Gojirra99

http://money.cnn.com/2004/03/09/news...reut/index.htm

Captain Bone

Good small read.

I hope to hear more on this issue, since I'm fairly certain its 90% user error.

-Anthony

mmarshall

Maybe so....but take this investigation with a grain of salt. Not so much the Solara, but many people driving Camrys and ES300's tend to be older drivers with poorer vision and reflexes. I've seen this happen....they sometimes step on the wrong pedal by mistake. There was a famous case of this recently in Florida whan an 86-year-old man hit the gas pedal by mistake and ran into the front of a store doing a LOT of damage.
The Camry is a nice, quiet, easy-riding car that appeals to older drivers in much the same way the Avalon does. Ditto for the ES.
Now, before you younger guys with ES300's here on the forum (and I know you're there) give me a bunch of flak, I KNOW that the ES is not ONLY for older people. Neither is the Camry. But the fact is that like it or not, the Camry, Avalon, and ES do have a reputation for appealing to older people.....much in the same manner as the Buick LeSabre/Park Avenue, Mercury Grand Marquis, and Cadillac DeVille. And Grampa and Grandma sometimes aren't too well co-ordinated with their feet.

SecPole14

Holy cow.

*Gets up, punches wall repeatedly*

OK, I'm fine now. But this is truly ridiculous. Anybody remember that fisaco with Audi in the '80s. Or that old bastard who complained about malfunctioing cruise control on the LS when Lexus first debuted?

I'm guessing that guy in California who mowed down all those poor people in that market had a sticky accelerator on his car that suddenly forced a surge forward.

Thanks to the miracles of modern science (read sarcasm) people are now living long enough to be considered fossils and refuse to give up their freedom [to drive]. Remember in our national doctrine where it says something about having your freedom, so long as it does not limit or intefere with other people's freedom? I guess these geriatrics don't. Or maybe they forgot. Just like they forget which pedal to push to make the car "STOP."

NO ONE can dispute the scientific findings that time after time have proven that with increased age, vision and reflexes decrease [significantly]. There's nothing wrong with Lexus or Toyota's products. There's something wrong with the idiot drivers in this country.

How many race car drivers do you see competing past the age of 60? And even if they do, it's on a closed course with tons of safety gear. I swear, anybody over the age of 75 (or maybe even less) should have to have a doctor give them a thorough physical and mental exam and then send them on their way to the DMV where they would have to reapply for a license and take a special driving test to determine real-life reflex ability.

This problem is getting worse by the day. I can't stand all these 5 foot ladies driving their deceased husbands' Fleetwoods when they can barely see over the wheel, parking crooked and swerving all over the road.

And the thing is, I really like old people. I'm angry because the safety of the old people is at stake, as well as safety of others on the road (or on sidewalks, etc.).

Families should also take an active role in deciding whether or not their loved ones should be on the road. But noooooooo, our society likes to ostracize old people and send them away to retirement villages. If my gandpa was not fit to drive, we would not let him and we would see to it that we could take him wherever he needed/wanted to go.

If you combine the number of Camrys and ES's sold, it would probably be the best-selling car in America. No crap that's going to automatically lend it to fall to a disproportionate number of these types of reports.

Old people are stubborn and most don't want to admit that they can't do something, so they just go on taking pills and getting surguries and living life like they're not getting older. This society needs to get a grip.

The fact that this country has no real mass transit system only compounds the problem.

I could write some equally empassioned things about why we shouldn't be licensed at the age of 16 or 17 or why we should have special license classes and restrictions and provisions for soccer moms and yuppies who see it fit to drive 3-ton SUVs. But that's for another time and place...

/rant

mmarshall

Thanks, wantAnewLex........sounds like you agree with most of what I posted.
On your reply....combining the Camry / ES sales figures would not MAKE the Camry the country's best-selling car........it already IS the best-selling car (trailed closely by the Accord and Taurus). And yes, that alone explains a number of its older drivers. But age alone does not necessarily make a bad driver.....look at Carroll Shelby, a guy in his eighties. Every bone in his body is held together by some kind of clip, pin, screw, etc..... Same with A. J. Foyt. Same with Mario Andretti, Richard Petty, and a lot of other guys.. Those guys could still drive circles around us on a course, even at their age. But yes, the average 85-year-old Granny will sometimes have a brain freeze.....unfortunately, sometimes with bad results.

Vegassc400

30 out of 1,000,000 vehicles? With all the other vehicles with proven problems (Honda's transmission prob comes to mind) they pick this problem to investigate.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and start a conspiracy theory here. Toyota just passed Ford to be #2. They are on the way to being #1. There have to be quite a few politicians with their hands in GM and Fords pocket. A few calls to Washington and here comes an investigation. Maybe they're grasping at straws hoping a bad report will help them keep their market share.

In my next post I will tell you who killed JFK and Marilyn Monroe.

RA40

iTrader: (6)

I've taken these reports as driver error. Now that you have to have the brake depressed to shift, it alleviates some of this. However I see enough two footed drivers on the roads...always obvious as their brakes lights are on while driving. It is these people I suspect that are the cause of such investigations and lawsuits into "faulty" cars.

"I had the barke depressed but the car revv'd and drove through the wall." Like a gremlin got in and swapped the brake for the gas pedal.

squarehat

The only story I've ever heard involving a Lexus and "unintended acceleration" involved an LS, not an ES--the story with the woman in Texas driving her LS 430 through a storefront . Here's the thread with that story: https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...=drive+by+wire

mmarshall

Even IF there IS a defect in the cars.....and THAT, of course, is doubtful....in most cases, all you would have to do is shift into neutral, look for a safe place to stop, hit the brake pedal, and pull over and stop. If the engine suddenly goes to redline and is damaged or siezes up when you shift into neutral.....well, that certainly is preferable to what could happen in a full-throttle accident. The conventional wisdom of just shutting off the ignition is not a good idea in today's cars....you would lose power steering and power brakes and make the car difficult to control. Even worse, you could also accidentally lock the steering wheel.

Pianoman72

That is so true. You could just pop it in neutral easily and quickly. My old Cutlass had some sort of problem with the idle speed (30mph!) and I had to pop it into N when coming to a stop or it just wasn't going to happen.

People should not be allowed to drive with two feet unless one is on the clutch pedal.

doug_999

Wow guys - no way could there be a problem with these cars, they are perfect right? Must be the old drivers, yea, that's it.

I posted this same story over in the ES forum along with my experience in an 04 ES loaner (a car not covered in this investigation). While slowing to a stop, the car would occasionally downshift and surge forward. This happened only when the car was cold and only when I was slowing to a stop. Pressing the brake a little harder brought the car to a stop of course but if anyone had been crossing the street in front of me, I'm pretty sure I would have scared the crap out of them (and myself).

mmarshall

Well, the ES has had a number of owner complaints about surging, hesitating, erratic transmission response, etc.... That has been well-documented not only here in the Club Lexus Forums but on other Lexus web and chat sites. But that is NOT the problem we are discssing here. Apparantly, what this so-called problem involves is unintended Audi 5000-style acceleration. I don't know if you remember that flap from 1985 when the TV media almost ruined Audi's U.S. market with the same allegations....I certainly do. Audi didn't really recover until just a couple of years ago. It is possible that a few Camrys and ES's could have faulty throttle position sensors or other devices that could cause this..... ( that is what the investigation is for ) but I think most of us here on this forum would bet....(me included).....that it is more likely Granny's unco-ordinated feet and slow reflexes. Heck, I myself am nowhere near Granny's age, and with my BIG size-15 EEE clodhoppers I sometimes press both pedals at once....accidentially.

Vegassc400

Doug999 - Thank you for clarifying the problem. Since no specifics were given in the article and I don't frequent the ES board this was news to me. If there is a problem then it should be resolved.

I don't believe that anyone was trying to state that these cars are perfect. Just that 30 reported incidents out of 1,000,000 cars seemed quite low and might have been driver error.

doug_999

What happened to Audi was bull I totally agree. I watch all of these 60 minute type shows with a bit of skepticism now. However, the investigations did find that the Audi pedal gas/brake placement was closer than almost every car on the street - this of course led to a bunch of these issues. Driver error? You bet. But Audi did not help the cause. However, I knew a couple of people that had 5000s back then and man they were in the shop a lot for stupid little things. So I think some of their sales issues were also self induced. Either way, it looks like they have cleaned up their act nicely.

SecPole14

My dad bought a 5000S in '85, aware of the reports. Needless to say, he never had the "surging" problem, but many other things went wrong with the car. It was a marvel of areodynamic engineering, but plagued with problems.

EDIT: Ack! Just realized I have the tach from that car sitting on my desk as a paperweight!