690,000 TACOMA TRUCKS RECALLED
Toyota is recalling 690,000 of its popular Tacoma pickup trucks because of a potential fire risk, the automaker announced Monday.
The recall affects Tacoma 4x4 and Pre-Runner models from 2005-11. A leaf in the rear suspension of these models can corrode and then crack, which might rupture the gas tank and start a fire, Toyota said. No accidents or injuries have been reported.
Owners of affected vehicles will be notified by mail, and Toyota dealers will fix the problem for free.
— Los Angeles Times
A U.S. safety agency is looking into a car owner’s allegations that older Toyota Corollas can accelerate unexpectedly at low speeds and cause crashes, reviving a problem that appeared to be in the automaker’s past.
The inquiry by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration covers about 1.69 million Corolla compact cars from the 2006 to 2010 model years. The agency said in documents posted Monday on its website that the inquiry will determine whether a formal investigation is needed.
There have been at least 141 complaints filed with NHTSA about unintended acceleration in Corollas, reminiscent of 2009 and 2010, when Toyota and its Lexus luxury brand vehicles were plagued by complaints of unwanted acceleration, as well as investigations and recalls.
Back then, Toyota blamed the problems on drivers hitting the gas instead of the brake, floor mats that could trap the gas pedal, and sticky gas pedals that could cause unwanted acceleration.
In the petition released Monday, electronics engineer Bob Ruginis of Bristol, Rhode Island, said a 2010 Corolla driven by his wife, Kathy, surged at low speeds several times, and a dealer couldn’t find the cause. The car already had been repaired under sticky-gas-pedal and floor-mat recalls, he said.
On June 8, the Corolla surged as Kathy Ruginis was making a slow right turn into a parking space on High Street in Bristol, and it crashed into an unoccupied Jeep, Bob Ruginis said. The brakes, he said, failed to stop the car in time to prevent a crash. No one was hurt.
Bob Ruginis, who specializes in consumer electronics, provided a report from the car’s event-data recorder showing that the gas pedal was in the idle position starting 4.8 seconds before the crash. It rose to slightly above idle at 2.8 seconds before impact, but returned to idle a second later and stayed there until the crash. The Corolla’s speed, though, was 3.7 mph until 0.8 seconds before the crash, when it rose to 5 mph. It was 7.5 mph at impact.
Revolutions per minute stayed constant at 800 until doubling at the time of the impact, the report said. And Kathy Ruginis’ foot was off the brake until the moment of impact, which her husband says is consistent with a driver slowly entering a parking space and being caught off-guard by acceleration.
“She told me that the car started going, she hit the brake and it kept accelerating,” he said, adding that a passenger in the car whom he declined to identify saw Kathy’s foot on the brake at the time of the crash.
Now, Ruginis says he’s stuck with a car that his wife won’t drive and his conscience won’t let him sell.
“Maybe I can help prevent an accident, to get people to look at it, to get Toyota to invest the time and money to figure out what’s wrong and make a change,” he said.
Toyota said in a statement that it is cooperating with the NHTSA investigation, but declined to comment on Ruginis’ allegations.
Last year, the company paid a record $1.2 billion to settle a U.S. Justice Department investigation. Toyota admitted that it hid information about defects that caused vehicles to accelerate unexpectedly, causing injuries and deaths.
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