Every automobile manufactured should be required to have a "smart brake pedal," or simply a brake override that cuts fuel to the engine after several seconds of sustained activation. Ideally the driver should be able to disable this feature by pressing a button on the ECU until the next engine start for sports and stunt drivers. This would have prevented several deaths verifiably caused by floor mat entrapment and drivers unable to figure out alternatives.
Toyota's other problem was their "ownership" of black box data, making people skeptical they were trying to hide something. Toyota should acknowledge that while black box data is raw data and may not indicate what it seems to, that the data is still owned by the car owner (not Toyota) and will be provided on request to the owner, authorities, or courts by shipping Toyota the ECU and paying a nominal charge of no more than a couple hundred dollars.
The rest of it probably comes down to pedal misapplication. I find it interesting of the people reported in the media to have a problem with Toyota cars (I think around 12 cases), a recent reporter found all of the driver's reported ages to be over 50 years old. Since Toyota is not an expensive or luxury brand, there is no reason to believe what is supposedly a random event to discriminate toward older people.
Maybe we have truly entered the “Jetsons era” — we’re now looking to the space travel industry to get help with fixing our cars.
Apollo 15 Rover on lunar surface. Credit: NASA
According to a news report, to get to the bottom of the root causes of the potential sticky accelerator problem plaguing recent Toyota models, NASA said it was joining the National Academy of Sciences in the government’s investigation.
US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced that “NASA scientists with expertise in electronics will help the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study potential electronic ties to unintended acceleration in Toyotas. NASA’s knowledge of electronics, computer hardware and software and hazard analysis will ensure a comprehensive review.”
NASA has experience with ground-based vehicles as well as airborne ones, such as the Lunar Rover (pictured above) or Mars probes.
The National Academy of Sciences will also be looking at acceleration and electronic vehicle controls from other auto manufacturers as well.
It used to be easy for a mechanic — trained, or even in the backyard — to spend a couple of hours tinkering or rebuilding car parts to get things running smoothly again. Perhaps we’ve crossed some kind of chasm when car technology is on a level of complexity with spacecraft technology.
