NHTSA confirms 60+ complaints about repaired Toyotas, LaHood may mandate override systems
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in the US has received more than 60 complaints about unintended acceleration in Toyota vehicles after they have been serviced as a part of their recalls.
The NHTSA’s David Strickland said the administration had begun to take action concerning the complaints.
“NHTSA has already started contacting consumers about these complaints to get to the bottom of the problem and to make sure Toyota is doing everything possible to make its vehicles safe,” he said.
Toyota is currently in the process of recalling around 9.5 million vehicles across the globe – 5.4 million for floor mat-related brake pedal jamming and 4.1 million over sticking accelerator pedals.
But the complaints about continued pedal faults could mean the source of the problem is different to earlier findings by Toyota and the NHTSA.
The NHTSA said if the recall repairs are not solving the problems Toyota may be ordered to develop a new fix, potentially leading to another recall.
“If Toyota owners are still experiencing sudden acceleration incidents after taking their cars to the dealership, we want to know about it,” Mr Strickland said.
Yesterday, Toyota spokeswoman, Celeste Migliore, told the LA Times that Toyota was at that stage unaware of any complaints made to the NHTSA about the Avalon, Camry and Matrix models allegedly involved.
“We very much would like to have any of those individuals who claim they’ve had unintended acceleration after the fix to go back to the dealership. If there was an accident, we want to see the vehicle and the driver and the accident report,” Ms Migliore said.
Meanwhile, US Transportation Secretary, Ray LaHood, is considering making brake override systems mandatory in all new cars to avoid a repeat of the unintended acceleration debacle dogging Toyota.
While not a solution to the problem on their own, override systems give complete priority to the brake pedal when pressed in tandem with the accelerator and cancel throttle input.
(with Left Lane News, LA Times)
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