Toyota Recall: Scandal, Media Circus, and Stupid Drivers - Editorial
We dive into Toyota’s three-ring circus and emerge with the facts.

First, What to Do if Your Car (Not Just a Toyota) Starts to Accelerate Uncontrollably

If your car starts accelerating unexpectedly, hit the brake (it's the one to the left of the gas) and shift into neutral. After you do this, the engine may race loudly but the car won't accelerate. Pull off the road, brake to a stop, shift to park, and shut off the car. This is a simple solution we guarantee will save your life in any car that suffers from unintended acceleration. For more, read our story “How To Deal With Unintended Acceleration,” which is based on our own instrumented testing.

How Big is This Problem?

We're no Toyota apologists, but if you look past the media circus, the numbers don't reveal a meaningful problem. Every man, woman, and child in the U.S. has approximately a one-in-8000 chance of perishing in a car accident every year. Over a decade, that's about one in 800. Given the millions of cars included in the Toyota recalls and the fewer than 20 alleged deaths over the past decade, the alleged fatality rate is about one death per 200,000 recalled Toyotas. Even if all the alleged deaths really are resultant from vehicle defects—highly unlikely—and even if all the worst things people are speculating about Toyotas are true, and you're driving one, and you aren't smart or calm enough to shift to neutral if the thing surges, you're still approximately 250 times likelier to die in one of these cars for reasons having nothing to do with unintended acceleration. So if you can muster the courage to get into a car and drive, the additional alleged risk of driving a Toyota is virtually negligible.

What's Wrong with Toyotas?

1. Floor mats. In some cases, an unsecured driver's floor mat can supposedly jam the gas pedal. Complaints and deaths stemming from this issue led to the first Toyota recall. Secure your floor mats, take them out, or, if you're too lazy to do either of those and the mat jams the accelerator, shift to neutral.

2. Sticky throttles. The accelerator may stick in some Toyotas. NHTSA hasn't determined that this has actually caused any fatalities, but there is enough evidence that the throttle may stick to warrant a recall. If this happens to you, shift to neutral.

3. The "electronic issue." Unlike vehicles from some other automakers, Toyotas don't kill the throttle when you hit the brakes. This means it's possible to apply both at the same time. Our own instrumented testing determined that you can safely brake a car from highway speed, even with the throttle pegged. But if the accelerator is floored and the car is in gear, repeated stabs at the pedal and modulation of speed with the brake will eventually overheat the brakes and cause them to fail. Pumping the brakes is a bad idea beyond the overheating issue. When the throttle is stuck open, the engine isn’t producing sufficient vacuum to enable power assist for the brakes, so press the brake pedal firmly once and don’t let up. (Some allege that electromagnetic interference could be causing the electronic throttles in Toyotas to become stuck open; this is completely unsubstantiated. It’s also possible that alien tractor beams are to blame.)

The lack of a throttle kill is probably the explanation for Toyotas' higher reported rate of "unintended acceleration" than other brands. But it's critical to note that the lack of such a throttle kill isn't a defect. It isn't Toyota's responsibility to account for every possible stupid thing people might do in a car. Anyone so uncoordinated that they can't differentiate the pedals and operate them independently shouldn't be driving.

And this is going to sound uncharitable, but even if the recall dealing with potentially sticking pedals applies to a lot of Toyotas, why aren’t people just shifting into neutral? Even if the throttle really sticks fully open, it won't have any accelerative impact on the car if it's in neutral. By this point, if you have a Toyota (or any car), and you don't know to shift to neutral if the engine races unexpectedly, you're going to succumb to what can only be described as natural selection.

Some Context: Audi's "Unintended Acceleration"

In 1986, the television program 60 Minutes started Audi's "unintended acceleration" scandal. The show trotted out tearful people, recounted death and carnage, spoke to so-called experts, and generally made it seem like the vehicle in question, the Audi 5000, was a roving menace with a mind of its own. In the end, the U.S. government determined that every single so-called unintended acceleration accident was the result of driver error. Some speculated that because Audi's pedals were closer together than those of some other brands, people were too uncoordinated to choose the correct one. The pedal-placement issue Audi faced at that time parallels the throttle-kill issue Toyota faces now.

What Does This Mean for Toyota?

Even if you buy our argument that most of the "unintended acceleration" issues are actually driver error and the company ultimately is vindicated, Toyota is still screwed. Audi sales were depressed for a decade and a half after the false claims leveled against it. Toyota either blames its customers and faces the wrath of the media or expresses contrition and admits it has quality issues. Perhaps having learned from the backlash against Audi when it—rightly—blamed its customers, Toyota has chosen the latter course of action.

Toyota has earned a reputation in this country over the past 30 years as a maker of utterly dull and utterly reliable transportation appliances. Readers of Consumer Reports and their friends buy them by the millions. But with the notable exception of the Prius (which now is facing its own recall fiasco), Toyota hasn't produced many interesting or exciting products. In Car and Driver comparison tests, Toyotas have generally placed mid-pack for years because they handle poorly and have increasingly chintzy interiors. Over the years, people haven't bought Toyotas because they offered driving thrills or prestige; they bought them because, in the words of one CR loyalist and former serial Camry buyer—this author’s mother—"The ultimate luxury is a car that doesn't ever break." So what happens when quality is called into question and the cars don't offer anything special? Well, Mrs. Dushane now drives a Subaru. Even the pragmatic tire of the banal.

How To Deal With Unintended Acceleration - Tech Dept.
We put unintended acceleration to the test and examine how to handle a runaway vehicle.

Elkhart, IN…CTS Corporation (NYSE: CTS) today provided comments on Toyota’s recent accelerator pedal recall. As previously announced by Toyota, the January 21 voluntary recall results from what Toyota described as “a rare set of conditions which may cause the accelerator pedal to become harder to depress, slower to return or, in the worst case, stuck in a partially depressed position.” Toyota said this condition “is rare and occurs gradually over a period of time.”



As has been publically stated by Toyota, we have no knowledge of any accidents or injuries that have resulted from this rare potential condition. Based on information that Toyota has provided us, we are aware of fewer than a dozen instances where this condition has occurred, and in no instance did the accelerator actually become stuck in a partially depressed condition.


As Toyota stated, this recall is different from and unrelated to the “sudden, unintended acceleration issue” which was the subject of the November 2009 Toyota recall. In the November recall, the pedals in Toyota models dated back to model year 2002. CTS became a pedal supplier in 2005. Accordingly, our products are not implicated by the November 2009 recall. The products we supply to Toyota, including the pedals covered by the recent recall, have been manufactured to Toyota’s design specifications.

Elkhart, IN…CTS Corporation (NYSE: CTS) today expressed its “deep concern that there is widespread confusion and incorrect information” about the role of CTS-manufactured gas pedals in the media coverage of the recent Toyota recall.


CTS stated that since the problem of sudden unintended acceleration has been reported to have existed in some Lexus vehicles and Toyota vehicles going back to 1999 when CTS did not even make this product for any customer, CTS believes that the rare slow return pedal phenomenon, which may occur in extreme environmental conditions, should absolutely not be linked with any sudden unintended acceleration incidents.



CTS is also not aware of any accidents and injuries caused by the rare slow return pedal condition, to the best of its knowledge. CTS wishes to clarify that it does not, and has never made, any accelerator pedals for Lexus vehicles and that CTS also has no accelerator pedals in Toyota vehicles prior to model year 2005.