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Drive-by-wire, at the economies of scale 21st century car manufacturers were trying to push for, was just a bad idea. Electrics are and will continue to be the 21st century car's achille's heel. These are not F-16s or Airbuses, where the weight considerations and aerodynamic stability augmentation requirements makes electric driven control worthwhile. No, these are the same buggies we've been driving for 100 years; mechanical linkages would suffice and make it quite idiot-proof to the peanut gallery that doesn't have the benefit of specialized pilot training or ejection seats. Everytime I hear a recall about "flashing" a car's PCM, I cringe. Gives an ironic outcome to the common "blue screen of death" moniker.
You want an futuristic experience? Go to disney world, leave the point A to point B transportation to the idiot proof mechanical linkages that won't read you the cotton-pickin' horoscope or call your mother-in-law while you glide behind ten LCD displays, but will get you to work just the same. Or you could die from a runaway PCM, your pick...Are we that broke we seek derive that much entertainment value out of our daily drivers? Sad.
AMEN, AGAIN!! I agree wholeheartedly. I couldn't have said it any better.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve_TN
John - Southern pizza SUCKS! It's pathetic. I'd kill to have a couple or more pieces of REAL Jersey pizza!!!! I'm so desperate, I might just get in your Camry to get the pizza!
You're both cracking me up. I might join you two for that NJ/NY pizza. I'll chip in for gas and food.
Drive-by-wire, at the economies of scale 21st century car manufacturers were trying to push for, was just a bad idea. Electrics are and will continue to be the 21st century car's achille's heel. These are not F-16s or Airbuses, where the weight considerations and aerodynamic stability augmentation requirements makes electric driven control worthwhile. No, these are the same buggies we've been driving for 100 years; mechanical linkages would suffice and make it quite idiot-proof to the peanut gallery that doesn't have the benefit of specialized pilot training or ejection seats. Everytime I hear a recall about "flashing" a car's PCM, I cringe. Gives an ironic outcome to the common "blue screen of death" moniker.
You want an futuristic experience? Go to disney world, leave the point A to point B transportation to the idiot proof mechanical linkages that won't read you the cotton-pickin' horoscope or call your mother-in-law while you glide behind ten LCD displays, but will get you to work just the same. Or you could die from a runaway PCM, your pick...Are we that broke we seek derive that much entertainment value out of our daily drivers? Sad.
Quote:
Originally Posted by John1960
News, New Evidence of Runaway Toyotas May Help Imprisoned Camry Owner.
Emerging evidence of flaws in Toyotas could help free a Minnesota man who was convicted of vehicular homicide despite his claims the brakes did not work as his Camry suddenly accelerated and slammed into another car, killing three members of one family.
I've suspected it was the drive by wire or CPU from the beginning.
For one thing, I defy anyone to wad up a floormat so it will cause the accelerator pedal to go down. A wadded floormat could possibly interfere with the brakes, but absent an outside force I don't see how a floormat could create acceleration.
A bug in the electronics, OTOH, can create numerous tragedies.
^ a hard plastic floormat can do this. the kind people use for weather protection. snow, wet, etc. it happened to me once, but the car was stationary. got into the car after putting in gas, the car went full on throttle when i turned the key. i thought 'wtf,' shut off the car, and started it three more times until i realized the prob. it was a very high mileage engine and it blew the head gasket
this has nothing to do with your post, i just wanted to share my story about floormats =]
yet the real reason i am posting is to say i saw last nights Nightline and even without this acceleration problem, the test results were somewhat disturbing. i mean you cause a short and not only does a so called "fail safe" not work, but the cars computer shows nothing happened? no error code at all, although a major malfunction seemingly occurred?
to be fair to Toyota, the guy doing the testing didn't say if other makes might do the same thing (no error code), and no other car makes were tested, apparently. and Toyota has invited him to do the same or similar testing with its own people after questioning his methods
what all this means atm, i don't know? but, it does make me look poorly on the brand, somewhat. if just until more is known. if its "more of the same" with no clear answers, i don't like that kind of mystery in my automobiles
Location: Still in Portland, Oregon, for some reason
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This explains everything as far as I'm concerned:
- The lack of proof or fault codes.
- The acceleration with out a jammed pedal or floor mat.
- The ineffectiveness of the brakes and the reaction of the drivers.
In computerized digital systems, you can never guarantee error free operation. You can only hope you found all the errors, and provided for their resolution.
(See: M$ Windoze for an example)
"To err is human -- to really foul things up, you need a computer!"
Drive-by-wire, at the economies of scale 21st century car manufacturers were trying to push for, was just a bad idea. Electrics are and will continue to be the 21st century car's achille's heel. These are not F-16s or Airbuses, where the weight considerations and aerodynamic stability augmentation requirements makes electric driven control worthwhile. No, these are the same buggies we've been driving for 100 years; mechanical linkages would suffice and make it quite idiot-proof to the peanut gallery that doesn't have the benefit of specialized pilot training or ejection seats. Everytime I hear a recall about "flashing" a car's PCM, I cringe. Gives an ironic outcome to the common "blue screen of death" moniker.
You want an futuristic experience? Go to disney world, leave the point A to point B transportation to the idiot proof mechanical linkages that won't read you the cotton-pickin' horoscope or call your mother-in-law while you glide behind ten LCD displays, but will get you to work just the same. Or you could die from a runaway PCM, your pick...Are we that broke we seek derive that much entertainment value out of our daily drivers? Sad.
You are confusing the ECU with the onboard entertainment systems, which are not connected in any way. You seem to think that just because it is electronic it is connected. Yet you seem to have the intelligence to at least parrot the S&C requirements for modern aircraft design. So I will be slow...
I am an aerospace engineer who has been working with Flight Controls of aircraft for some time now. Inherent are the safety and reliability requirements and what to do when there is a fault detected. It's called vehicle health & monitoring systems, or monitors for short. Aircraft have, since electronic computers have been on airplanes (pioneered by Boeing and its heritage companies), had monitoring systems to see if there are shorts, grounds, erroneous data, or unbelievable inputs like air data coming from the pitot probes.
I saw the ABC news special where they interviewed the professor who designed a board to short out a segment of the ECU, and proved that Toyota does NOT HAVE ANY INDEPENDENT MONITORING SYSTEMS WHATSOEVER WITH THE ENGINE CONTROL UNIT. That seems very dangerous and it bewilders me that they do not have rigid safety fault trees to determine where monitoring is required. Aircraft have monitoring on anything that may fault with more than 1,000 hours of flying. Then, by design, the rest of the stuff that doesn't has redundancy and is considered minor and will be logged in the maintenance computer. This system has been used, safely, by Airbus and Boeing, for decades. They're in fact advancing to the point that single failures, if present, will still not present a problem and the pilots will be able to fly normally without special input with minor failures.
So, while I cannot comment whether Ford and other companies do the same, all I know is Toyota better learn quality and safety processes that have been in the software world for decades and apply it with the same rigor they applied the safety and reliability processes to car mechanical components.
That was a long-winded explanation that drive-by-wire systems need not be dangerous or this mystical thing that somehow, by osmosis, is connected to the onboard entertainment and that somehow by calling Auntie Anne with the Bluetooth system will cause an uncontrollable acceleration.
Drive-by-wire, at the economies of scale 21st century car manufacturers were trying to push for, was just a bad idea. Electrics are and will continue to be the 21st century car's achille's heel. These are not F-16s or Airbuses, where the weight considerations and aerodynamic stability augmentation requirements makes electric driven control worthwhile. No, these are the same buggies we've been driving for 100 years; mechanical linkages would suffice and make it quite idiot-proof to the peanut gallery that doesn't have the benefit of specialized pilot training or ejection seats. Everytime I hear a recall about "flashing" a car's PCM, I cringe. Gives an ironic outcome to the common "blue screen of death" moniker.
You want an futuristic experience? Go to disney world, leave the point A to point B transportation to the idiot proof mechanical linkages that won't read you the cotton-pickin' horoscope or call your mother-in-law while you glide behind ten LCD displays, but will get you to work just the same. Or you could die from a runaway PCM, your pick...Are we that broke we seek derive that much entertainment value out of our daily drivers? Sad.
Fault is the ELECTRONIC THROTTLE CONTROL as he has been saying all along. I didn't want to believe it.
He's not the only one who has said this. We have argued every detail throughout many threads. The only logical conclusion is that something is wrong in the drive-by-wire system. Still waiting for Toyota (and their fans) to admit it.
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I couldn't have said it any better. 
