Toyota’s Largest Recall in History
November 27, 2009 by Gainesville Detailing
Toyota, the Japanese automaker is recalling four million vehicles. The recall, on gas pedals, is the largest recall in history for them. News broke yesterday, November 26, on the $460 million dollar recall. Vehicles manufactured in the last 6 years are affected. Toyota had initially asked owners to remove the floor mats. The gas pedal is known to get stuck in the accelerated position. Not only is it getting stuck but hitting the brake does not slow the vehicle down. This sudden acceleration can be fatal. Reports are conflicting as to how many deaths are related to the sudden acceleration. To ensure that this is not a problem on future models the company is redesigning the floorboards.
Here is a picture of what the gas pedal looks like when it is stuck.
As you can tell the pedal is lodged against the floor mat. Once stuck the vehicle will continue to rapidly accelerate making it impossible to slow down.
Five different models will have a brake over-ride system put into place. This new system will cut power to the engine while accelerating if the brake is applied.
Although the cost of the recall is almost half a billion dollars it is peanuts to the automaker. The amount translated into Yen equals roughly 40 billion. Toyota executives claim the auto manufacturer sets aside 500 billion yen every year for occasions such as this.
Only time will tell how much the recall will affect Toyota’s image. With sales drastically down this is a bad time for such a blemish. According the the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration said that many models have a “serious defect”. One hundred incidents have been linked to the faulty floormat/gas pedal according to the NHTSA. Other sources have the number as high as one thousand incidents with nineteen deaths.
Starting in January Toyota will cut the bottom of the pedal to create more room between pedal and floor mat. This seems like a pretty poor fix for a problem that is causing deaths and widespread accidents.
Plans to begin the redesign and installation of replacement accelerator pedals will begin in April. Affected Toyota models are Camry, Avalon, Prius, Tacoma, and Tundra. Toyota’s luxury line, Lexus, did not go unscathed in the recall. Three Lexus models were affected.
Anyone Toyota owners worried whether their vehicles are affected can visit Toyota.com or Lexus.com for more information.
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