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Anyone else had the accelerator pedal 'stick'?

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Main Forum' started by mikepaul, Mar 25, 2005.

  1. mikepaul

    mikepaul Senior Member

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    It's been a few days, and it hasn't repeated, but when I decided to floor the accelerator the other day it didn't stop accelerating when I pulled my foot off.

    I was pulling away from a stop sign, and since the road was open I decided to see how the car would respond if I punched the pedal to get to 50 instead of easing up. Well, it punched back, I guess. A quick repress on the gas and firm application of the brake ended the 'fun' ride at about 64MPH.

    With all the fast-charging-this and constant-idle-that that have been posted here, I worry a bit that I'll trigger it again when it won't end nicely...
     
  2. kam

    kam New Member

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    Do you have all the all season floor mats installed? I seem to remember reading about someone else that experienced exactly what you described. It turned out that the back of the acceleration pedal is shaped such that it can wedge in between the ridges of the floor mats and get stuck down.
     
  3. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    The throttle is drive-by-wire on CANBus and is Timing Triggered with multiple fault checks. Theoretically, the pedal will stop responding before causing unattended acceleration.

    I'll side with physical interference with the pedal. I've had a few cases in my driving years where the pedal remained stuck: unusually humid cold day and the throttle blade on a carb actually froze; throttle cable frayed and stuck; and the worst offender a floor mat or an ice scraper caught on the pedal.
     
  4. V8Cobrakid

    V8Cobrakid Green Handyman

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    it happens. I haven't had the "problem" in a long time. Doesn't really matter though. The breakes are a lot stronger than the power on the prius. If you hold the breaks and it still accelerates, it's simply just charging the battery as you slow down. A little freaky because that boost is usualy quite powerful. It tends to go away. At least that's what i found in my experiance 27,000 miles +
     
  5. mikepaul

    mikepaul Senior Member

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    <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(kam\";p=\"75715)</div>
    OK, I would have thought the fat/grooved mats I did put in just a couple of months ago would have prevented the pedal from going all the way to the floor, but this getting-caught thing sounds plausible.

    No more screwing around: those retention clips are going IN this time, so the mat will stay out of the way and not be a potential problem.

    Thanks...
     
  6. angeleno

    angeleno New Member

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    HEY PEOPLE - THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH FLOOR MATS!!

    I can replicate the exact condition that the writer of the first post describes. No floor mats in the car, aggressive acceleration from a stop (i.e. punching it), results in a sticking gas pedal.

    The floor mats are absolutely, unequivocally, NOT the problem!
     
  7. Politburo

    Politburo Active Member

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    Yelling isn't going to change anything. Report your concerns to Toyota and the NHTSA.
     
  8. David Beale

    David Beale Senior Member

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    I suspect either we have a panicked new owner, or a troll. Searching the forum, resurrecting VERY old threads, and trying to generate panic.

    If this claim is real, do as I posted in one of the other threads you resurrected, turn off the car, get out, remove floormats, depress throttle and try to make it stick. If it does contact Toyota USA immediately (the number is in your owners manual). That is the only way you will get the problem resolved. If you think you are doing us a favour by this sort of posting, you're wrong. We already know the pedals don't stick! Most of us have been driving the car for years now.
     
  9. danl

    danl New Member

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    Yup, we got a troll.
     
  10. BAllanJ

    BAllanJ Active Member

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    Up here in Canada, if you wanna troll in the winter, you need a skidoo. :)
     
  11. Rokeby

    Rokeby Member

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    not_this_shit_again.jpg
     
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  12. fuzzy1

    fuzzy1 Senior Member

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    So you have determined that there is exactly one problem, no more? And that none of the millions of Toyotas out there had a floormat problem?

    How did you do that?
     
  13. spinkao

    spinkao New Member

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    [​IMG]
     
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  14. bestmapman

    bestmapman 04, 07 ,08, 09, 10, 16, 21 Prime

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    Troll alert.
     
  15. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    Funny how now there are new members that al start to post stuff.
    knowing the prius is not involved in the gas pedal faulure only the floor mat problem
     
  16. ystasino

    ystasino Active Member

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    I wonder how many Prius drivers ever "floor" the accelerator pedal.
     
  17. jgod12

    jgod12 Junior Member

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    Never had this problem. I did take my rubbermats out awhile ago and replaced them with the clip in ones.
     
  18. chuckh1958

    chuckh1958 New Member

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    Never floored the pedal. Never had the throttle stick either - with or without the floormat present. Of course I'm not certain if any of these problems being reported recently affect 2007's or not.
     
  19. mikepaul

    mikepaul Senior Member

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    As the original poster on this thread, I can say that a combination of properly installed mats and never floring the car again has led to a thrill-free (almost) 5 years of driving. After I learned that going about half-way to the floor gets the car moving as fast as I needed, nothing scary has happened...
     
  20. lurker

    lurker New Member

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    I've been a Prius owner for about 64,000 miles, and absolutely love my car. I've been behind Toyota 100-percent in what I thought was a smear-job.
    But yesterday while out for a Sunday drive with my family I had it happen to me.
    My wife noticed the engine making an odd sound. I heard it too, it was running at higher RPMs than necessary for the driving enviroment (flat surface). Wondering if I could take my foot off the accelerator and coast to essentially shut the engine off, I took my foot off the pedal. To my surprise we maintained the 32 MPH speed for probably 1-1.5 miles. My wife was freaking out, but I was completely calm. I checked the cruise control — it wasn't on. I checked the floor mat, it was in its normal position. Finally, I pushed my toes beneath the accelerator and kind of swept them under there and out from the bottom of the pedal pulling the pedal out.. We finally started decelerating and eventually came to a stop. There was nothing underneath the pedal that I could find. What do you guys think I should do? It didn't happen again for the remainder of our drive — about 50 miles — and I knew I could have always popped it into neutral if I really needed to. I found it more fascinating than anything.