Toyota: Data Refutes Runaway Prius Story

(CBS/AP)  Toyota Motor Corp. was quiet last week when James Sikes told reporters how the gas pedal got stuck on his 2008 Prius, leading him on a wild ride on a Southern California freeway.

Now the Japanese automaker is talking at length about how its tests don't support Sikes' version of events, and the driver is quiet.

Toyota says its tests showed the car's gas pedal, backup safety system and electronics were working fine. It was unable to replicate the stuck gas pedal that Sikes reported.

The automaker said Monday that it found Sikes rapidly pressed the gas and brakes back and forth 250 times, the maximum amount of data that the car's self-diagnostic system can collect. That account appears to contradict Sikes' statements — backed by the California Highway Patrol — that he slammed the brakes, even lifting his buttocks off the seat.

Toyota officials said they believed Sikes hit the pedals lightly, which would have prevented a brake-override system from kicking in. Under the Prius design, engine power is cut if the brake pedal is pressed with moderate force.

Toyota stopped short of saying that Sikes fabricated his story.

"We have no opinion on his account, what he's been saying, other than the scenario is not consistent with the technical findings," spokesman Mike Michels said at a news conference.

Listen to an excerpt of Sikes' 911 call

The episode March 8 was among the highest-profile headaches Toyota has suffered in recent months. It recalled more than 8 million cars and trucks worldwide because gas pedals can become stuck in the down position or be snagged by floor mats. Dozens of Toyota drivers have reported problems even after their cars were supposedly fixed.

The company had no explanation for discrepancies with Sikes' account but confirmed the brakes were overheated and the pads worn. Bob Waltz, vice president of product, quality and service support at Toyota Motor Sales USA, said the front brakes were "metal to metal."

Toyota said it believes a CHP officer's account that he smelled burning brakes while guiding Sikes on the freeway. Officials said repeatedly pressing the pedal could have overheated the brakes but were unclear why the car didn't stop sooner than it did.

"That is the puzzling aspect of this," Michels said in an interview. "All we know are the engineering facts. We looked at all the components, they all work."

Toyota said its tests showed the car's electronics were working fine.

"If there were some kind of electronic problem, you would think it might actually stay permanent," Michels said. "When your TV goes on the fritz, when electronic stuff goes on the fritz, it doesn't just do it once and never do it again."

There were no trouble codes in the computer or warning lights on the dash either, reports CBS News correspondent Dean Reynolds.

Former federal investigator Richard Schmidt studied a similar runaway phenomenon in Audis in the 1980s and said it turned out that human error was largely to blame back then and may well be now, Reynolds reports.

Sikes, 61, has said his car raced to 94 mph on Interstate 8 east of San Diego. He said he reached down with one hand to try to pull the pedal back, while keeping the other hand on the wheel. He called 911 but did not respond to repeated instructions from the dispatcher to throw the car into neutral.

The CHP officer eventually helped bring the car safely to a stop by telling him over a loudspeaker to hit the emergency brake and foot brake simultaneously.

Sikes spoke to reporters shortly after the incident but has since kept a low profile. He did not respond to phone messages Monday.

John Gomez, Sikes' attorney, said Monday that he would not comment on the episode until a government investigation was complete. Gomez has noted previously that Toyota has never been able to replicate stuck accelerator.

"This problem is sort of a ghost in the machine that is the Toyota system," he said Sunday. "It doesn't leave a fault code, it doesn't leave a footprint, and you can't make it happen upon demand."

The 2008 Prius is subject to a recall for floor mats but not sticky accelerators.

More on Toyota's Troubles:

Runaway Prius Probe Can't Verify Story
Calif. Prius Driver's Story Stirs Skeptics
Calif. Prosecutor Sues Toyota Over Defects
Prius Panic Drives Fear, Real and Imagined
911 Call Reveals Prius Driver's Terror
Toyota Fires Away at Acceleration Theory
House Panel Seeks Details on Toyota Recall
New Reports of Post-Recall Toyota Troubles

[JimHarris44]

Man-made "climate change" is analogous to the flat-earth theory. You have to do legitimate geologic research and critical thinking. Climates have changed throughout time, sometimes dramatically. Environmentalist are notorious for getting it wrong. They protested nuclear power was in the 70s, so we listened to them and stopped building. 30 years later, they were saying "oops, we got it wrong, nuclear good." Five years ago they said "Ethanol good source for fuel since it's not a fossil" So we listened to them again and the food supply chain caused more havoc than the energy issue by using corn in a less than optimal economic way. In the 70s they were worried about the ice age returning. Fortunately for us, the climate changed before they could get everyone doing things to combat global cooling. Now, they are the ones we are supposed to listen to? Come on - fool you once, shame on them; fool you twice, shame on you.

[According_To_Madness]

Well I cannot help but notice that everyone knows the pads are worn out, the officer noted brake burning, the machine doesn't have a record of fault code, there are no dash indicators, but Sikes' brakes are severely worn "metal to metal". Give the man a break, this machine's breaking system is so complex to incorporate regenerative, anti-lock, electronic force distribution, brake assist and stability control and it cannot tell the driver the breaks need servicing? BULLSugarHoneyIcedTea!!! I smell a very suspicious diagnostic laptop, mislead NHTSA engineers and a whole lot of gullable public to believe Toyota even suggested Sikes is lying.

[interlopert]

Similarly, the press/media has the vital responsibilty of providing
responsible and accurate information for the public at large. It is worrisome to see that the media as a whole is moving away from responsible journalism and becoming more inclined towards sensationalism as has been demonstrated by this TOYOTA WITCHHUNT and this ridiculous Prius hoax clearly perpetrated by a con artis(SIKES).
I am deeply disappointed that the MASS MEDIA for it's part has not given enough coverage regarding the hoax(it's all over the internet)particularly since it(MASS MEDIA) so eagerly participated in reporting the purported runaway Prius story.

It's time we demand responsible journalism.

[interlopert]

In my opinion, there is an alarming trend in our society these days to capitalize/exploit on tragic incidents as we have witnessed in the latest incident involving James Sikes and the supposedly out of control Prius. I dont have any doubt that as a nation we all feel the pain and sympathise with the family members of (CHP) officer Mark Saylor and the the other victims. There should be a thorough investigation of all the reported/recorded cases of sudden acceleration taking into account all auto makers, not just Toyota. We should not give a blank check to anyone but be as objective as possible to unearth the facts and get to the root of the problem. Instead of playing the blame game, we need to focus on the real issues and find a solution to reduce fatalities in the future.

The people who are participating in this frenzy dont realize that this is a pandora's box. Already the class action suit lawyers are counting their money. If this kind of irresponsible behavior becomes the norm in our society than we are in for big trouble.Toyota employs over 15000 people in the US not to mention thousands more who directly and indirectly rely on Toyota products for their livelihood. There are over 20 million Toyota vehicles on the road in North America, yet statistics show that Toyota vehicles are not more prone to sudden acceleration than other auto makers. That's right, data shows that Toyota actually fares better than most auto makers in the reported/recorded cases of sudden acceleration. Even after all this Toyota bashing frenzy- the fact is Toyotas are still among the safest vehicles on the road.

BTW, the Japanese lost in the 2nd WW over 60 years ago- they are now one of the closest allies the US has in the world.

There is a very interesting article on the Wsshington Post. Link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/15/AR2010031501693.html

Here are some excerpts from the aritcle written by Jeremy Anwyl in the Washington Post dated 3-15-10 (monday):
"When we focused on the major automakers and limited our review to recent-model-year vehicles (2005 to present), the 52,000 complaints through September 2009 -- a fair stopping point, because it was before news reports erupted -- showed that every car company had
incidents of sudden acceleration. This is not strictly a Toyota issue. NHTSA head David L. Strickland said as much when he told Congress recently that Toyota's rate of complaints was
"unremarkable."

Here is another, and I think the most significant:
"The case for saving property and lives should be obvious. But there is another risk for consumers: Toyota's legal bill for unintended-acceleration cases will be in the billions. Soon enough,
entrepreneurial lawyers will realize that other car companies are vulnerable. And who ends up covering this tab? Future car buyers -- in the form of higher prices."

There is also some debate about what Mr. Wozniak(co-founder of APPLE)said about his PRIUS. It is documented that Mr. Wozniak himself admitted on the WOLF BLITZER show that he made up the Prius hoax to get on the show. He had bet a friend that he would be called on the show if he made this claim. Also, it later came to light that his PRIUS had DYNAMIC LASER CRUISE CONTROL(DLCC) and the system did exactly what it was supposed to do- measure the distance to the vehicle in front and if necessary accelerate to maintain its position.

Interestingly there are reports that Mr. James Sikes is a member of the CORVETTE owners club. So, now we are supposed to believe that he doesn't know how his PRIUS(for which he has not made payments on for 2 years) operates?!?! Also, it's important to note that the testing was conducted both by Toyota and the NHSTA. If Mr. Sikes is attempting to pull a fast one, it's obvious he apparently rode on the brakes just enough so the brakes didn't actually stop the prius but had caused damage to the brakes. That's probably because he had his foot on the accelerator as well?!?!

Rule of law, freedom of expression/speech/press, human rights, personal liberty are some of the fundamentals of any democratic society and the US is the very symbol of that. In order to protect our rights and uphold the spirit of the constitution, each and every
citizen has a resposibility to make an effort to be well informed about the issues that effect us all.

[MoParMan45]

Strange things DO happen with electronics!!!!

[Robin081564]

As a software engineer, this quote really gets me too:

"This problem is sort of a ghost in the machine that is the Toyota system," he said Sunday. "It doesn't leave a fault code, it doesn't leave a footprint, and you can't make it happen upon demand."

How does this statement possibly indicate that there is no problem with the electronics. I have had similar problems with testing of software systems where a problem results in the CPU becoming so overburdened that it can no longer perform even simple functions like logging. People sometimes refer to this as a "system lockup" because even though the system is still "running" it has become complete unresponsive to further commands. Troubleshooting these sort of problems is especially difficult since any attempt to observe the behavior only further complicates the problem.

I know there are a lot of people who are quick to jump on this guy and call it a hoax or call him a scammer because their most recent memory is that of the "ballon boy". But, speaking as someone with a lot of experience working with computerized systems, I can tell you that that the potential for this being a real problem with the electronics is very high.

In fact, I would say that the longer I work with computer hardware, software, firmware, OS kernels etc... the more I am amazed that any of it ever works at all. The complexity is enormous and the number of components that must work together, as well as the number of human minds that must work together and communicate all the details in order for things to work flawlessly is staggering.

But, this does not mean that it cannot be fixed. Like any other failed system, it starts with admission that there is a problem. This is always the most difficult part because everyone becomes defensive about their part in the bigger picture, and the finger pointing begins... In the end, someone will be the "hero" for finding the root cause... typically this happens during the finger pointing phase when each engineering team attempts to demonstrate why some other teams component is to blame.

[tsigili]

Considering that people are being killed in runaway Toyota cars, which Toyota cannot find the problem with, I don't think we should be putting too much stock in anything Toyota says at this point.

Let's turn the cars over to US manufacturers, and pay them to find the problem......they have nothing to "cover up".

[steveherb1]

Wait a minute. My Ford cruise control recall was fixed and my truck still burned as others. What do you mean by U.S. maunfactures have nothing to cover up.

[Robin081564]

"When your TV goes on the fritz, when electronic stuff goes on the fritz, it doesn't just do it once and never do it again."

Are you freakin kidding me? That is typically exactly the the type of behavior that failed electronic components or software bugs will exhibit.

And what about this 250 times of switching between the brak and accelerator that was shown in the log..? First off that old man who was driving that car probably would have given him self a heart attack if he actually did that. It would be like 10 minutes on a step climber. And secondly, if there is a problem with the electronics, what makes you think that the logging would be behaving normally. Maybe, while he was jambing down on both...as he was instructed to do... the sensors and the computer interpreted that as him rapidly switching back and forth between the pedals...

Come on... you can't expect the public to believe that the engineers at Toyota are too stupid to see these obvious arguments.

[ge556]

He was NOT instructed to push both the accelerator and the brake.
He WAS instructed, multiple times, to put it in neutral, which he REFUSED to do.

Truth Teller

[Robin081564]

You mean which he was unable to do... After which he was instructed to slam on the brakes.

[kbbpll]

Scammer.

[book_of_wally]

They were the ones that claimed it was the floor mats. I dont believe anything Toyota says anymore.

[ge556]

There's a recall on some floor mats, but not Sikes's floor mat, apparently.

Truth Teller