Toyota floor mat issue solved with zip ties
October 9, 2009 by Matt Brogan
In response to a recall of more than 3.8 million vehicles over a floor mat malfunction that was believed to have caused an accident involving a Lexus ES 350, Toyota has instructed its North American dealerships to attach driver’s side floor mats to metal seat rails with self-locking wire ties, better known as zip ties, in a solution the manufacturer calls a “semi-permanent” fix.
“We have reviewed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration what we’re calling a semi-permanent floor mat installation process, and we’re providing these instructions to our dealers,” said Toyota spokesman, Mr Brian Lyons. “This allows dealers to continue selling and delivering both new and used vehicles.”
Dealers are instructed to attach a warning label to the mats instructing drivers not to stack two floor mats on top of each other.
Print it: 
Is this for real!
Hmmm, I guess its better than no solution and I suppose that they have to show they are doing something, there is a lot of facts which havnt come out of this tragic accident. Such as the person not turning off the car, the car not being put into neutral, the brakes not being effective to halt the car. A lot of euro cars will kill the throttle when the brakes are applied.
Researching on the web, it appears there have been many cases of people having acceleration issues with Lexus, it would be interesting to see if the mat was the cause.
Yes, Sir, we are fixing your luxury, expensive Lexus sedan, the one we believe is the best car in the world, with a 10c zip tie.
Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaha
Oh, What a Feeling
Yeah; but the build quality and reliability of the Zip Ties is second to none –
because they are used by Toyota..
However; If they were in a Ford or Holden they would somehow become inferior.
Your finally getting it!
Thats the way!
Absolutely. And I also bet the Toyota ones would have been boring and misleading whereas the Holden ones would have used old zip tie technology and their PR department would tell us it is the greatest thing there is.
Lol
And of course the zip tie’s must be made in europe.
Haha, Toyota are slowly losing the plot, they thought they were sooooo good but no one can stay on top for long when they get as lazy as Toyota have!!!!
Take a step back from the computer, inhale… exhale slowly.
Repeat after me…
“Toyota does not hate me, they did not eat my children, they are only a car company”.
Relax, And just to correct you. Toyota and ALL japanese companies tend to be the LEAST arrogant companies in the world… its their culture. I’m serious on that. If you know anyone who works for Toyota, they will always tell you. One of the main policies… “continues improvement”….. “to achieve perfection the first time, is to not learn anything at all”…. “The more problems discovered the better, if there is no problem discovered, then there definitely is a problem”.
so your saying if Toyota find a problem with all their Camry’s for example that the engine explodes eveytime you start it then thats a good thing because they have learnt that the engine should not explode. Or lets take this stupid mat example, so because a family had an accident that is good for toyota because they learnt that their cars shouldnt crash due to faulty mats. YOUR LOGIC IS AS BORING AND SCREWED AS THE MATS IN TOYOTA”S
No, his logic states that the Japanese value continuous improvement and try and get feedback from everyone involved in the production of a vehicle. He is saying that a problem has been identified and it is being fixed.
If you take the example of when Mitsubishi took over the Chrysler plant in Adelaide, the most notable difference between the two management styles was that Mistubishi actively sought feedback from production line workers, whereas Chrysler told the workers how to build the car and that was it.
Back on topic, how stupid must the person have been who was driving this car that was killed? There are many things that the person could have done when instead they tried to call 911.
Hahahahaha………When i took a step back as you toyotaphiles suggested i still couldn’t stop laughing!!!!!!! Hahahahaha
Oh and don’t forget ARROGANT coz Toyota and their diminishing fans are so so arrogant…….it’s so good to see an undeserving giant start to fall so hard!!!
I can’t believe you guys are making such a fuss about a zip tie… saying Toyota has lost the plot and gotten arrogant because of it? Typical armchair expert mentality yet again on caradvice.com.au.
You guys need to get out more, seriously.
If you judge a car manufacturer just because of something as small as that, all of you should be riding bicycles… because there is no car manufacturer in the world that doesn’t use wire ties, cable ties, or electrical tape somewhere in their construction.
Yeah but isn’t that mainly used in the engine bay? Fair enough that there’s a problem with the mats, but maybe a more acceptable solution could of been suggested. Zip Ties + Lexus = WTF? It doesn’t sound right for customers, at least they made it a technical term “self-locking wire ties”.
I think for any manufacturer to suggest using zip ties to resolve an issue that doesnt involve anything mechanical sounds obsurd, and I mean any manufacturer.. I’m sure if I owned a Kia Rio and that was their solution, it still would not be good enough.
It’s obviously not a permanent fix. You lot need to get over yourselves (except Joe and Devil’s Advocate).
Why don’t they just fit some velcro strips on the bottom of the mat? The ‘factory’ mats on our car have that and the things don’t move an inch. Would be a lot more discrete than zip ties, plus it would also prevent the front from moving side to side as well, which the zip ties at the back wouldn’t.
So this “semi-permanent” fix goes into not only recalled cars, but also new cars sold. It “semi-permanent” stitches the mat to the car, so an owner won’t be able to move the mat out of the car to clean, or replace the mat, unless he/she cut the zip ties. Then what? Find some wire and tie the mat back?
I am wondering whether toyota will do a second-round recall to permanently fix this issue.
No – you would have to go back to the dealer and be charged $100 for those Toyota Genuine Quality Zip Ties
oh don’t forget about labour which will be another $150.
I think you’ll find that the zip ties only lock down one side or one end of the mat. Thus allowing for cleaning by levering the mat up.
Attaching velcro to make them removable? How do you effectively retrofit velcro to the mat and the existing floor? I don’t think so people.
I give full credit to Toyota for finding an inexpensive (if later removal/replacement is required by owners) and environmentally friendly solution. I also means owners’ cars won’t be off the road for long.
Actually, I give credit to Toyota for doing anything at all. Whomever was driving the car that crashed because of this “fault” was not familiar with “how to drive a car”. Any sane person would have taken the car out of gear, turned off the ignition, or engaged the brakes (rather than making 911 phone calls). The whole recall situation seems crazy to me.
NacaYoda, it is a strip of the harder ‘hook’ part of the velcro stitched onto each corner the mat. It uses the natural pile of the carpet as the other ‘end’ to mate to. NO retrofitting/modification of the floor is needed. It is not hard to stitch a strip onto the mat, especially if they start doing it where the mat is made as a permanent fix. This also means you don’t have to completely re-design the whole mat etc.
All I have to do to clean under my velcro fitted mat it is pull the mat up and OUT OF THE CAR. Something you CAN’T do to a zip tied mat without cutting the zip tie and having to fit another one! Not to mention it would be much easier to clean the floor and the mat with the mat OUT of the car. I can just imagine holding the zip tied mat up with one hand whilst trying to vacuum the floor with the other in the limited space of a footwell. Not to mention the left over dirt etc that would be so hard to clean where the ‘hinge’ would be. It would get frustrating after a while!
anyone who know how to drive would know how dangerous a car out of gear is let alone one with its ignition switched off while rolling…….
the crazy person is the one delivering that advice
As for “how to drive a car” I agree to some extent, but also consider:
1. The car was a loaner and the driver was not familar with the push button start feature that requires you to push and hold the start/stop button for 3 seconds to turn off the vehicle when the vehcile is moving.
2. The boost for the brakes is provided by engine vacuum. At high throttle, there is no longer any vacuum source, so one you apply the brakes a couple of times, you will no longer have boost. Between lack of boost and heat buildup in the brakes, it is likely that the engine will overpower the brakes.
3. No excuse on the trans shifter, unless Toyota actually does inhibit neutral on a reving engine. This makes no sense to me, as the normal rev limiter can handle this with no problem.
The real solution for Toyota is to learn not to allow the accelerator pedal to travel all the way down to the carpet where it is vulnerable to floor mats or other obstructions. It ain’t rocket science.
while you guys are bashing up toyota… I will have to mention my Mazda 3 SP23 has a very very big issue of the mats floating everywhere on the drivers side. There are NO HOLES to secure it to the floor. Nothing. Touch wood I haven’t crashed yet.
Good thing the bloody accelerator pedal is so sensitive (depress 5mm = rev to 4krpm) that I don’t need to push it to the floor. Heaven forbid If I have to do that….
Interesting Milobob. If they are ‘factory’ mats and the dealer fitted them they didn’t fit them properly (surprise surprise, being lazy!). The factory Mazda mats have a bracket that is attached to the floor near the seat rails which has a pin that fits into a hole in the corner of the mat to stop it from moving forward. Not to mention on top of that my factory Mazda 3 mats have the velcro underneath as mentioned above. Mine don’t move anywhere!
Ill agree with that,
the mats in my Mazda dont move an inch
BM, most if not all have plastic clips to secure it down. My 09 Lancer has velcro as well. I was disappointed with the mazda as you’d expect a car like that to have plastic clips.
But I have to say, plastic clips alone aren’t really enough to stop the mat from moving. you really need the spiky rubber underneath or the non-slip surface and maybe even velcro to fully stop it from moving.
You do pay alot for the mats anyway…
Thanks for that Milobob ,Tim on another thread had said Subaru were also recalled for a similar thing, so I was starting to think that Jap cars dont have secured mats.
mmmmmmmmm,interesting though ,comes down to the material they are made out of I guess,the ones in the BM are rubber backed and quiet heavy , never move .
$200 for mats it bloody stupid,they should come standard !
So the brilliant toyota Engineers have come up with…….drum roll……a zip tie !
So here’s a couple of solutions from one wh’s not on the Toyota spinroll
1) Remove the driver’s mat, guaranteed 100% fix …… no longer possible to foul the accellerator. Thanks, I’ll take $200,000 consultancy fee for that one.
2) Punch 2 holes through car carpet just in front of the seat, insert a clip device into the carpet and clamp solidly. Then punch 2 holes through the mat, and insert fitting that will clip solidly onto the floor fitting. Replace mat and clip firmly onto floor holders.
Can’t take any credit for second idea, since that’s exactly how the carpet mats are held in place in my Golf GTI…..
Toyota can’t do it, VW can and does. But I confess, VW also uses zip ties around the wiring loom.
Actually
There’s more to it than just adding “zip tie”.
Toyota, when faced with an issue, they undergo a detailed engineering revision that takes upto 3 months, with evaluation, tooling mods, and such. It could cost upto hundreds of thousands of dollars usually… or it could even cost in the millions. Depending how serious the “change” is.
This ZIP tie, floor mat issue… HAS 1 extreme case, in which a fatality has occured.
Im sure there are thousands that had the same issues, if not millions for all car owners… MOVING FLLOR MATS… ITS happened to all of us don’t lie.
Toyota WILL NOT issue a “tooling” and engineering change based on 1 very very, worst type of misfortune.
(1) The dealership installed the part.
(2) the design engineer obviously benchmark many vehicles Toyota and NON-toyota vehicles and proven that a “clip” to prevent the mat is not required.. a novelty but not a REGULATION or MINIMUM requirement.
It simply comes down to extreme case of bad luck for the people that got killed.
Its very hard to pin point a “mistake” done by the design engineer…. or Toyota for that matter when 90% of vehicles sold today does not have a “fixed” floor mat as a “REQUIREMENT”…. again its a novelty.
This “short term” fix is to basically act as IMMEDIATE change to prevent it from happening. The long term fix being… the design engineers studying a new “requirement” in their design…. FLoor MAT movement into the pedal and preventing it from happening.
So this came about because the floor mats were creeping forward and activating the accelerator causing accidents, apparently this is quite common…
Anyway, the ‘09 model Lexus ES fatal crash involving the California Highway Patrol officer that ignited/reignited the unintended acceleration issue has left me with some questions.
I get that he wasn’t able to turn the car off because it uses a start button that needs to be depressed for 3 seconds to switch the car off when the vehicle is in motion. It was a loaner vehicle and I wouldn’t have known that either.
And I’ll ignore the issue of applying the brakes…
But is it true that some cars, such as this lexus model, use an automatic transmission that electronically prohibits the selection of neutral at high speed to protect the engine/transmission from damage? To me this seems highly unlikely but I can’t find any reliable source on the issue.
Off topic…. I feel the need to express my hate of the Google ads in the middle of the stories with the new look site. I lost the comment initially because I thought the box was for the Ads.
Remove these ads immediately please please please with cherries on top please!
At the bottom of the article there is a share it link,tags, print, then a banner ad, then five(!) related articles, then finally we get to the comments. It all seems a bit bloated. Overall I like the new look, but don’t like the ads in the middle of the articles or the bloat afterwards.
/off topic
/on topic
Just remove the mats. I’ve never had mats in my car (but mine is getting on a bit ;-) ).
Stupid Americans if you ask me. Next they will want their asses glued to the seat for when the car goes over a speed hump?
I prefer duct tape for “semi permanent” fixes. Nice job of outhouse engineering.
Who did Toyota get this advice from? The bush mechanics? How about recalling the floor mats and replacing them with new ones that fit?
Don’t let Toyota engineers anywere near space shuttles.
“Help, the boosters are falling off. What ever will we do?”
I know………Zip ties