too quickly...not any quicker then a 3200 pound Camaro with a 500 horsepower motor, at least...

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If you are cruising at 70, which most of us in Michigan do, since that's the speed limit on the freeway (so more than likely going 80), and then you get an "unintended acceleration" you're going to be going 90 in no time, whether it's a toyota or not.

Funny, there is this exact debate on another forum I post on.... Language NSFW

But this was posted which I found interesting... there is really no reason brakes shouldnt be able to slow the car:
(Granted these are not Toyota products, but still)


What I want to know is why, (I realize that in a prius it is not possible, and maybe in some lexus' as well) the people dont just turn the freakin' car off? I imagine most of these cars have turn-key ignitions...

This is another reason that I will avoid driving an Automatic as long as I possibly can. Clutch it and pull over. I had many times the throttle (cable) stuck in my early '90s Jetta, and I just pulled right over and popped the hood to deal with it.

Baja_Brewer said:

What I want to know is why, (I realize that in a prius it is not possible, and maybe in some lexus' as well) the people dont just turn the freakin' car off? I imagine most of these cars have turn-key ignitions...

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fear that the steering wheel will lock or power brakes won't work...

I had a hopped-up 350 V-8 in my Malibu and the throttle stuck wide-open one night.
There wasn't any good place to stop and fix it, so I just drove it home (about 2 miles).
The brakes stank, but I had no trouble slowing down for the turns.
It ran out of gas in the driveway.

I had an old Duster that ended up with a similar issue only with mine the cable that ran from the pedal into the engine compartment had started to fray. One day I hit the gas to accelerate up to highway speed when I was merging and it just kept accelerating after I let up on the pedal.

AZ_IPA said:

fear that the steering wheel will lock or power brakes won't work...

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I'd rather lose control of a car that is decelerating than one that is accelerating.

So everybody knows, the guy in the prius here recently is completely full of crap. He said that he tried to pull the gas pedal back with his hand, but he couldn't let go of the wheel...or his phone to shut the car off????? Sounds more than a little fishy. I can't imagine puting my head under the dash to try to pry up on the gas pedal while going 90mph down the road. And by the way, the prius WILL shut off if you hold the power button. It will also shift into neutral in you push the shift lever over to NEUTRAL! Lastly, the prius will cut fuel to the engine if both the accelerator and the brake pedals are pressed at the same time. It does this to avoid burning up the gears in the CVT. If all of these mechanisms failed on this idiot's car then god must hate him.

Baja_Brewer said:

\
What I want to know is why, (I realize that in a prius it is not possible, and maybe in some lexus' as well) the people dont just turn the freakin' car off? I imagine most of these cars have turn-key ignitions...

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Once again more armchair quarterbacking, that if you spent 5 minutes even listenning to the news stories, you would the realize that it does NOT have a turnkey ignition, it has a push button ignition, which he repeatedly stated, that he punched til he was blue in the face, and the car didn't stop.

Maybe amongst the zillion articles you would actually have come upon this tidbit, that is if you really cared to...

Consumer Reports' Jake Fisher says there's a problem with turning off a Prius in motion. The car has a push-to-start button that would have to be held down to stop the car.

"You actually have to hold it down for 3 seconds, which is quite a time to hold it down and not intuititve," Fisher says. "This is a problem that Toyotas have implemented in their push-button starts. We don't think that's intuitive. We don't think they should have implemented it that way."

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Which apparantly he did attempt to know avail.


Like I said it's really great to speculate and formulate opinions (which you know what they say about them) but unless you are actually behind the wheel of something, and find that nothing works the way it should....

Older cars have a mechanical linkage, like a bicycle cable, between the gas pedal and the throttle. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Well Toyota had to go and make it all electronic, with no reliance on a mechanical linkage. What do you expect. Furthermore, I think this is only happening on Toyota's with Automatic Transmissions, driven by complacent American Drivers. Overseas most of the cars have a manual transmission, whereby you disengage the engine from the driveshaft every time you depress the clutch pedal and change gears. I would be impressed to find out that this has happened on a single Toyota with a manual transmission.

I've experienced 'unintended acceleration' in a 5-ton RV on a two-lane highway. Throttle cable hung up on the aftermarket cruise control. I shut the engine off and coasted down. When my speed dropped to where I needed the power steering, I shifted to 1st and turned the engine on long enough to get to the shoulder. No big deal. OFF always works.

Have you seen the followup on that guy? Apparently $700K in debt, behind on his Prius lease ... wonder where that's going?

Revvy said:

Once again more armchair quarterbacking, that if you spent 5 minutes even listenning to the news stories, you would the realize that it does NOT have a turnkey ignition, it has a push button ignition, which he repeatedly stated, that he punched til he was blue in the face, and the car didn't stop.

Maybe amongst the zillion articles you would actually have come upon this tidbit, that is if you really cared to...

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Elementary reading comprehension will reveal that Baja Brewer is aware of the difference in ignition between a Prius and other cars and that he explicitly described this difference in the post that you quoted. Note that "people" is the plural form of "person".

I have a 2009 Prius.

It is a little more difficult to shift to neutral or power off than a normal car.

The gear shifter has drive, neutral, reverse, and engine break. If it's an unintended acceleration issue with cruise control, you can easily shift into the engine break mode and it kills cruise control.

To shift to neutral, you have to hold the shifter in neutral for at least 2 full seconds. You can't just slap it there like a manual or automatic and have instant neutral. You can shift to neutral under heavy acceleration conditions, I tested it out.

To power off, again you have to push the button for 2 full seconds. It's not the same as flipping the key off on other cars. It's a bit more hazardous than shifting to neutral because you loose power steering when you do it.

I don't believe the guy in California either. The interview I saw, he had shifty eyes and was wearing a corvette owners club jacket. I think he faked it to get out of a ticket

Copy/paste the link below. WARNING: He drops about 200 f-bombs in the short video, so NSFW.

Edit: I can't get it to NOT embed, since this is not a NSFW section...

Go to Youtube and add /watch?v=lZ4PtafRB9c after the youtube url

Also, everyone should be familiar with emergency procedures of their vehicle. You should practice it as muscle memory. Unfortunately, people don't take responsibility for their own safety, so what are you going to do?

I don't believe the guy in California either. The interview I saw, he had shifty eyes and was wearing a corvette owners club jacket. I think he faked it to get out of a ticket

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Winner. He is just trying to get something out of Toyota.

I had "unintentional accelleration" happen to me in my Fiero. I just changed out the EGR Valve and that fixed it.

Ha Ha Ha...
you had a FIERO ???

jk...

Clarification for everyone:
Power steering is NOT needed to steer your car. The only time you really need power steering is when you're in a parking lot, or going below 10 mph and making sharp turns. At high speeds you don't even need it because you are making such small movements.

As for braking, you have a few "pumps" of the accelerator before the vacuum assist runs out. So if need to shut your car off and brake, DON'T let up on the brake, keep it constant.
Some cars might have a little different systems, but to my knowledge, most are still this way. It is your responsibility to know how to stop your car in the case of an emergency. If you don't bother to learn how, then you shouldn't be behind the wheel.

ndsgr said:

Copy/paste the link below. WARNING: He drops about 200 f-bombs in the short video, so NSFW.

Edit: I can't get it to NOT embed, since this is not a NSFW section...

Go to Youtube and add /watch?v=lZ4PtafRB9c after the youtube url

Click to expand...

MOD EDIT: no need to embed that here

I think he must be a Toyota dealer (I feel really sorry for him right now if that's what he really does for living). I would be getting scared and desperate right now too if I was selling those cars, that's for sure.

I think the biggest problem with Toyota right now is their corporate culture: "cover-up, deny, act like there is no problem". And it all comes not from the American branch of Toyota, but from their Japanese headquarters.

IMO they could have fixed the problem years ago, but they didn't want to admit there may be something wrong with their cars so they kept on denying the problem exists.

Scooby_Brew said:

I think the biggest problem with Toyota right now is their corporate culture: "cover-up, deny, act like there is no problem". And it all comes not from American branch of Toyota, but from their Japane

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Thats the corporate culture of pretty much every major manufacturer in this country. Admitting something is a problem just opens you up to liability.


Nobody thought this was a big deal until Toyota started recalling cars.

Here is some background on the guy:

http://www.hybridcars.com/safety/why-james-sikes-hybrid-hero-27496.html

Hang Glider said:

Ha Ha Ha...
you had a FIERO ???

jk...

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I had it for 6 years and put over 200,000 miles on it and it was never in the shop, except for recalls...

Keep the computer out of the car and you won't have any problem. Why can't they just take a design from 10 or 20 years ago and build it today?? It would probably be a lot cheaper. You could even implement some modern efficiency and safety features but still keep the machine simple, and easy to repair.

Cars from 20 years ago had computers. I had to replace one on an '88 Olds Cutlass Ciera twice.

The continuously variable transmission the Prius uses to switch between: combustion engine, electric motor, gliding, and regeneration wouldn't be possible without some serious programming. And I kind of like the 53 mpg I'm averaging.

TheBroonery said:

Keep the computer out of the car and you won't have any problem. Why can't they just take a design from 10 or 20 years ago and build it today?? It would probably be a lot cheaper. You could even implement some modern efficiency and safety features but still keep the machine simple, and easy to repair.

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That’s as good question. All my PC’s crash once a while and I don’t even notice - I just reboot them, no big deal. But what if you are driving a car 75 miles/hour and your gas pedal ’stalls’ on you and you need to 'reboot' your Toyota in the middle of a highway? That would suck.

TheBroonery said:

Keep the computer out of the car and you won't have any problem. Why can't they just take a design from 10 or 20 years ago and build it today?? It would probably be a lot cheaper. You could even implement some modern efficiency and safety features but still keep the machine simple, and easy to repair.

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Because the driving factor of sales are what people want. People WANT something better than what they had before. They want something that is more advanced and has more features. Look at all the stupid stuff they are putting on cars. Windshield wipers that come on when they sense water, lights with their own windshield washers, tire pressure sensors, automatic back up. People are getting lazier and lazier, and they want convenience. What better way to prey on that than by selling fancy cars?
You'd never ever see a car that goes back to basics, because it would be too cheap and reduce sales.

Fuel injection and basic engine emission monitoring is as much as we need. Carburetors are a hassle and don't work right for certain things. But they really need to stop trying to make the whole car run on a computer.

Beernik said:

Cars from 20 years ago had computers. I had to replace one on an '88 Olds Cutlass Ciera twice.

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They didn't really control much of anything though. Some emissions controls, ignition, stuff like that. If you turned on the cruise control, it was likely run by engine vacuum (all mechanical.)

IceFisherChris said:

Clarification for everyone:
Power steering is NOT needed to steer your car. The only time you really need power steering is when you're in a parking lot, or going below 10 mph and making sharp turns. At high speeds you don't even need it because you are making such small movements.

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Possibly that's true for a small car. I will say it's NOT true for my big Chevy truck. My power steering pump suddenly broke while I was driving down a highway at nearly 60 mph. I had NO steering. None. I was headed across the center line, and trying desperately to turn the wheel away. The car coming towards me managed to swerve and get out of my way, and I had braking so I was able to stop the truck. At a very slow speed, I was able to maneuever the truck to the side of the road. At a higher speed, forget it. No control at all.

That really doesn't really apply to the "acceleration" issue, but I wanted to point out that saying it isn't necessary except for slow speeds isn't accurate.

TheBroonery said:

Keep the computer out of the car and you won't have any problem. Why can't they just take a design from 10 or 20 years ago and build it today?? It would probably be a lot cheaper. You could even implement some modern efficiency and safety features but still keep the machine simple, and easy to repair.

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My 1986 Ram has a computerized carburetor! What an abortion. I plan on yanking it and putting on a 32/38 Weber.

Don't know if it's been mentioned here or not......but that guy in the prius admitted he was lying. As if it wasn't plainly obvious, that is if you know anything about the prius. This moron is going into bankruptcy and was just trying to make a quick buck. I guarantee that this isn't the first unintended acceleration story published that's been completely bogus. Hopefully the media is as anxious to report some of the couter-lawsuits for false accusations that I'm sure are soon to come. Maybe that will shut these idots up.

I haven't seen it reported that he has admitted it. I saw where a former business partner said he thought it was a hoax.