Knee Jerk Toyota Reactions

[Daugette_Matt]

Quote from surfrider28

"Plaintiffs' lawyers and their clients in auto-accident cases say they have butted heads with Toyota over access to its black-box data, or have gotten data from the company that sheds little light on the causes of the crashes at issue. Among the problems they encounter is that only Toyota can read the black-box information in its vehicles, and it says it only makes the data available when requested to do so by law enforcement, federal regulators or by court order.
By contrast, the three Detroit auto makers have black-box formats that can be read without their involvement using commercially available tools. "


that comment is total nonsense.

No vehicle has a "black box". All vehicles built since 1995 have real time date from the Power Management System stored in the ECU. The system is not designed to work like a flight recorder
this information is only saved from the last trip. once the car is started, the last info is gone, and new info is saved. So if there is a wreck, and after info is obtained, it will only show what the vehicle was doing on it's last engine on cycle. It can show when the airbags went off and what speed the vehicle was going, and if the brakes were on, or what angle the throttle was opened to, was the a/c on, engine rpm, etc.
This information can be pulled from the car by any service tech, and does not require toyota engineers to obtain it.
Detroit and japan cars are built to the smae standards, ther is NO difference in how this info is obtained from any vehicle built for service in the USA.

these are the kind of Media 1/2 truths that are being thrown out there.

 

[Bob]

I don't disagree.

15 yards for media piling on after the whistle....first down! toyota/honda are the benchmarks

 

[Lynnie]

Unfortunately, the $100MM they saved will now cost them ten fold and maybe more. Eight million US cars on recall, 34 deaths with no cap on punitive damages (should law suits be filed) because we haven't initiated steps toward tort reform, and labor 24/7 through the recall. Their ads are strong and Mr. Toyota was forthright before Congress, but this is going to cause a downward spiral.

Matt, you explained the mechanics and innovation very well. It seems like a simple repair/tweaking. What a shame that this has occurred.

 

[Geo]

The mayor of a town in Indiana that is home to a Toyota plant was on NPR today. He very diplomatically expressed very similar points to mine but when on to talk about the consequences to the American economy resulting from the government grandstanding and the media blowing this up. Quite a domino effect...

 

[Daugette_Matt]

I am totally confident Toyota will survive this inconvience. Their vehicles are safe and well engineered, and always will be.
Soon the dominos will fall the other way.

 

[30ashopper]

The mayor of a town in Indiana that is home to a Toyota plant was on NPR today. He very diplomatically expressed very similar points to mine but when on to talk about the consequences to the American economy resulting from the government grandstanding and the media blowing this up. Quite a domino effect...

I'm not sure I understand the logic here, if someone is shopping for a car, and they shy away from Toyota due to safety concerns, they'll just buy something else.

 

[Geo]

Sorry- I was speaking on a microeconomic level. TMMI employees over 4000 Americans in Indiana. This excludes local companies that support them. Let me know if you'd like me to expand.

 

[Geo]

I think it is possible that part of why this is being blown up in the media and government is the outdated perception of American cars vs. Foreign cars. "Real Americans" heard for a long time that Toyota was better than their American Pie brands. Whether they believed it or not is a whole other story. But now that Toyota has a product issue and their is some bad behavior involved they want to stick it to the Japanese automaker. But they won't just be sticking it to the Japanese because the lines are blurred now of what makes a car an American car vs. other.

 

[Teresa]

I think it is possible that part of why this is being blown up in the media and government is the outdated perception of American cars vs. Foreign cars. "Real Americans" heard for a long time that Toyota was better than their American Pie brands. Whether they believed it or not is a whole other story. But now that Toyota has a product issue and their is some bad behavior involved they want to stick it to the Japanese automaker. But they won't just be sticking it to the Japanese because the lines are blurred now of what makes a car an American car vs. other.

yes, as I posted above, Toyota has not lived up to their own standards in several ways in this huge recall. we expect more from Toyota. I do. If anyone wants to make it an American v. Foreign issue - well, that is just out of pure ignorance, imo. Its about Toyota setting very high standards for themselves and all cars. They have failed to meet their own standards. They do deserve every bit of public scrutiny they get, imo. They put themselves in this position.

 

[Lynnie]

Does anyone know how far back this recall goes with respect to year of mfg.? I have a couple of friends who drive Toyotas - I am concerned, but I think their cars are older than this recall involves.