Yes they do exist, they are called EDR's. However they aren't meant to reconstruct accident data, they also don't save the data for an extended period of time. Their is no standard of what is collected and no federal mandate to have the EDR's in use, how they should be used, etc.

Do you really think Nissan, GM, Toyota, etc would collect data to possibly damage them voluntarily later on? That is why they don't save any data long term and as you mentioned 5 minutes is all that is saved in some cases.

Some are suggesting certain models don't even have the EDR turned on. Until NHTSA gets off their **** this won't happen. In the airline world this is called "Tombstone Technology" where it takes a disaster unfortunately for the Government Agency's to act properly.

Also I forgot to mention that EDR's activate only when sensors indicate that a crash is imminent or has occurred.

the new GTR has a VSDR, Nissan's VSDR runs constantly, collecting information such as wheel and engine speed. The device, thought to be a first in the automotive industry, stores more than a few days' but less than a week's worth of data on the vehicle's operation, Nissan says. The VSDR cannot be deactivated.

In technical information provided to buyers, Nissan says the VSDR does not record sounds or images but "always records and stores vehicle-operating data between periodic inspections, which can assist and be used for servicing, diagnosing and performing warranty repairs."

"It's always running," said Ed Hibma, senior manager for technical support with Nissan North America. Nissan says the VSDR isn't intended to spy on unsuspecting GT-R drivers but is needed to help mechanics and engineers monitor the performance of various onboard systems in the highly advanced car.

 

The EDR in our Maxima is turned on. The owner of the car "owns" the data. I am sure, in the event of a crash, the cops can get their hands on it. Moreover, it's probably discoverable in civil proceedings.

Toyota's unintended acceleration issue has lead to 50 deaths and other human mayhem. They have known this problem for a long time with no clear cut answer. Plaintiff's attorneys all around this country are chomping at the bit to get a piece of Toyota for their client and for themselves. Just this morning, a talking head estimated that civil litigation arising from this problem will cost Toyota $5 Bln.

My point is that Toyota is at a point of maximum damage. Any effort to get to the bottom of this problem can only help them. The more they sit smugly and claim "operator error" only hurts them.

 

I finally got around to reading that article today. In it, he (the driver) mentioned that he didn't want to shift into neutral because "he didn't want to cause his car to flip." The article left this statement uncommented.

I've been around for a few years, but have never even heard of any urban legend surrounding shifting into neutral causing cars to flip, let alone any mechanical inferences that would lead to this. Panic'd comment or any foundation to this?

 

What you are saying is very true. The problem is that there are a billion gazillion Toyotas and Lexuses on the road, and, despite Toyota's disclaimer, this very dangerous acelleration problem goes way back to the 1990s. I first read about it in 1996, and paid close attention because my daughter was driving a '95 Camry.

Diagnosis is made extremely difficult because the problem is happening in well under one tenth of one percent of cars, but it would cost trillions of dollars to set up a recording device in a way that could measure everything, and manufacture and install a billion gazillion of them.

I stick by what I said last year, in that this will prove to be an electrical/software problem, will be difficult to pin down, and even if found, could be problematic to fix in a billion gazillion cars. I also said this will get far worse before it gets better. That has proven to be the case. But far worse is yet to come. Toyota has wasted much time and effort in denial and throwing red herrings (floor mats, gas pedal, etc) out to the public.

It will take Toyota years to get past this, and the denial, negative approach and attitude they have maintained over several years concerning this problem will prove long-term to have been a very critical marketing mistake that will affect their brand image for decades.

 

I too have never heard about a car flipping over due to the shifting into neutral. If it were me, that would be on the list of things to do to stop the runaway.

The "stuck" throttle position must have been less than 100% given that the harrowing ride lasted for 20 minutes. Imagine your Maxima at full throttle and with no control? I envision speeds of 130+ mph. Two minutes, tops.

 

We can look back to the Audi unintended acceleration issue of the '80s for a similar case. I share your concern that Toyota has totally bungled their unintended acceleration problem. Audi survived theirs without a scratch on their image.

What makes this perplexing is that Toyota is Japanese. This situation is extremely shameful to them and I expected a stronger response from them. Americans will take actions to preserve sales and profits even though it may be shameful. Example: Enron, Worldcom, Bernie Madoff, etc. Shame does not trump profits for Americans. Not so with the Japanese. Going forward, I must believe that the deep heritage of the Japanese culture will kick in and fix this problem without denials issued by $400/hr lawyers.

 

This behavior by Toyota has been the aspect I have had trouble understanding. It is as if typical American behavior has permeated the Toyota management hierarchy. I spent some time in Japan in the late 1950s, and again in the early 1960s, and was most impressed by the importance of honor in their social and business structure. Dishonor in business in Japan often results in the suicide of the person at the top.

And this aberrant behavior continues until the present, in that Toyota is wasting time, money and research effort this week trying to prove publically that the experiment done by the SIU professor was flawed. That effort by Toyota would be more wisely spent ignoring such sidetracks (floor mats and gas pedals were also sidetracks) and concentrating on finding the real problem.

The real problem might well be one of these:

1 - Short in a circuit board resulting from a 'whisker' (wisp of solder) falling across two circuits that should not connect. The recent removal of lead from solder has been causing this problem.

2 - Short in wiring caused by abrasion or wearing of wire sheath resulting from contact with metal.

3 - Glitch in computer programming of the onboard computer (i.e., software problem).

4 - Failure of some component of the onboard computer.

5 - Failure of a sensor, leaving the onboard computer unaware of an important event that has happened.

The longevity of this problem (from 9 to 14 years, depending on who you ask) would work against # 1 being the problem.

The spread of this problem between most models of Toyota and Lexus would tend to work against #2 being the problem, as the metalwork and brackets vary from model to model.

I would bet on either #3, #4 or #5, and feel those should be the areas of concentration for Toyota. Their unqualified statement of a few weels back in which they denied the problem could be computer-tied was very ill-advised, especially since their words of the past few months leave one to wonder if they have any idea whatsoever where to look.

Watching Toyota mishandle this safety problem, as well as the accompaning public relations disaster, is almost like watching a brave and noble warrior fall on his own sword.

 

Yes it's turned on but it only reports when the airbag went off, brake pedal position, etc all for 5 minutes maximum. NOT enough data to recreate an accident event with....... Those lawyers are all licking their chops but the reality is they aren't going to get crap from the EDR to support any argument against Toyota.

I was reading an article about Toyota EDR's and amazingly just a couple weeks ago only 1 laptop was available in the USA that could read the EDR data! The article went on to say that 50 laptops with the special software were to arrive this week and that some were allocated for NHTSA investigators. The article also mentioned that since we have no standards on EDR systems, some models don't have the EDR on, some only track very minor events, some don't track any events at all except diagnostics, etc, etc.

I also learned that Kia/Hyundai has no EDR at all, BMW / Mercedes don't either because of the super strict German privacy laws and they feel it provides no customer value, Nissan seems to be the most liberal with EDR data providing access to the owner, police, or anyone asking and will loan consults to investigators, GM wrote the book on EDR systems and probably has more information about what is going on in your auto then you would like to know about, Ford and Chrysler provide open access and Honda won't allow any access at all unless you have a court order.

 

Swimming close to every school of piranhas (lawyers) is a species known as expert witness. From miniscule data, such as skid marks, experts can recreate the accident scene. You can bet that EDR data can play a role in accident reconstruction.

However, I never said that present day EDR is the proper configuration to diagnose unintended acceleration. The critical questions to answer are: if the brake pedal is depressed and the gas pedal is at 0% (idle), how come the command output to the fuel system feeding the engine is anything other than idle? Or in the alternative, if the fuel command output is idle, and the brake pedal is depressed, how can the vehicle's velocity continually rise? So on and so forth. The point is that somewhere in the logic mesh is a fault. This is automotive engineering 101. The data capture capability of EDRs need to be expanded to provide answers to these questions. Can it be done? Absolutely!

 

So it appears this whole Prius run-a-way was a hoax perpetrated by a person in financial ruin.... What a surprise same as all the lawyers licking their chops...

http://jalopnik.com/5493011/this-mem...yline=true&s=i

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...YiLgwD9EE7DM80

 

Well, maybe there is to much "geek" in me, but the testing scenario mentioned in the articles is more of a synthetic test (i.e. They were consciously applying gas and brake at the same time) and may not replicate the situation that actually occured. While there indeed may be some nefarious motives to this claim, I'm not sure I agree that there isn't some more "flakey" (note the technical term not intended as a pun to the driver) issue at work here.

 

Actually, although I have had some reservations from day one about Mr. Sikes' incident, the tests proved only ONE THING: that the problem, if real, does not 'happen on command', and/or may not be linked to having the acellerator pedal all the way down. But then we already knew that, because he had been driving this Prius without incident for some time.

If there is a person here on the ORG who has never had an intermittent problem they had trouble duplicating in front of their service tech, they are a rare bird indeed.

I have no reason to doubt that Mr Sikes' Prius may have done something unusual. My problem is why, in the eternity the problem lasted, did he not put the car in neutral? I can understand a panic situation of a few minutes, but 23 (or so) minutes at 93 MPH gave him ample time to react in a more thoughtful manner. I found his excuse that putting the car in neutral might make it 'flip' to be especially weak. If he really thought that, then it may be that he should not be driving on a public highway.

I sympathize with Toyota's situation, but whether or not Mr. Sikes had a real problem with his car does nothing to address the REAL RUNAWAY problems Toyota should be addressing. The longer it takes them to accept that there is an electronic or computer problem in many of the cars they have built in the last 14 or so years, the more we are going to see accidents and fender benders blamed on Toyota's runaway problem, even though no runaway was involved.

The ball has been in Toyota's court for many years. Their actions in blocking proper federal investigation of this problem in both 2003 and 2004 bought them an additional seven years in which to investigate this situation, but they spent that seven years in denial. My sympathy for their predicament will not last forever.

 

Since Toyota's runaway problem popped up on page 1 of the news, there have been more reported incidents. Are some phony? Perhaps. Mr. Sikes burnt through a lot of rotors and pads to draw attention to himself. What was his motivation?

Toyota's accusations against Mr. Sikes is that they were unable to duplicate the failure with his car. Duh! Do they really think this is conclusive proof? Toyota suggested to the San Diego police to investigate Mr. Sikes for being a fraud. The cops told Toyota to take a hike.

While I am not absolutely sure of Mr. Sikes' credibility, I know for sure that Toyota is digging a larger hole for themselves. This reminds me of the Challenger disaster in 1987. The SRB's on the Space Shuttle exploded during the launch due to a leaking "O" ring. It took months of investigation to uncover the truth: the manufacturer of the "O" ring advise strongly to not launch in cold weather. This warning was ignored. It was the culture of NASA, with the pressure to launch, that caused the disaster. I think we have the same phenomena at Toyota.

 

Because the very concept of 'Neutral' is not consistent with the normal operation of an AT car. It's never really needed. You've got 'D' to go somewhere, 'N' to back up once in a while, and 'P' for when you get there and shut the car down. None of the other positions (if present) are commonly used. Force of habit and "muscle memory" are difficult to overcome especially when suddenly faced with an urgent situation.

Even among drivers who are almost entirely MT drivers, the FIRST thought is not normally "put it in neutral" (it's to step on the clutch).


Miscellaneous notes.

The three second requirement to hold the button depressed is almost certainly to prevent inadvertent actuation (inadvertent actuation of "STOP" = deactivation?), with the attendant loss of brake and steering assists. The three tap alternative does sound like a good option. Nicely done.

Regarding throttle cut if the brakes are applied, not so nice. You lose the ability to prevent the brakes from getting thoroughly wetted - or to rapidly dry them out afterward, give up some snow driving capability, and should you tap the brake to suggest to the driver of the car behind to please leave a little more space you'll get some deceleration whether you really wanted any or not.

Maybe a brake override at some speed setting above which the car is normally driven just to handle this one specific emergency situation could be lived with. But not "25 mph". For the record that agrees in principle with the thoughts of an automotive engineer who works at the OE level (though not in the USA), but is my own independent opinion.

Note also that BMW provides an automated brake drying feature on at least some models as part of the extended DSC (dynamic stability control) functions.



Neat how the discussions of the new tech seem to end up here in 7th Gen.


Norm

 

Folks this car was impounded and NHTSA with Toyota tested the car, it's amazing of all the conspiracy theories going around.

"During two hours of test drives Thursday, technicians with Toyota and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration failed to duplicate the same experience that Sikes described, according to the memo prepared for the Oversight Committee.
"It does not appear to be feasibly possible, both electronically and mechanically that his gas pedal was stuck to the floor and he was slamming on the brake at the same time," the memo stated.
The brakes on the Prius also did not show wear consistent with having been applied at full force at high speeds for a long period, the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday, citing three people familiar with the probe, whom it did not name. The newspaper said the brakes may have been applied intermittently."

 

No conspiricay theories here. Pretty much everyone agrees there is definitely the chance the problem was the driver, not the car.

BUT

The limited scope of the attempts to recreate the problem only go to show the illogical and unscientifically narrow focus of both Toyota and the government testers. Sadly, I feel Toyota is still sort of calling the shots as to what and how the government inspectors approach this, just as they did in 2003 and 2004. Why, if this man drove this Prius for thousands of miles without this problem happening, do they think their attempts to recreate it would yield success in just a few hours of effort? This type of illogical thinking betrays the total lack of scientific process involved

Worst of all, they assume the problem involves the gas pedal and/or brakes, so limited their testing to situations involving the gas pedal and/or brakes. I feel the chances the position of the gas pedal and/or brakes being involved in this runaway problem are less than 50-50.

Of course there will be situations attributed to the runaway problem that have no such connection. But that does not change the fact Toyota absolutely has a very serious runaway problem, and has had it for around fourteen years. They have sidestepped responsibility for over a decade; a decade in which their chief effort has been to throw a blanket of denial over the situation. Toyota engineers have concentrated their problem-resolving efforts in peripheral areas, as the company officially denies electrical problems. The visionless government testers are simply repeating Toyota's tests.

It is time Toyota accepted the fact they have no clue as to what is causing these sometimes fatal runaways, and officially convene a group of highly proficient and neutral scientific experts to analyze the computer, software and electronics of a few vehicles that were KNOWN to have actually had the runaway problem.

Until they approach this runaway problem logically and scientifically, more and more unrelated incidents will unfortunately be blamed on it. If they hope to maintain their good image, very serious research by highly qualified scientists needs to begin immediately. At least that would show sincerity on their part.

 

Not really in disagreement that they might have several issues over many different models and years however how can you determine the tests that they conducted were "limited in scope" and how do we know if the tests have even been concluded?

Just by providing publicly an initial finding as to what their test results have yielded so far does not automatically assume they have given up on their part.

I also haven't seen any test plans or exactly how they are testing so I find it rather biased to assume that NHTSA and Toyota are somehow in collusion together and as you stated "unscientifically narrow focus of both Toyota and the government testers"

I can't believe for a minute with all of the bad publicity that Toyota doesn't want to find any fault regardless if it's electronic, mechanical or in this case "human" as soon as possible to try and get this "monkey" off their backs.

 

Like others, I cannot totally endorse Mr. Sikes' story.

But it is very clear that Toyota's press release was formulated by their marketing department. Their purpose was to get in front of the story and mitigate the downward spiral in public opinion. Engineers are very cautious and do not come to such conclusions so quickly.

Let's just highlight one piece of evidence from a reliable source. The cop on the scene said he smelled the odor of burning brakes as he approached Sikes' Prius. How is this possible with only applying brakes "intermittently?" It isn't.

 

Steve Wozniak Reports That Prius Issue Is a Big Hoax

During Wolf Blitzer’s interview of Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computers, Steve admitted that the allegations he made about his Prius and unintended acceleration were a hoax. In his interview he stated that he bet a friend that he could use his Prius allegations to get on Wolf Blitzer’s show – which he was able to accomplish.
Furthermore, Wozniak also stated that other media outlets had spliced together footage of his interview to make it sound like his vehicle was experiencing “unintended acceleration”. The truth is much simpler – his vehicle has Dynamic Laser Cruise Control – a feature that will “lock on” to the speed of the vehicle in front of you and maintain a certain distance. The intricacies of this system, paired with someone who may not understand how it works fully, may seem like “unintended acceleration” is happening. However, the fact is that the system is working as designed. You can see the full video at Wolf Blitzer’s Situation Room at CNN.com

Listen to the video and how the media has "made up" statements that he never made...

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/...iref=allsearch

 

MaxLoverAz - Like you, I am not yet convinced the Prius has the problem certain other Toyotas and Lexuses definitely have. To my knowledge, we have not yet had a clear-cut acelleration problem with the Prius like we have had with some other Toyota and Lexus models.

There was a long front-page feature article on this Toyota runaway problem in yesterday's USA Today. Several of the dozens of fatal incidents are explored. I haven't had a chance to read it yet.

According to Toyota's press release, the testing done on the suspect Prius involved fully depressing both the gas pedal and brake pedal simultaneously, which activated the system in the Prius that was supposed to reduce power to the engine in such a situation. It worked, and so they concluded this Prius was not susceptable to the runaway problem plaguing certain other Toyotas and Lexuses.

This was a fair test of this particular system in the Prius. The problem is that there is no way to test for a sporatic or one-time event such as the onboard computer failing to receive the signal that the gas pedal is all the way down because of an intermittent faulty sensor, or an intermittent frayed or shortened wire, or an intermittent software glitch. Or to test for an intermittent glitch in the onboard computer that fails to properly process the gas-pedal-down signal.

There are many millions of Toyotas and Lexuses on the road, and 99.999% of them will never have a runaway incident. I have no concerns whatsoever that my beloved daughter drives only Toyotas.

I empathize with Toyota's situation, because, when a car does the right thing 99,999 times out of 100,000, trying to replicate an abberation is virtually impossible.

Having said that, I feel they have been in denial for around 14 years, and don't seem to have fully publically accepted that the problem exists, when we have thousands of such incidents officially on record, hundreds of such wrecked Toyotas and Lexuses that have raced at a frightful speed for many miles, and which are left with a smoking molten glob where the brakes once were, and dozens of folks dead. That cannot be denied.

In view of this, I feel Toyota should not be making official statements of what the problem is 'not', when it is very clear nobody knows exactly what the problem is. This Prius incident could be a hoax, or a mental lapse by the driver, or a misunderstanding of proper driving technique by the driver, or a one-time failure of some function of the vehicle that was badly mishandled by the driver. It could be a failure that would not happen again in that particular Prius in 100 years, in which case testing has no chance of repeating it. We just don't know.