Toyota fixes arent working.

[ultimatebob]

Well, in all fairness.. you just have to hold the button for a few seconds. But yeah, I agree with the sentiment.

I'd probably replace the button with a keyswitch.

Great... so when the engine computer gets confused, you need to cold boot it by pressing and holding the power button? Sounds like an answer from the computer support forum!

What's next... having to drive my car next to a WiFi hotspot, so I can get the download the latest firmware updates from toyotaupdate.com?

 

[Numenorean]

Yeah I have thought from the start that a mechanical throttle control is the proper method - I mean look how many years it's been used, improved, etc. It works and there is not really much in the way of a failure point for them. I don't see the need to switch. I have driven a Toyota with the electronic controlled throttle and it just doesn't respond like a mechanical throttle at all, and that's what I really dislike about them. You have a disconnect between your action and the cars response and that's bad.

 

[Numenorean]

Fly-by-wire greatly improved airplanes' reliability, lowered their weight, and made them more easily controllable. Cars are smaller so it may not be as big of a difference, though.

From actually driving one, the computer version is WORSE than the mechanical version in the control department.

 

[waggy]

The early Escort was one of Ford's major lemons. We owned an '82 Wagon. It was good looking and fun. But after 65,000 miles the engine locked up and it was game over. :'(

to counter that.

my wife owns a ford escort with 131k and still running great.

 

[FelixDeCat]

Yeah I have thought from the start that a mechanical throttle control is the proper method - I mean look how many years it's been used, improved, etc. It works and there is not really much in the way of a failure point for them. I don't see the need to switch. I have driven a Toyota with the electronic controlled throttle and it just doesn't respond like a mechanical throttle at all, and that's what I really dislike about them. You have a disconnect between your action and the cars response and that's bad.

Dont tell that to darkswordsman. Hes hell bent for leather for something wholly useless and completely unneccesary, if not outright dangerous.

Lemmings, I tell ya.

 

[FelixDeCat]

to counter that.

my wife owns a ford escort with 131k and still running great.

But what year? Escorts did improve eventually after numerous consumer complaints about reliability and safety. The early versions sucked egg.

I remember when Ford introduced them on television as "the world car". Have you driven a Ford, lately? :hmm:

 

[DonaldC]

If it is the same driver in the same car is anyone looking at the driver as possibly being at fault?

 

[Eli]

In all fairness.. saying that it's dangerous isn't really correct. If implemented properly, it should have a similar MTBF to a cable I would assume.

The key is fail safes and redundancy. It just shouldn't be possible for a fault to cause a WOT situation in the first place.

As others have said, airplanes use fly by wire and are very safe overall. They just need to apply that level of safety to cars. Toyota got sloppy somewhere.

FWIW, my brother was in an accident because his wired throttle stuck open. This was on a 1989 Honda Accord. It wasn't actually the wire, but the butterfly valve.

Shit happens, but what is happening to Toyota right now is the result of them getting sloppy with their implementation of these systems. You can bet that heads will roll within the company over this.

It sucks, and it's sad that it has to happen this way, but it seems to be human nature. The auto industry, and especially Toyota, will emerge from this with safer and more reliable systems.

 

[Squisher]

With evermore strident federally mandated fuel economy standards on the horizon the need for technology to disconnect the ever inefficient human being from driving the vehicle will become more and more commonplace. Get used to it.

 

[grrl]

My thoughts exactly. There are plenty of other car companies that are implementing electronic pedals without any problem at all.

Not to mention airplanes.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I don't understand how they should screw this up again and again. Isn't the gas pedal just a mechanical valve control? As long as there's a spring of some sort to bring it back, I don't see how they can fail this bad at making this work. I could understand maybe once, like because of the floor mat, but again, and again? Come on now.

 

[Bignate603]

I don't understand how they should screw this up again and again. Isn't the gas pedal just a mechanical valve control? As long as there's a spring of some sort to bring it back, I don't see how they can fail this bad at making this work. I could understand maybe once, like because of the floor mat, but again, and again? Come on now.

The car's drive by wire, there is no mechanical connection between the throttle and the pedal. Instead, the pedal senses how far you've pushed it down and sends that to the computer which then adjusts the throttle position. Toyota has currently blamed the issues on the floor mats and the pedal mechanism. They deny that there is any problems with the electronics. If these new reports are true this suggests that Toyota completely messed up with the recall. If they thought their sales were bad now just imagine what will happen if that story starts showing up in the papers.

 

[LTC8K6]

Yes, we never had unintended acceleration with drive by cable...

People never claimed their cars were possessed and accelerated out of control by themselves with drive by cable...

People never claimed they couldn't stop their accelerating cars with drive by cable...

People never claimed they were pressing on the brake pedal so hard that they injured themselves, and the car still wouldn't stop, with drive by cable...

Right!

 

[LTC8K6]

I don't understand how they should screw this up again and again. Isn't the gas pedal just a mechanical valve control? As long as there's a spring of some sort to bring it back, I don't see how they can fail this bad at making this work. I could understand maybe once, like because of the floor mat, but again, and again? Come on now.

Yes, you are correct. The DBW throttle pedal is essentially the same as the old pedal. You press it down, and a spring returns it to idle when you release pressure.

 

[bob4432]

back in the days of the cars you could wrench on, there was throttle return to idle redundancy - a secondary $1 throttle return spring.

can somebody explain how the mechanical setup is less efficient than the electronic on when they could read throttle position through something like a rotary switch into the fuel injector?

are the brakes all electronic too? no mechanical pump anymore? are clutches electric too?

also, does the vehicle somehow lock out neutral during this wide open throttle experience? i understand it may take a couple seconds for one to realize what is happening, but after they do, why not just put it in neutral - at that point who cares if the motor blows if it goes WOT.

 

[LTC8K6]

US Government requirements mandate DBW. Period.

 

[darkswordsman17]

Dont tell that to darkswordsman. Hes hell bent for leather for something wholly useless and completely unneccesary, if not outright dangerous.

Lemmings, I tell ya.

Wholly useless? I pointed out a very specific reason why manufacturers use it. Outright dangerous? Must be why there's millions upon millions of cars that make use of it without issue.

Talk about lemming. Did you even know about this until the Toyota recall? You're just another person pushing ignorance and fear when its not even really valid.

The sloppy response is due to them compensating for the terrible drivers. There is nothing preventing them from having instantaneous (in fact quicker than mechanical) throttle response from this.

Just think about the numbers. Out of the millions of Toyotas that have this, how many have actually had this happen? Less than 100? Now, consider the other millions of cars made by other companies that also have this.

The danger of this would be wholly negated by having drivers that actually know how to manage emergency situations.

Also, throttle by wire would allow paraplegics full control of a car via just their hands. But you're right, completely pointless and useless technology.

 

[LTC8K6]

DBW has been around a long time.

Even Chrysler has been using it for a while now. Since 2007 on some vehicles and almost universal since the 08 MY.

I think it came out in like 1993 on pax cars.

So why all the animosity all of a sudden?

 

[OS]

Fly-by-wire greatly improved airplanes' reliability, lowered their weight, and made them more easily controllable. Cars are smaller so it may not be as big of a difference, though.

no it doesn't, fly by wire systems are heavy and complicated and if done properly still require a mechanical back up
the main thing fly by wire does is improve the performance of the airplane

 

[LTC8K6]

no it doesn't, fly by wire systems are heavy and complicated and if done properly still require a mechanical back up
the main thing fly by wire does is improve the performance of the airplane

There are no mechanical backups in any modern FBW aircraft, and the systems are much lighter than the mechanical systems they replaced.

 

[OS]

yeah and you can ask airbus how thats working out for them

 

[Sea Moose]

And now for something completely different

Random?

 

[geno]

Using microchips to replace something that your foot and one wire attached to the throttle has done reliably for over 100 years is just stupid.

Are you out of your mind? Cable throttles don't stick? Manual brakes never fail? Newsflash : they do. Take Toyota out of the equation and there's no serious evidence of DBW being an issue when compared with their manual counterparts.

 

[geno]

yeah and you can ask airbus how thats working out for them

This. DBW is far more reliable than Felix is making it out to be. Stop buying into the sensationalism your shitty local news is feeding you and look at the facts. DBW is very common nowadays. Read up.

 

[LTC8K6]

yeah and you can ask airbus how thats working out for them

It's working great for Airbus, and also for the Boeing 777 which has been flying for ~16 years now without any mechanical backup.

The A320 and A340 do have some backup systems, but only for small pitch control and for some control of the rudder.

Don't forget that the A320 was the very first airliner with modern digital FBW, and it's had very few problems. There's no evidence that the demo crash had anything to do with FBW, despite the conspiracy theories.

The fact that Boeing and Airbus have different FBW philosophies is an interesting point, but so far there is no evidence that one is actually better than the other in reality.

The Avro Vulcan, a bomber from the 1950's was analog fly by wire.

The Concorde was FBW.

Many modern bizjets are fully FBW, as are many modern military aircraft.