By accessing this website, you acknowledge that Edmunds and its third party business partners may use cookies, pixels, and similar technologies to collect information about you and your interactions with the website as described in our
Privacy Statement, and you agree that your use of the website is subject to our
Visitor Agreement.
Comments
Great choice. Getting rid of a Camry for a PU is always a step in the right direction. Comfortable stable ride with no blind spots and able to see down the road in front of you. Good rear view vision to see if any runaway Toyotas are bearing down on you. :shades:
Your link proves you can make statistics say anything you want them to say. Every one of the many supposed studies of NHTSA complaints comes up with a different end result. So how do they do that? I will tell you. They cherry pick MY and model to make it look like they want. A bit like the AGW cult sells the weak of mind on Global warming.
If they want to get a clear accurate picture they should look at all complaints from the last decade that DBW became widely used. Then compare those years. It would be helpful, as one graph that was posted, to compare frequency by MY also. My understanding is Ford products had most of theirs in the middle of the decade and seem to have solved their problems. As the complaints have dropped off for Ford.
The most telling statistic would be accidents attributed to UA. That would mean the driver was unable to get the car under control. And I think you know which maker has that statistic tied up. That is why Toyota is before Congress. I have had UA with no accident. Our old Mazda 626 would catch your shoe sole under the cheap plastic on the center console. I suppose I should have reported it so Mazda could recall their 1990 model 626.
I noticed that there were no Mazdas on the list (makes me happy!), not even the Mazda Tribute, which is the twin of the Ford Escape (#31 on the list).
No German vehicles on the list. Although I have heard that German vehicles have a problem with UI - Unintended Invasion. Curiously, it is most likely to happen as they are driving along the border of France or Poland.
Gas at $5 per gallon is a bargain and not a big part of the budget.
So you think Edmunds and TTAC in particular are manipulating the stats? Why? I think both organizations are trying to get a handle on the problem. Maybe Steve could provide some insight?
Yes, you could have reported the Mazda problem you had. It could be argued that the shoe/console interference was a poor design choice.
I reported my Volvo 240 when the engine "blipped" up a thousand or so rpm when I was coming to a stop during the era of the Audi 5000 blowup (manual tranny, so no harm done). A NHTSA staffer even followed up with a phone call about my incident. I later figured out that with my steel-toed boots on, my right foot had caught the gas pedal along with the brake pedal.
To put it in Perspective, where is VW/Audi. A similar attempt to exonerate Toyota on the other thread had VW/Audi with more complaints for UA than Toyota. On a reports per 100 thousand vehicles sold in 2009.
Who do you believe
It would seem that all the auto rags are rallying behind Toyota. Toyota is a big buck advertiser. ABC and LA Times are more interested in the truth than the Toyota big buck advertising. Which tells me something else. If Toyota pulls ads from those that say negative things about them. They must be hiding something. That is a form of intimidation by Toyota.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Also, the earlier analyses were looking at complaints by make (Toyota, VW/Audi, Ford, etc) per 100K vehicles sold. This new analysis drills down to the model level (Camry, Passat, Crown Victoria, etc.) so you get a more detailed picture, plus it goes back 5 model years.
"Toyota Fix YOUR Cars"
A couple things to note about our “complaints per 100k sold” measure: if the model sales was less than 30k, then we excluded it from the list...
VWs and Audis have not been stellar sellers in recent model years. So when you look at individual models, none may have crossed the 30K threshold.
We hosts aren't in the home office so I don't know any more that y'all do about who's doing the researching or who's buying ads here. We do have PhD statisticians and lots of other people with auto analysis backgrounds on staff so I assume they know a bit about collating data and sorting it out.
I mean, anyone that can keep track of ~31 models of Chevy trucks for the vehicle pages here shouldn't have much trouble sorting a laundry list of SUA complaints.
There's a firewall between editorial and the rest of the company so that people have a harder time accusing Karl and the gang of sopping up to advertisers.
By the way for 2009:
MB sold well over 30k C and E models
VW sold over 100k Jettas
I don't think Lexus has sold 30k LS models in any year over the last decade. Yet they are number 9 on the list of complaints. It looks like the Germans know DBW, and Toyota needs to learn.
Your comparison is about as fair as comparing the Camry and Corolla total sales to the E class total sales. WOW Toyota is kicking their butt !!
2013 LX 570 2016 LS 460
In January, Toyota's purchase intent averaged just over 13 percent and then fell to a 9.7 percent low as a result of the recall announcements.
On March 1, Toyota purchase intent had recovered to 13 percent. A day later, when the incentives program was announced, Toyota purchase intent soared to 18 percent - a 14-month high."
Toyota Purchase Intent Soars After Incentives Announced, Edmunds.com Reports (AutoObserver)
No one is arguing that Toyota and Lexus are not sales leaders. We are saying they got too big too fast and left quality behind. I think even the big man on top agrees with that statement. Or at least he said as much.
2013 LX 570 2016 LS 460
Yet those Germans, and even Volvo still have UA problem too, ha3x! You're simply blind to look at an elephant in the room - the driver's fault.
I'm amazed you were able to put up with it so long and so many times. Were you thinking that if you just bought ONE MORE you'd end up with one of Lemko's GM experiences?
As one who doubtless considers himself a capitalist, you should be aware of other markets and perceptions.
I don't know of UA issues with any MB products either. You made the comparison
I think we can find a nice stretch of open road to do the test so dying won't be necessary. Maybe even a test track?
Also, have any FEARFUL hysterical Toyota owners thought about just keeping 1/2 a gallon in the tank so that if UA happens you'll run out of gas if you can just keep it going a bit?
2013 LX 570 2016 LS 460
I'm amazed you were able to put up with it so long and so many times. Were you thinking that if you just bought ONE MORE you'd end up with one of Lemko's GM experiences
I like the last part you said, lol!!!
My wife and I are in the market for a new minivan to replace our 14-year old Chrysler Town & Country LXI. We figured out last June that the 3rd gen Sienna was going to come out as a 2011 model early this year, so we waited.
I'm glad we did. Not because we like the new Sienna (there are actually a number of things we DON'T like about it), but because of all that has transpired with the sudden unintended acceleration issue with Toyota.
We have followed the case closely, and have watched as Toyota:
- continues to insist the problem has nothing to do with electronics
- causes huge inconvenience to its customers by having them bring their cars in
to make a fix that has been shown doesn't work (unbelievably incredible)
- refuses to divulge the full contents of event data recorders
- has less than a small handful of event data recorder readers in the entire US
- surreptitiously works behind the scenes with NHTSA to prevent recalls
The bottom line for us? We NO LONGER TRUST Toyota USA and will not buy any of its vehicles. I can't imagine what the company could possibly do to bring us back. Perhaps they think in a year or two it will all blow over and everyone will forget, but that kind of thinking surely is "setting the stage for failure."
Not to mention, the Corollas power steering issues, the Tacoma drive shaft issues, and now, that Toyota is is hiding safety evidence from NHTSA via their "black box", it all points to the same thing.
They don't want to comply with our rules and regs. They've cheapened their vehicles that they've now become unsafe. And, the only way they'll do anything about it, is if Congress/NHTSA, etc forces them to.
http://investing.businessweek.com/businessweek/research/stocks/people/board.asp?- ticker=TM:US
Notice the comment that Jim Press had and also the "no comment" from Watanabe who refused to be interviewed for this article. Watanabe is trained as an economist and not an an engineer. Bean counters always find ways to "cheapen" a product.
That is BS!
Again look at this chart, the ODD of having UA in Audi/VW is much higher than Toyota in 2008 and 2009. Even Volvo in early 2000 had more UA complaints than the rest of car manufacturers.
And the link so you can check out the top 117 UA cars.
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/deeper-nhtsa-data-dive-117-models-ranked-by-rat- e-of-ua-incidents/
And then, claim ignorance when the inevitable failures happen.
The people who were managing General Motors back then must be chuckling to themselves hearing about where Toyota is today. They've got to be thinking...."been there, done that, bought the T-shirt."
But toyo doesn't have the union problem that GM, Ford, and Chrysler got themselves into over the years.
Toyo also has much newer factories with which to work their production. There's no excuse for the misaligned pieces, cheap doors on dash parts. etc., that were on the avalon redesign a few years back-the one based on the previous Camry design. When I looked at that at the dealership, it was embarrassing. The ratty production gaps continued and people in Camrys started noticiing them in the cheap cars. The avalon should have been a perfect car when it came out. But it wasn't. What was toyota's excuse? Union; no. Cost; no. Profit for company: yes.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
And then, claim ignorance when the inevitable failures happen
I couldn't say it better myself, that is exactly what I have been thinking the last several weeks seeing all this Toyota stuff going on because it reminded me of exactly what I went through with GM 10-20 years ago!
Hit the nail right on the head!! :shades:
A Sacramento-based consumer advocacy group is urging consumers who have experienced multiple problems with runaway Toyotas to consider relief under California's lemon law.
The group, Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety (CARS), on Tuesday also urged Toyota officials to replace or offer refunds on vehicles with sticking gas pedals.
"Why not repurchase the car and treat it as a lemon buyback?" asked Rosemary Shahan, president of CARS and a nationally known advocate for motor vehicle buyers' rights. "We're hearing about consumers who have two or three of these (unexpected accelerations), but (Toyota) won't buy it back."
Generally, the state's lemon law applies to problems arising in the first 18 months or 18,000 miles of vehicle ownership. The law presumes that an automaker has made a "reasonable number" of attempts to repair a vehicle during that time.
California's lemon law provides for car owners to get a refund "if the vehicle has a life-threatening safety defect, and if it has not been remedied after two repair attempts," Shahan noted. For other types of defects, the number of repairs to trigger the lemon presumption is four.
Attempts to get comment from Toyota representatives were unsuccessful.
Citing consumer testimony in Washington, D.C. Tuesday before a congressional commmittee investigating Toyota's acceleration problems, Shahan said that when "customers have experienced such a frightening incident, rather than subject them to repeated harrowing experiences, it would make more sense to simply provide the car owner with a refund Then Toyota can treat the runaway cars as lemon law buybacks and, most importantly, keep possession of them and fix them before they re-enter the auto marketplace."
Shahan suggested that Toyota could "retire such vehicles until they have developed a fix, have them examined by NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) or others with the expertise to identify what is causing the problem, then donate them to a technical school."
Let me see if I understand this - German made vehicles had several reported cases of UA, but were not on the list? Why would that be? And if the German makes now all have the override system, then there must be some other cause for UA and the override is not a fix.
Also, why would this site exclude vehicles that sold less than a certain number. If a manufacturer sold few vehicles but had instances of UA, that would be an even bigger red flag due to the % of incidents? No?
Somebody figure this out for me, please. :confuse:
From the April 2010 issue of Popular Mechanics, rating midsize sedans with four-cylinder engines and automatic transmissions since they make up the majority of the sales in this class:
Mazda 6 - The winner
2nd place - Honda Accord tied with Subaru Legacy tied with Nissan Altima
3rd place - Ford Fusion
4th place - Chevy Malibu
5th place - Suzuki Kizashi tied with Toyota Camry
Interesting noted; ALL cars but the Suzuki Kizashi and Toyota Camry were noted for excellent interior quality. For the Camry "The interior that was once lauded for its quality feel now seems cheaply made, with poor panel fitment and low-rent materials.
So, are there still problems with UA still being reported for German made vehicles or not? Many were saying that they did not havethis issue any more, because they now have the override feature. Perhaps the override solves nothing.
That is why I am confused.
It all goes to show what fun we can have with charts and numbers!
That's what could be assumed.
It all goes to show what fun we can have with charts and numbers!
Precisely!!
I would like to see a chart of fatalities as related to SUA/UA. Something tells me Toyota would be far ahead of the field.