I find it rather surprising that so many of the members here are laughing and joking about Toyotas recent sticking gas pedals and brake problems. And the media are like sharks in a feeding frenzy.
Toyota is no different than any other Japanese, Korean, American or European auto manufacturer. They all strive to make safe, quality vehicles at a reasonable price, but occasionally something goes wrong. In most cases the executives at these companies will down play the significance of these defects for several reasons:
1. They may not have sufficient evidence that there is a true defect or cannot duplicate the problem.
2. They realize there is a defect, but have not determined the exact cause.
3. If they have found the defect, they are looking for the most practical and economical solution.
The fact that Toyota stopped production and sales of the affected vehicles surely indicates that they were serious about finding and correcting this problem, and goes far beyond anything that any other Auto manufacturer has ever done in the past.
We should not be so snobbish about Ford recent success because their vehicles have been the subject of some very serious recalls in the past where they denied any defects existied.
Lets go back about 10 years ago when Explorers were rolling over all too frequently. Ford blamed it on Firestone tires. It is common for all auto manufacturers to blame a supplier for their engineering problems.
Firestone blamed it on Ford since Firestone was making the tires to meet Fords design specifications for the Explorer, and that Fords tire pressure specs were too low for the size and weight of the Explorer and that was causing the tire failures.
While Ford successfully pushed most of the blame over to Firestone, Ford continued to lose a number of lawsuits for wrongful death and negligence related to the Explorers design causing the roll overs. At the height of this Ford vs Firestone controversy, Ford recalled and replaced Firestone tires on all Explorer vehicles back to 1996. That made Ford look like the good guy and convinced more people that Firestone was the bad guy. Months later, after Ford convinced the world that Firestone was to blame for the Explorer roll over issues, they quietly issued new tire-pressure specification stickers to owners of Explorers that increased the recommended tire pressures, just as Firestone had recommended !! Hmmmm?
Then there is also the Ford Aerostar vans that would self ignite due to problems in the alternator wiringa number of people died before that problem was found and corrected, again, very quietly.
And who over 50 can remember the IED Pintos (Improvised Explosive Device) which used the hatch-backs trunk floor as the top of the gas tank. Hit a Pinto in the rear, the floor seam splits open spilling the fuel into the passenger compartment and the Pinto instantly becomes an inferno. A lot of people died because of that stupid design, but Ford denied any design problems
Dont get me wrong, I am not bashing Ford for their recent success and profit. I think Is great that they got the right leadership in their company to realize that they had to get out of the hole that all US auto makers were digging themselves into. And they were smart enough to start doing that 5 years before Chrysler and GM did.
I just think there is an unfair feeding frenzy going on now with Toyota mostly because Toyota is one of the top selling brands in the world and it is not and American owned company. If Ford had a similar issue with some of its vehicles like it did in the past, they would have never shut down production or even acknowledged that they had a problem and just blame it on one of their supplierslike they did with Firestone?
Rich
Toyota is no different than any other Japanese, Korean, American or European auto manufacturer. They all strive to make safe, quality vehicles at a reasonable price, but occasionally something goes wrong. In most cases the executives at these companies will down play the significance of these defects for several reasons:
1. They may not have sufficient evidence that there is a true defect or cannot duplicate the problem.
2. They realize there is a defect, but have not determined the exact cause.
3. If they have found the defect, they are looking for the most practical and economical solution.
The fact that Toyota stopped production and sales of the affected vehicles surely indicates that they were serious about finding and correcting this problem, and goes far beyond anything that any other Auto manufacturer has ever done in the past.
We should not be so snobbish about Ford recent success because their vehicles have been the subject of some very serious recalls in the past where they denied any defects existied.
Lets go back about 10 years ago when Explorers were rolling over all too frequently. Ford blamed it on Firestone tires. It is common for all auto manufacturers to blame a supplier for their engineering problems.
Firestone blamed it on Ford since Firestone was making the tires to meet Fords design specifications for the Explorer, and that Fords tire pressure specs were too low for the size and weight of the Explorer and that was causing the tire failures.
While Ford successfully pushed most of the blame over to Firestone, Ford continued to lose a number of lawsuits for wrongful death and negligence related to the Explorers design causing the roll overs. At the height of this Ford vs Firestone controversy, Ford recalled and replaced Firestone tires on all Explorer vehicles back to 1996. That made Ford look like the good guy and convinced more people that Firestone was the bad guy. Months later, after Ford convinced the world that Firestone was to blame for the Explorer roll over issues, they quietly issued new tire-pressure specification stickers to owners of Explorers that increased the recommended tire pressures, just as Firestone had recommended !! Hmmmm?
Then there is also the Ford Aerostar vans that would self ignite due to problems in the alternator wiringa number of people died before that problem was found and corrected, again, very quietly.
And who over 50 can remember the IED Pintos (Improvised Explosive Device) which used the hatch-backs trunk floor as the top of the gas tank. Hit a Pinto in the rear, the floor seam splits open spilling the fuel into the passenger compartment and the Pinto instantly becomes an inferno. A lot of people died because of that stupid design, but Ford denied any design problems
Dont get me wrong, I am not bashing Ford for their recent success and profit. I think Is great that they got the right leadership in their company to realize that they had to get out of the hole that all US auto makers were digging themselves into. And they were smart enough to start doing that 5 years before Chrysler and GM did.
I just think there is an unfair feeding frenzy going on now with Toyota mostly because Toyota is one of the top selling brands in the world and it is not and American owned company. If Ford had a similar issue with some of its vehicles like it did in the past, they would have never shut down production or even acknowledged that they had a problem and just blame it on one of their supplierslike they did with Firestone?
Rich
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