Autoblog's Sam Abuelsamid video explaining Toyota's sticky pedal - with actual PEDAL!

[Mini 9]

I listen to Sam every week on Autoblog's podcast. He's also occasionally on Autoline After Hours, a great car industry insider show.

http://www.autoblog.com/2010/01/29/video...#continued

[macphanatic]

Not sure that I buy that this is the only issue. A sticking pedal could be resolved by the driver using his foot to pull it back up. And it doesn't explain why a car would accelerate to max rpm unless the driver pushed the pedal to the floor.

[Seacrest]

I love that my motorcycle is now safer than all the Bay Area douchebag Prius drivers' cars. :driving:

And it still produces less smug.

[JoeH]

Prius is not on the recall list. Sorry Seacrest, you missed your chance at feeling smug.

[Mini 9]

Prius(es) have had pedal/throttle, whatever you want to call it issues, though. Plenty of unintended Prius acceleration stories. (I drive a Prius and have experienced issues that others could themselves feel should fall underneath the umbrella of throttle issues) Just search Priuschat.com.

http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-ii-prius...issue.html

My 2006 Prius (pkg 8) has on several occasions decided to accelerate on its own.

http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii-2010...-than.html

prius owners said there's more to it than a floor mat getting in the way of the gas peddel.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/20..._mats.html

Toyota announced it will conduct a recall of 55,000 floor mats which are used in the 2007/2008 Lexus ES 350 as well as the 2007/2008 Camry.

Read more: http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/20...z0e7EUi7FE

http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-ii-prius...eally.html

I was at a light stopped dead. Not in neutral. I accelerated when the light turned green. The car shot off like a bullet. Much faster than I would ever take off.

http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-ii-prius...-mats.html

I had an incident where my pedal stuck on my 2006 Prius...I was being a moron and floored it trying to show off my new car and how "fast" (not) it went (although I am still impressed by the low end torque).

[Grateful11]

Seacrest wrote:
I love that my motorcycle is now safer than all the Bay Area douchebag Prius drivers' cars. :driving:

And it still produces less smug.

I've had over 20 new vehicle in my lifetime and so far the only ones that
haven't had at least 1 recall are an '07 Honda CR-V, an '07 Scion xA, and
our current '10 Prius. Even our '04 Explorer had a 2 or 3 recalls and they
had been making those for 13 years and still didn't have them right. That
POS cost me a bundle when I traded it in. Everything before the '07 Honda
was Big 3 vehicles but no Chrysler products.

Douchebag, no I don't think so we just have watch out for the next redneck
that might try to clip us or tailgate us or try run us off the road. We bought
the Prius because we liked it, were going to buy a Scion xB but didn't like it
the Prius was about $3K more than the xB, rode better, much quieter, nearly
double the gas mileage but we didn't think we would have to deal with scumbag
rednecks that act like 2 year olds because it's certain people have made
popular to not try and save energy because if you do try you'll be lumped
into one big group of anti-American, tree hugging extremists.

[Doc]

I watched an interview with the pedal manufacturer that was part of a tv profile of the problem. According to him, there have been no more than 8 incidents of stuck pedals.

( I assume that he meant to say that he is only aware of 8 incidents.)

I've read of two incidents where it was not the pedal at all. Notably, there was that occasion where the guy managed to safely drive his car to the dealer by moving in and out of neutral. His pedal was not stuck and he had no floor mats to get in the way.

Funny how they didn't mention those incidents. I wonder how much of the tv profile was researched independently and how much was provided to them by Toyota in an attempt to moderate fears.

[Mini 9]

I have never had anyone treat me badly because of my Prius.
I was just in a room with 15 people yesterday, most of the primary income coming from rural, UAW, hourly 'big three' workers, and EACH and EVERY ONE of them could not stop talking about my car. They kept asking if they could borrow it when they go on their trips (to save gas) and such. These are hard core UAW line workers, too.

[Mini 9]

Doc wrote:
I watched an interview with the pedal manufacturer that was part of a tv profile of the problem. According to him, there have been no more than 8 incidents of stuck pedals.

( I assume that he meant to say that he is only aware of 8 incidents.)

I've read of two incidents where it was not the pedal at all. Notably, there was that occasion where the guy managed to safely drive his car to the dealer by moving in and out of neutral. His pedal was not stuck and he had no floor mats to get in the way.

Funny how they didn't mention those incidents. I wonder how much of the tv profile was researched independently and how much was provided to them by Toyota in an attempt to moderate fears.

Still, I hang out at Prius Chat. Very biased bunch of Prius owners. And there are plenty of stories of whatever you want to call it. The bottom line is/was that the car did something the driver had not intended it to do. Now, one CAN dismiss all those claims by actual, PRO PRIUS drivers, or one can believe that something is going on. Again, MINE HAS ISSUES TOO. Nothing I feel that I cannot deal/live with, though. But I warn my wife when she drives it to be alert for when it does it. It does it at least once a week. And I am a neighbor to a local Toyota dealer's service manager, as well. Anyway, issues do exist. Somewhere from the driver's brain to the actual physical movement of the car lies the answer.

[Seacrest]

Calm down folks, it was a little bit o' humour.
I love [zooming by] Prius drivers!