Scienciness has a bad day

I have tried to ignore the ginned-up controversy over Toyota and it's so-called unintended acceleration problem.  But damn! this issue annoyed me.  I took it personally--which was probably pretty stupid but there you have it.  I have a lot invested in this.

• We own a Toyota Camry and an Lexus LS in this household.  This story had a real-world impact on the resale value of our vehicles.
• I spent quite a bit of time in the 1980s reading up on Toyota's successful attempt to re-invent the whole concept of quality control.  If in fact this process was flawed, I have wasted a bunch of time and have lowered my credibility because I became a minor expert on the subject--going so far as to cite their efforts favorably in Elegant Technology.
• I like to be the car stud in any room--I have gone to some effort to be the expert on things automotive.  I have an ego at stake here.

But mostly I couldn't stand the friggen liars that were telling these utterly unbelievable fabrications about Toyota--often in the face of hard physical evidence.  What was worse, there were those--especially on the left--that not only believed these whoppers, but thought themselves morally superior to those of us who didn't.  Uff da!


To recap.  Even though I TRIED to ignore this foolishness I still blogged about it five times.

Thursday, February 25, 2010
Why I don't believe the Toyota slander

Friday, February 26, 2010
The crazy war against Toyota

Sunday, February 28, 2010
Why I defend Toyota

Thursday, March 18, 2010
I know, I promised no more posts on Toyota

Thursday, August 12, 2010
After months of hysterical Toyota bashing, the facts start coming in

So Tuesday, the BIG government report on the study conducted by the Transportation Department AND NASA confirms what folks like us have believed all along.  I was worried--not because the facts were not on our side--but because the Predator Classes so routinely get matters of science and technology wrong.  Well the study was in the hands of real rocket scientists so the good guys won the day.

And yes, this has made me happy!

Government: No electronic flaws in Toyotas

By KEN THOMAS, Associated Press – Tue Feb 8, 6:12 pm ET

WASHINGTON – Electronic flaws weren't to blame for the reports of sudden, unintended acceleration that led to the recall of thousands of Toyota vehicles, the government said Tuesday.

Some of the acceleration cases could have been caused by mechanical defects — sticking accelerator pedals and gas pedals that can become trapped in floor mats — that have been dealt with in recalls, the government said.

And in some cases, investigators suggested, drivers simply hit the gas when they meant to press the brake.

"We feel that Toyota vehicles are safe to drive," declared Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

The investigation bolstered Toyota's contentions that electronic gremlins were not to blame and its series of recalls — involving more than 12 million vehicles globally since fall 2009 — had directly addressed the safety concerns.

Transportation officials, assisted by engineers with NASA, said the 10-month study of Toyota vehicles concluded there was no electronic cause of unintended high-speed acceleration. The study, launched at the request of Congress, responded to consumer complaints that flawed electronics could be the culprit behind complaints that led to Toyota's spate of recalls.

Recalls to fix sticking accelerator pedals, gas pedals that became trapped in floor mats, and other safety issues have posed a major challenge for the world's No. 1 automaker, which has scrambled to protect its reputation for safety and reliability. Toyota paid the U.S. government a record $48.8 million in fines for its handling of three recalls.

Toyota said the report should "further reinforce confidence in the safety of Toyota and Lexus vehicles" and "put to rest unsupported speculation" about the company's electronic throttle control systems, which are "well-designed and well-tested to ensure that a real world, un-commanded acceleration of the vehicle cannot occur."

Toyota reported a 39 percent slide in quarterly profit earlier Tuesday but raised its full-year forecasts for earnings and car sales. The financial results and government report boosted shares of the automaker on Wall Street by more than 4 percent, to close at $88.57.

Analysts said the report would help Toyota's reputation but the company would still need to work hard to regain its bulletproof image of reliability. Toyota was the only major automaker to see a U.S. sales decline last year at 0.4 percent.

"This is really something that is going to take years and years to recover," said Rebecca Lindland, director of automotive research with consulting firm IHS Automotive.

Federal officials said they thoroughly examined the acceleration reports and could not find evidence of an electronic problem. Instead, investigators with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said the evidence showed that cases in which owners complained about ineffective brakes were most likely caused by "pedal misapplication," in which the driver stepped on the accelerator instead of the brakes.

Many of the complaints involved cases in which the vehicle accelerated after it was stationary or at very low speed.

LaHood said NASA engineers "rigorously examined" nine Toyotas driven by consumers who complained of unintended acceleration. NASA reviewed 280,000 lines of software code to look for flaws that could cause the acceleration. Investigators tested mechanical components in Toyotas that could lead to the problem and bombarded vehicles with electro-magnetic radiation to see whether that could make the electronics cause the cars to speed up.

Electronic problems can include buggy software, circuitry influenced by electrical interference and electrical shorts. The problems are often difficult to spot and can surface when combined with environmental factors like a blast from a heater vent or moisture from the road.

A preliminary part of the study, released last August, failed to find any electronic flaws based on a review of event data recorders, or vehicle black boxes. more

The official Toyota response can be found here.