Recall Woes, Product Quality Issues Grip Toyota ~ With Chart for 2006

[Ming]

Recall woes grip Toyota ~ Chart for 2006
As company quickly expands, it suffers through third vehicle callback this month.

Christine Tierney  and David Shepardson / The Detroit News
www.detnews.com
7/19/06

In its third vehicle recall this month, Toyota Motor Corp. is calling back almost 420,000 cars worldwide, including 34,700 in the United States, to replace a faulty engine part.

Most of the recalled U.S. cars are Echo compacts, but they also include Prius hybrids.

Toyota said it had no reports of accidents or injuries, but the recall caps a bruising month for the automaker renowned for its vehicle quality.

Last week it recalled 367,500 sport utility vehicles, including premium Lexus RX models, because a piece in the front console area could come loose and lodge near the gas pedal.

Earlier in July, Toyota recalled 24,200 vans in Japan.

While recalls are not the only or best gauge of vehicle quality, Toyota has experienced a sharp rise that industry analysts no longer dismiss as an anomaly.

"Toyota is growing so fast that they're starting to make mistakes that they avoided in the past," said George Peterson, president of Tustin, Calif., consultant AutoPacific.

Last year, Toyota's recalls in the United States more than doubled as the number of recalls industry-wide declined slightly.

The company says it is working to maintain vehicle quality, even as it increases production to meet worldwide demand for its vehicles.

"Recalls are an example of opportunities we have sometimes where we can make repairs to cars before customers have failures," Jim Press, president of Toyota Motor North America Inc., said Tuesday in Washington. "Our quality is very high and always at the very top."

But the automaker's reputation may be tested by a criminal investigation in Japan of three quality-control managers who may have failed to act on steering-problem reports.

That problem was cited as the possible cause of a collision in Japan that injured five people and led to a global recall of more than 1 million Toyota vehicles.

In its announcement Tuesday, Toyota said it would replace the crankshaft position sensor on certain 2001 and early 2002 cars.

Engine oil could leak into the connector because of a problem with the molding of the resin body of the crankshaft position sensor. There might also be a problem with the shape of the locking tab securing the sensor's wire harness connector.

Source: http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll...607190391/1148

[mucker15]

I sound like a broken record but this isnt exactly all over the news. I would just like to see our own news agencys report it fair. This should be as important as all the bad news GM gets.

[darknight9]

Is anyone else tired of Toyota recalls making the splash page?

Gawd, mabye it's time to change the site name to:
toyota-recall-headlines-mentioned-in-detroit-newspapers.com

How about some GM, Inside, News?

[2000GTPBROTHER]

Doesn't appear that chart includes the Tundra Air Bag Switch or the FJ Crusier tires.

RECALL: Toyota FJ Cruiser

[lilredcrvtt]

This is interesting! Japanese quality is not what it used to be, is it? I agree that these recalls should get as much exposure in the news as anything that affects the domestics but will they?

Toyota is not the perfect vehicular appliance.

[Ming]

Originally Posted by darknight9

Is anyone else tired of Toyota recalls making the splash page?

Gawd, mabye it's time to change the site name to:
toyota-recall-headlines-mentioned-in-detroit-newspapers.com

How about some GM, Inside, News?

A lot of people were asking for a list or chart of all of the Toy recalls in the other recall threads. Hopefully (?) this will be the last one for a while.

[darknight9]

Originally Posted by Ming

A lot of people were asking for a list or chart of all of the Toy recalls in the other recall threads. Hopefully (?) this will be the last one for a while.

Awesome. It just seems like freep.com and detnews.com can't go one day without stroking the home teams ego with this seemingly old news.

Sweet avatar, by the way!

[mucker15]

Originally Posted by darknight9

Awesome. It just seems like freep.com and detnews.com can't go one day without stroking the home teams ego with this seemingly old news.

Sweet avatar, by the way!

I feel the same way although its not exactly old news the last few items were from July, It would be nice to get some GM inside news like info about the next Impala Camaro Astra and finally how about some news about this awesome new Malibu that seems to have vanished from this web site.

[johnny smallblock]

Quick calculations:
2,121,306 vehicles recalled since April.
That's 20,012 per hour.

[DenCo]

Originally Posted by darknight9

Awesome. It just seems like freep.com and detnews.com can't go one day without stroking the home teams ego with this seemingly old news.

Sweet avatar, by the way!

I wouldn't complain about some of these not being hot off the press...

Ever notice how many times the Ford Firestone thing made the news? How many time the Ford cruise-control switches made the news? How about the GM truck tailgates? GM 60-degree V6 lower intake manifold defect? CHRYSLER PAINT, back in the day? Chrysler 2.7L V6 oil sludge (while neglecting to mention Toyota's same problem)?

...and I could go on for days.

[Dizzer]

Quality Issues?

"There is nothing to see here."
"This is none of your concern."
"Move along."

[darknight9]

Originally Posted by DenCo

I wouldn't complain about some of these not being hot off the press...

Ever notice how many times the Ford Firestone thing made the news? How many time the Ford cruise-control switches made the news? How about the GM truck tailgates? GM 60-degree V6 lower intake manifold defect? CHRYSLER PAINT, back in the day? Chrysler 2.7L V6 oil sludge (while neglecting to mention Toyota's same problem)?

...and I could go on for days.

I'm certainly not complaining about these being "hot off the press", more that they keep beating the same dead horse. Truly, other than the condensing of the statistics, there is no real news in that article. Heck, even the list is incomplete! This stuff is briefly mentioned on "national" news portals like cnn, yahoo, foxnews and msnbc. I don't live in Detroit, so myself and I'm sure many others, don't look to Motown's local news rags for the most recent news. Since this was mentioned in several other splash page threads, it feels like "old news".

Like someone mentioned above, I look to the splash page news ticker for "GM" news, not Toyota quality, or lack therof, headlines from the 'freep.

Ming, this post is not directed toward you, I understand from your second post why it is where it is.

Now, who has some Inside News about the new Mali?

[ChevyNovs99]

Originally Posted by johnny smallblock

Quick calculations:
2,121,306 vehicles recalled since April.
That's 20,012 per hour.

Well if my Math degree means anything, its actually 803 vehicles an hour and 19,284 vehicles a day. Unless your counting from April 4, which then it'd be what you said but per day, not per hour.

[HiLow64]

i heard it on my local news last night. but nothing and good morning america or those national news programs. where's that new york times guy tom friedman. i wonder what he has to say about this.

[Ming]

Originally Posted by darknight9

INow, who has some Inside News about the new Mali?

I thought the Malibu Hybrid was supposed to be out by this summer. Huge Engineering by Press Release a year or two ago and it has mostly disappeared from the news since then. 'Course we've see what we think are spyshots of the new interior, but it really needs more than a new interior or an exterior that looks like it was borrowed from the Aura (ala 1998 Malibu and Olds Cutlass) -- it needs an affordable BAS-hybrid option that really saves gas, and a 6-speed trans to make it even more efficient. At least its getting the 3.5LVVT for 2007.

If I can find out anything fresh I'll post it...