Published on February 6th, 2010 | by Nick Chambers

Is the Prius Broken? What are Toyota’s Quality Woes Really All About?

Toyota’s certainly been having a hell of a time recently. Millions and millions of cars recalled, public relations disasters, seemingly aloof executives—the scope of the whole thing is so mind-boggling to me that it’s almost hard to imagine that this is the same Toyota I grew up with. So I’ll admit it, I’m a Toyota fan boy. My family owned way more Toyotas than anything else and my first car was an ’84 Tercel hand-me-down I got from my parents.

But none of that stops me from objectively evaluating the company and judging for myself if there really is a reason to stop buying Toyotas. Certainly now that even their untarnishable Prius seems to be tarnishing, my trust in Toyota is more shaken than at any point in my life. On top of the stuck accelerator pedals, the Prius braking problems threaten to put a stake through the very heart of a car company that hundreds of millions of customers worldwide hold so dear.

But when I take a step back, I’m left wondering what this is actually all about.

Late last year I wrote a piece in which I questioned whether or not the current Toyota quality issues would actually translate to customer dissatisfaction or a cognizance of some bigger overall quality issue. In that post, I also talked about how if a flagship car like the Prius were to go down in flames it could irreversibly damage Toyota’s reputation. Well, based on what we’re all hearing in the mainstream media, it now seems that all of that is coming to pass.

But is it really? Is this whole situation more of a result of a disproportionate mainstream media feeding frenzy than a truly vast and conspiratorial implosion of Toyota? Truthfully I’ve been kind of disgusted by the foaming mouths within the mainstream media on this issue. Toyota’s been a quality brand for decades. This is the first time in what, 40 years, that anything serious has happened?

The vast majority of Toyota owners are still happy with their cars. And you know what? If it weren’t for Toyota, other automakers wouldn’t have had any impetus to make better cars. We wouldn’t have the super quality Fords of the last 3 years without the quality Toyotas of the last 40. Toyota has been a consistent innovator and has single handedly made hybrids a household word—something the world owes a great debt of gratitude for. Not only that, Toyota is on the cusp of using their market leverage with the Prius to spread the cult of hybrid across all market segments, from subcompacts to minivans.

Certainly Toyota has been kind of doltheaded in their slow-witted response to the current quality issues, but I feel like that’s more of a result of the fact that even Toyota themselves couldn’t believe they were witnessing a quality issue of this scope… just as to consumers, to Toyota execs it was unfathomable that it could be happening. Can you blame them? They’ve been bulletproof for decades.

But even though they were slow to start responding, the current level of response certainly has shown that Toyota wants to please their customers and takes safety seriously. And you know what, the braking problem with the Prius is not something singular to Toyota’s hybrids. It now turns out that Ford has quietly admitted design flaws in the new Fusion Hybrid brakes that they have subsequently issued a software fix for—just like Toyota.

These types of braking problems are a result of the fact that all cars are more and more dependent on software, and that hybrids present a special challenge with regenerative braking versus mechanical braking and when to make the switch between the two. It’s a balance between fuel efficiency and performance that hybrid designers are still tweaking. Of course, because Toyota has so many more hybrids on the road than any other manufacturer, their customers were the first to notice. And in case you missed it, Toyota’s already issued a software fix for the Prius braking problem, showing just how easy it is to tweak.

So what is it? Why are we so intent on tearing down a company that has been so good to us for so long? When it comes to quality issues, why would we expect a company with such a good track record to all of a sudden start building crappy cars? The fact of the matter is they aren’t. This is a bump in the road… A wake up call to Toyota that even they can mess up sometimes. In those immortal words, “This too shall pass.” Toyota is not crumbling. They still make good cars. If you have one that needs to be fixed, take it in to the dealer and move on. Ten years from now we’ll all be in love with Toyota again. Huggy, huggy. Kissy, kissy. And we all went down the road feeling warm and fuzzy again.

But seriously, I feel like something about this Great Recession makes the public hungry to tear down even our immortals. Tiger Woods. Toyota. It’s as if we, as a society, are so collectively upset that we’re worse off than we were 2 years ago that we want even the good guys among us to suffer just so that everybody is miserable. We can’t have anybody else be successful or better off than the rest of us now can we? This type of reactionaryism is so petty. For a rational guy like myself, it just makes me sick.

As for the mainstream media’s response to Toyota’s quality issues, it’s so obvious that they feel impotent when compared to the bloggers because the bloggers started covering these Toyota quality issues months ago. It’s as if the mainstream media has to make up for their growing redundancy with volume and quantity. Meanwhile, here I am, a blogger doing blogger work and I want nothing more than traditional media outlets I can depend on for well-reasoned and critical reporting—taking the blogger leads and sussing them out, not taking the blogger leads and making them louder and less informative.

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Tags: brakes, innovation, mainstream media, prius, quality, Toyota

About the Author

Nick Chambers Not your traditional car guy.

http://www.technologyslice.com.au Tech

Toyota will bounce back. They’re just having a rough time at the moment.
http://www.technologyslice.com.au Tech

Toyota will bounce back. They’re just having a rough time at the moment.
http://blueberrypointe.com Steve Hanley

You raise several issues. One is the increasing irrelevance of the MSM. Its all Ted Turner’s fault. He created the perceived need for 24 hour a day news. And you know what? When you have to fill all those minutes, you wind up dumbing down the news to little more than drivel. Neil Postman’s seminal book, “Amusing Ourselves To Death”explains it all.

A second issue is the basic human instinct to tear down anyone and anything that is at the top of the heap. Watch adolescents playing King Of The Mountain for more on this subject.

A third point is more subtle and uglier. There are still people who maintain a xenophobic hatred for anyone or anything viewed as “unAmerican”. Even though Toyota builds many of its cars here in the US in a process that provides good paying, American jobs to hundreds of thousands, they are still perceived as a Japanese outsider. Maybe folks are still mad about Pearl Harbor. I don’t know….

Lastly, I drove a Prius for 3 years and 75,000 miles. I am well familiar with the peculiar operation of the brakes and it IS pretty unsettling to be slowing down and suddenly feel the brakes stop working. Even though there is no input from the engine, it feels to the driver as if the car is accelerating. It only lasts for a moment, but its a strange thing when it happens.

What amazes me is that the Toyota folks did SUCH a good job of making the transitions between the gasoline engine and the electric motor so seamless as to be undetectable to the driver. Unless you are watching the monitor screen, which shows exactlty which component is doing what and when, the driver is oblivious to all that is going on down in the engine room. Why can’t they do the same thing with the regenerative braking? It’s a conundrum.

Lastly, I believe that Ford relied heavily on Toyota technology when developing its own hybrid systems. So its little wonder that the braking issue that effects Toyota hybrids also effects Ford hybrids.

When you get right down to it, when you consider the degree to which modern cars rely on electronics, the wonder is not that occasional glitches occur. The wonder is that it doesn’t happen more often!
http://blueberrypointe.com Steve Hanley

You raise several issues. One is the increasing irrelevance of the MSM. Its all Ted Turner’s fault. He created the perceived need for 24 hour a day news. And you know what? When you have to fill all those minutes, you wind up dumbing down the news to little more than drivel. Neil Postman’s seminal book, “Amusing Ourselves To Death”explains it all.

A second issue is the basic human instinct to tear down anyone and anything that is at the top of the heap. Watch adolescents playing King Of The Mountain for more on this subject.

A third point is more subtle and uglier. There are still people who maintain a xenophobic hatred for anyone or anything viewed as “unAmerican”. Even though Toyota builds many of its cars here in the US in a process that provides good paying, American jobs to hundreds of thousands, they are still perceived as a Japanese outsider. Maybe folks are still mad about Pearl Harbor. I don’t know….

Lastly, I drove a Prius for 3 years and 75,000 miles. I am well familiar with the peculiar operation of the brakes and it IS pretty unsettling to be slowing down and suddenly feel the brakes stop working. Even though there is no input from the engine, it feels to the driver as if the car is accelerating. It only lasts for a moment, but its a strange thing when it happens.

What amazes me is that the Toyota folks did SUCH a good job of making the transitions between the gasoline engine and the electric motor so seamless as to be undetectable to the driver. Unless you are watching the monitor screen, which shows exactlty which component is doing what and when, the driver is oblivious to all that is going on down in the engine room. Why can’t they do the same thing with the regenerative braking? It’s a conundrum.

Lastly, I believe that Ford relied heavily on Toyota technology when developing its own hybrid systems. So its little wonder that the braking issue that effects Toyota hybrids also effects Ford hybrids.

When you get right down to it, when you consider the degree to which modern cars rely on electronics, the wonder is not that occasional glitches occur. The wonder is that it doesn’t happen more often!
Steve Shurts

What a schill piece… Several years ago, Toyota took the stance that they were going to knock off GM as the largest auto manufacturer in the world. And, they have achieved that goal. However, with that status, comes the inevitable slippage in quality control.

Through their aggressive marketing, they rushed through all kinds of makes and models that were outside their “normal” business model. Look at their large trucks. The T-100 has a frame that rusts in half and Toyota began buying them back and crushing them. Was that a cover-up? Seems like one to me…

Toyota is now suffering the fate of mega-corporations with top management far removed from the manufacturing process. While they may want to maintain Toyota’s image, they don’t know what is going on in the plants. I’m sure Toyota will rebound, but it will cost them a lot of money and consumer trust.

Of course, this could all be a plot by Obama Motors to make them look bad so people will rush out and buy Chevrolets. Nah, I doubt it… I think this is an example of corporate greed outstripping corporate quality. Toyota will be fine – you’re reporting is suspect.
- Nick Chambers
  
  Steve S,
  
  You really think this is a shill piece? I’m not paid by anybody but this blog for my writing here. If you think I’m likely biased, that is a different story. I made no attempt to hide the fact that I like Toyotas, but Toyota has never compensated me for anything. Blogging is typically one part reporting and one part opinion. In the case of this piece, it’s mostly opinion. I’m simply trying to be realistic about the situation. If you have a problem with my opinion, fine. If you want to accuse me of being paid by the industry to write puff pieces, I suggest you read my hundreds of other posts on this site and around the web, including on the New York Times website. Then come back here and try to defend your accusatory position.
Steve Shurts

What a schill piece… Several years ago, Toyota took the stance that they were going to knock off GM as the largest auto manufacturer in the world. And, they have achieved that goal. However, with that status, comes the inevitable slippage in quality control.

Through their aggressive marketing, they rushed through all kinds of makes and models that were outside their “normal” business model. Look at their large trucks. The T-100 has a frame that rusts in half and Toyota began buying them back and crushing them. Was that a cover-up? Seems like one to me…

Toyota is now suffering the fate of mega-corporations with top management far removed from the manufacturing process. While they may want to maintain Toyota’s image, they don’t know what is going on in the plants. I’m sure Toyota will rebound, but it will cost them a lot of money and consumer trust.

Of course, this could all be a plot by Obama Motors to make them look bad so people will rush out and buy Chevrolets. Nah, I doubt it… I think this is an example of corporate greed outstripping corporate quality. Toyota will be fine – you’re reporting is suspect.
- Nick Chambers
  
  Steve S,
  
  You really think this is a shill piece? I’m not paid by anybody but this blog for my writing here. If you think I’m likely biased, that is a different story. I made no attempt to hide the fact that I like Toyotas, but Toyota has never compensated me for anything. Blogging is typically one part reporting and one part opinion. In the case of this piece, it’s mostly opinion. I’m simply trying to be realistic about the situation. If you have a problem with my opinion, fine. If you want to accuse me of being paid by the industry to write puff pieces, I suggest you read my hundreds of other posts on this site and around the web, including on the New York Times website. Then come back here and try to defend your accusatory position.
John

I’ve always liked Hondas quite a bit more than Toyotas, so I never understood the enthusiasm in the first place. But I agree that the media feeding frenzy is overdone — such is the nature of media feeding frenzies.
John

I’ve always liked Hondas quite a bit more than Toyotas, so I never understood the enthusiasm in the first place. But I agree that the media feeding frenzy is overdone — such is the nature of media feeding frenzies.
Tim Cleland

Welcome to the #1 spot. GM held it for many decades and all they got was grief from the MSM, consumer reports, etc., even though their cars had the best quality of the American cars and, starting around year 2000, had better quality than all but Honda and Toyota.

GM had the additional disadvantage of being an “evil American corporation” (even while providing thousands of cushy, secure union jobs), so they never got any kind of respect for having the most fuel efficient trucks/SUVs, compact cars (Cobalt/G5 XFE), mid-size cars (Malibu, G6, Aura) and full-size car (the 2000-2005 Impala) or the fact that, for many years, they

had the least expensive car on the market (Aveo). All during the bankruptcy debacle, none of the above was ever acknowledged…in fact the message seemed to be just the opposite: “All they make is big expensive gashogs with bad quality.”

(Sorry, this is a bit of a sore spot with me and I’m sure it shows. I don’t work for GM, but I have/had the same love for GM cars growing up that you have for Toyota.)

Toyota will bounce back. They seem to have a penchant for pleasing the “in” crowd.
Tim Cleland

Welcome to the #1 spot. GM held it for many decades and all they got was grief from the MSM, consumer reports, etc., even though their cars had the best quality of the American cars and, starting around year 2000, had better quality than all but Honda and Toyota.

GM had the additional disadvantage of being an “evil American corporation” (even while providing thousands of cushy, secure union jobs), so they never got any kind of respect for having the most fuel efficient trucks/SUVs, compact cars (Cobalt/G5 XFE), mid-size cars (Malibu, G6, Aura) and full-size car (the 2000-2005 Impala) or the fact that, for many years, they

had the least expensive car on the market (Aveo). All during the bankruptcy debacle, none of the above was ever acknowledged…in fact the message seemed to be just the opposite: “All they make is big expensive gashogs with bad quality.”

(Sorry, this is a bit of a sore spot with me and I’m sure it shows. I don’t work for GM, but I have/had the same love for GM cars growing up that you have for Toyota.)

Toyota will bounce back. They seem to have a penchant for pleasing the “in” crowd.
Steve Ribich

Im sorry there have been deaths due to the Toyota braking problem, about 17 deaths I understand.

But I wonder why the studies showing that there are 100,000 deaths each year in our hospitals is not getting the same concern and coverage as to what to do to fix it.
Steve Ribich

Im sorry there have been deaths due to the Toyota braking problem, about 17 deaths I understand.

But I wonder why the studies showing that there are 100,000 deaths each year in our hospitals is not getting the same concern and coverage as to what to do to fix it.
ChuckL

Sorry, Nick, but The better cars would still be here even without Toyota.

What bothers me more than the preliminary denials is that the available evidence seems to indicate that we now have “drive by wire” vehicles with no mechanical connection between the accelerator or the brake pedals and the item being controlled. I know that the F-16 and later military planes are “fly by wire” but both the F-16 and the B-2 have multiple redundancy by way of several back-up computers.

Perhaps there should be a way to switch the regenerative braking off so that every driver can experience this failure in a big open parking lot.

As Toyota is supposedly fixing this problem with a metal pedal stop under the brake pedal, it would seem that the problem which they have is not the same.

The Consumer Reports story indicates that the Ford does indeed have redundancy, just that it requires a much longer throw of the brake pedal. I fully agree that this will cause most operators, I hesitate to call them drivers, to believe that they have lost all braking and to not even use other stopping means. You know, I am sure that the hand brake is an excellent emergency brake; we used to call them that and I even had an opportunity to use one in an emergency. Of course I am 73 years old, have been driving since I was 16, and have covered well over a million miles, so I’ve probably had more opportunities than most. Word of warning. If you do use the hand or foot parking brake in an emergency, be sure to keep the release activated so you don’t lock up the bake wheels and spin the vehicle out.

You berated the “mainstream media” for not covering this news item quickly, but what used to be a news media is now just a political opinion issuing group. They don’t cover news stories that don’t support their opinion and from their coverage of the Tea Party assemblies, one has to question if they were even there. If you were at one of those assemblies and then read about it in “mainstream media” you couldn’t recognize the same assembly.
ChuckL

Sorry, Nick, but The better cars would still be here even without Toyota.

What bothers me more than the preliminary denials is that the available evidence seems to indicate that we now have “drive by wire” vehicles with no mechanical connection between the accelerator or the brake pedals and the item being controlled. I know that the F-16 and later military planes are “fly by wire” but both the F-16 and the B-2 have multiple redundancy by way of several back-up computers.

Perhaps there should be a way to switch the regenerative braking off so that every driver can experience this failure in a big open parking lot.

As Toyota is supposedly fixing this problem with a metal pedal stop under the brake pedal, it would seem that the problem which they have is not the same.

The Consumer Reports story indicates that the Ford does indeed have redundancy, just that it requires a much longer throw of the brake pedal. I fully agree that this will cause most operators, I hesitate to call them drivers, to believe that they have lost all braking and to not even use other stopping means. You know, I am sure that the hand brake is an excellent emergency brake; we used to call them that and I even had an opportunity to use one in an emergency. Of course I am 73 years old, have been driving since I was 16, and have covered well over a million miles, so I’ve probably had more opportunities than most. Word of warning. If you do use the hand or foot parking brake in an emergency, be sure to keep the release activated so you don’t lock up the bake wheels and spin the vehicle out.

You berated the “mainstream media” for not covering this news item quickly, but what used to be a news media is now just a political opinion issuing group. They don’t cover news stories that don’t support their opinion and from their coverage of the Tea Party assemblies, one has to question if they were even there. If you were at one of those assemblies and then read about it in “mainstream media” you couldn’t recognize the same assembly.
http://NA Peg Willard

I have a 2006 Prius and have experienced brief loss of control, feeling like skidding, when going over bumps or potholes. Not a big problem. But have also had a problem with cruise control use coinciding with the acceleration dragging, on an interstate. Problem stopped after I pulled off the road, stopped the car and restarted. Then had a problem recently about 5 miles after leaving a Toyota regular checkup appointment–saw three scary icons on the dash, stopped to call service dept, turned around to return as asked, and, after waiting to cross a stream of traffic, the car, which had turned off as usual, refused to accelerate and stopped dead. Towed…in the shop 2 days…Toyota paid for a rental and what I’m guessing was a resetting of the computer…they could find nothing. Car has been fine since. But I feel I am driving a computer, and computers in my experience are not always reliable.
Tim Cleland

“But I feel I am driving a computer, and computers in my experience are not always reliable.”

Something that bothers me about this gas pedal “fix” that Toyota is touting, is that when you listen to the stories of the “incidents”, the fix doesn’t fit.

Most of the accounts I’ve heard relate something to the effect of, “the car suddenly accelerated”…i.e. not “kept on accelerating” or “the engine wouldn’t come down to idle” which would be what a stuck gas pedal would cause.
Tim Cleland

“But I feel I am driving a computer, and computers in my experience are not always reliable.”

Something that bothers me about this gas pedal “fix” that Toyota is touting, is that when you listen to the stories of the “incidents”, the fix doesn’t fit.

Most of the accounts I’ve heard relate something to the effect of, “the car suddenly accelerated”…i.e. not “kept on accelerating” or “the engine wouldn’t come down to idle” which would be what a stuck gas pedal would cause.
http://chrisdemorro.com/ Christopher DeMorro

I have a simple solution to this mess.

Unintended acceleration? Shift the car to neutral.

Should the car accelerate on its own? Hell no. But all this media attention is unnecessary. I’m not even a big Toyota fan and I can see they are getting raked over the coals here.
http://chrisdemorro.com/ Christopher DeMorro

I have a simple solution to this mess.

Unintended acceleration? Shift the car to neutral.

Should the car accelerate on its own? Hell no. But all this media attention is unnecessary. I’m not even a big Toyota fan and I can see they are getting raked over the coals here.
jogartrago

Given the reliability of most autos these days it makes economic sense to buy a low-mileage 2 or 3 year old used car. Toyota dealers and most used car dealers are going to take a hit on Toyotas in their inventory for the likelihood of these used cars to undergo the repairs needed to make them safe is remote.
jogartrago

Given the reliability of most autos these days it makes economic sense to buy a low-mileage 2 or 3 year old used car. Toyota dealers and most used car dealers are going to take a hit on Toyotas in their inventory for the likelihood of these used cars to undergo the repairs needed to make them safe is remote.
Ken

Based on your comments, you show a surprising lack of Toyota historical knowledge. Toyota presided over what was probably the largest engine recall in automotive history … that would be the 3.0 sohc v6 as found in 4Runner’s, T-100’s, early camry’s, SR5’s et. al. I don’t believe there was ever an official recall, but for years, you could find these vehicles stacked up the back of dealerships. They were waiting for rebuilds ranging from heads only to complete rebuilds. The heads were defective. A good reporter would have done some actual research. Those of us who paid attention could have told you 18 years ago that this would happen … and no Toyota management weren’t surprised, they just got caught, doing what they have done for years … conceal quality/safety flaws.
- Nick Chambers
  
  Ken,
  
  Two things:
  
  1) Your argument makes no sense. You show a clear disregard for rational analysis. “I don’t believe there was ever an official recall, but for years, you could find these vehicles stacked up the back of dealerships.” Back up your argument with some actual facts please. I’ve never heard this from anybody, ever. You say it was “probably the largest engine recall in automotive history” yet in the next sentence you say there was never a recall. Does that truly make sense to you beyond being complete gibberish? Seriously.
  
  2) A reporter with the kind of time you suggest I have to follow up on leads like the ridiculous one you’re providing me get paid a lot more money than I do and don’t work other jobs. The reality in this world of lowered journalism salaries is that there is no one left to follow up on those leads because people want all of their news for free. If you want reporters to spend the kinds of time you suggest they spend, then you better be willing to start paying for your news again. You and millions of others. If not, then you’ll have to settle with “bad reporters.” It’s called blogging.
Ken

Based on your comments, you show a surprising lack of Toyota historical knowledge. Toyota presided over what was probably the largest engine recall in automotive history … that would be the 3.0 sohc v6 as found in 4Runner’s, T-100’s, early camry’s, SR5’s et. al. I don’t believe there was ever an official recall, but for years, you could find these vehicles stacked up the back of dealerships. They were waiting for rebuilds ranging from heads only to complete rebuilds. The heads were defective. A good reporter would have done some actual research. Those of us who paid attention could have told you 18 years ago that this would happen … and no Toyota management weren’t surprised, they just got caught, doing what they have done for years … conceal quality/safety flaws.
- Nick Chambers
  
  Ken,
  
  Two things:
  
  1) Your argument makes no sense. You show a clear disregard for rational analysis. “I don’t believe there was ever an official recall, but for years, you could find these vehicles stacked up the back of dealerships.” Back up your argument with some actual facts please. I’ve never heard this from anybody, ever. You say it was “probably the largest engine recall in automotive history” yet in the next sentence you say there was never a recall. Does that truly make sense to you beyond being complete gibberish? Seriously.
  
  2) A reporter with the kind of time you suggest I have to follow up on leads like the ridiculous one you’re providing me get paid a lot more money than I do and don’t work other jobs. The reality in this world of lowered journalism salaries is that there is no one left to follow up on those leads because people want all of their news for free. If you want reporters to spend the kinds of time you suggest they spend, then you better be willing to start paying for your news again. You and millions of others. If not, then you’ll have to settle with “bad reporters.” It’s called blogging.