Catastrophic failure, no brakes at 50 MPH

Well, it only takes once at the wrong time and that's my fear.
My daughter received my hand-me-down 2007 Touring edition. She had just turned into a parking lot at @20mph when the panel lit up. She claims engine still running but brakes completely unresponsive. She had to stand on the brakes just to effect a stop after avoiding obstacles (power steering apparently still working. She went to Toyota , they kept it 2 days and drove it 40 miles they say, and went through everything. The 12V battery had been replaced less than a year ago after the vehicle just did a complete shutdown at 40MPH. They could find nothing wrong and no codes. No codes? How can a car that will tell tell them everything not throw a code after that.
I've had a Gen1 for 200K and this Gen 2 for 135K. I'm used to Prius lighting up the panel now and then for no apparent reason but leaving my daughter without brakes because of an intermittent "glitch" is not within my tolerance. I read in this thread that the brakes have a hydraulic reserve... how could a 12V battery failure cause that to fail on the first pedal push?
Toyota said they would check their network for similar incidents... does anyone know if that is true or just std customer deflection?

 

no idea. i agree, once is too many times. most of us have never seen it, so it's hard to assess.

 

Please do as Friendly Jacek suggests. Sadly, businesses seem to be more proactive/serious when a governmental regulating agency starts inquiring, and/or when the company makes headline news (ie, Saylor family's last moments w/ 911 before horrific crash). Sadly, it was this incident that made national and international news, forcing Toyota to finally act. LINK

 

interesting article, thanks. i never read that story before, sounds like a confluence of bad decisions and a lot of people along that way that could have done something, but failed to act. very sad.

 

Standing on the brakes is the proper response to power-assist failure, in any modern passenger car. By federal regulation, the brakes should still function similar to old-fashioned manual brakes.

Have you reported this incident to NHTSA, as linked earlier?

Don't wait for the shop to find, or not find, similar incidents before reporting your incident to NHTSA.

 

That AOL article gives a good summary. Gross negligence on the dealer's part: 1) wrong floor mat, b/c they just didn't care. 2) Secretary not making sure the vehicle doesn't get used again b/c not her job description.

Toyota knew the powder keg was lit with this tragedy; no Public Relations spin possible. A first responder, with driving skills superior vs the average driver, was behind the wheel. You have the 911 audio recording moments before their deaths. Headline news in the US and abroad. NHTSA investigation and Congressional hearings, in overdrive. Incriminating Toyota document boasting of $100Millon savings in a limited recall of Camry and Lexus ES vs a more costly safety recall, July 6, 2009. LINK. The Saylor's die a horrific death Aug 28, 2009.

Personally, NHTSA should of told every vehicle manufacture to make a new universal keyless start/stop system, that's as intuitive as a key, and retrofit their existing smart key cars with this new system. Otherwise, NHTSA will dictate what they new system would be. I doubt any manufacture would have fought NHTSA on this because, of the mood of the public and our lawmakers. They definitely wouldn't want to be seen as profit over safety, like the Toyota memo.

 

i think if the problem was obvious and mechanical, more would have been done. but with millions of cars operating without issue, and a doubling of floor mats causing such a tragedy, the human mind just can't absorb and diagnose it. apparently, even that guy that had it and warned the receptionist didn't bother to take the winter mat out.

 

Yeah I remember reading about that case but I never knew that another driver had borrowed the car just a few days prior and had also experienced the exact same stuck accelerator issue.

The one thing about that case which has always puzzled me, is how someone with as much driving experience as Saylor was unable to put the car into neutral as the previous borrower had done in the earlier incident. It was the exact same car so we know it was possible. And the fact that the passenger had time to make a 911 call makes the mystery even more unnerving. Thinking about this just now however, I'm starting to think that the ergonomics of the power button are probably the real culprit here. I don't know of course, but I will bet that the poor driver was furiously stabbing at the power button right up until the crash. I just don't believe he would have been passive and not tried to turn it off.

The problem is that in a panic situation it is very easy to to get fixated on a single s0lution to a problem. In a non panic situation it's oh so easy to step back and say, "well that didn't work, let's try something different", but not so easy under extreme pressure like this. Of course the 2 to 3 second "lock out" on the power button is actually a necessary safety feature in it's own right (if you are to have a power button in the first place that is). This is because a button is relatively easy to press by accident, either by bumping it with a flick of the hand, or even by just mistaking it for another button on the dash, and of course that would also be considered a safety issue as it would cause and unexpected loss of power.

So I can see why the 2 to 3 second delay is implemented. The problem is that 3 seconds in an extreme situation like this can seem like an eternity. So we see these cases where no doubt people are trying to shut it down but they can not. From what I can gather it appears that in these panic situations the more intuitive response, when the button seems not to work, is to just repeatedly "stab" at it. Maybe the good old ignition key was a better idea?

BTW. The second thing about that case that troubles me is why does the car have more engine power than braking power. Perhaps that (as in not having that) should be a requirement on all model cars?

 

i think it is now.

 

People never think about braking until it becomes really important. Most are only interested in the 0-60, not vice-versa.

I know of some new makes/models that have been released with brakes that are not well-matched to the vehicle.

 

I believe the 'repeated stabs' now works too, on newer models (e.g.. my 2012).

 

Back on topic, the 12v battery only boots up the computers. I'd be very suspicious of the shop if they believe the 12v battery is the culprit.