What do you drive?

[darrenm]

Sticking accelerators, steering problems, brake probs too I think. They were the world recall champs by a country mile for a few years.

 

So it's bad that when they find something wrong they take steps to correct it at their own massive cost?

I wish every manufacturer was that bad.

[turnbull]

I think the problem is though, when there are issues with throttles, brakes, steering or any safety critical items, OEMs and customers get very jumpy and the media rub their hands with glee.

When JLR were Ford owned, we had to save absolutely every last bit of paperwork for years because they were still spooked over the Firestone issue. That particular problem didn't do Ford a lot of good, though they are more than over it now. Anything my particular department did that had anything to do with wheels and/or tyres was highly scrutinised and we were even prevented from painting them to customer requirements in case wheel integrity was affected.

I think in Toyota's case it was the amount of issues that made it harder for them, but as you say, they worked with their suppliers, sorted the problems out and came out of it all largely unscathed.

It will be interesting though to see how VAG deal with this one.

[darrenm]

I remember being impressed with all of the Toyota recalls because they really didn't have to. Loads of manufacturers have issues that they choose not to recall as it's not worth their cost. Toyota don't mess about and just recall.

To me it's a positive. It's one of the reasons I chose a Toyota over anything else. They have integrity unlike lots of other car makers.

[BOF]

I'm with Bicks. It doesn't actually matter. Sure, it's a story, and it's juicy because there's deception but so what. Maybe you'll pick up a VW cheaper than you would have a month ago from some idiot. The world keeps turning while we get distracted from what actually matters.

[chrisp65]

Many years ago I bought a Beetle from a VW main dealer, not a new one but a decent one. Then I bought a nearly new Golf. Then I bought a new Golf.

I'd always queried that the engine didn't sound right, but had always been told it was fine. I'd had the good sense to go in to print from the start.

Anyway, first service after 3 year warranty was up and the main dealer phones to say the engine is knackered. A month of arguing between me, the dealer and VW and it's agreed that my having put my concerns in writing at every service since new is a bit of a killer. So VW instruct the main dealer that they have to give me a new engine at their expense. In a bizarre piece of revenge, the main dealer then gives me a file of letters and e-mails between him and the VW head office and engineers. Basically, VW told the dealer (before they knew what I had in writing) that the engine had a flaw in it from the get go, it was a defect they'd seen in other cars - but there was no way they were telling me and to try and get me to pay for all of it, or as much as I could be convinced to pay without going legal.

Anyway, in the end VW and the dealer went halves, I paid nothing. I never bought a VW product again.

I appreciate somebody somewhere could most likely tell the same story for any other manufacturer. That much will be true. But if you're happy to keep buying from proven conmen, that's great, best of luck to you.

[Stevo985]

I'm with Bicks. It doesn't actually matter. Sure, it's a story, and it's juicy because there's deception but so what. Maybe you'll pick up a VW cheaper than you would have a month ago from some idiot. The world keeps turning while we get distracted from what actually matters.

It matters lots for the company.

 

The huge fine being touted, plus the effect on meeting their emissions targets, could have huge knock on effects.

They're probably a big enough company to cope with it though.

[tonyh29]

Many years ago I bought a Beetle from a VW main dealer, not a new one but a decent one. Then I bought a nearly new Golf. Then I bought a new Golf.

I'd always queried that the engine didn't sound right, but had always been told it was fine. I'd had the good sense to go in to print from the start.

Anyway, first service after 3 year warranty was up and the main dealer phones to say the engine is knackered. A month of arguing between me, the dealer and VW and it's agreed that my having put my concerns in writing at every service since new is a bit of a killer. So VW instruct the main dealer that they have to give me a new engine at their expense. In a bizarre piece of revenge, the main dealer then gives me a file of letters and e-mails between him and the VW head office and engineers. Basically, VW told the dealer (before they knew what I had in writing) that the engine had a flaw in it from the get go, it was a defect they'd seen in other cars - but there was no way they were telling me and to try and get me to pay for all of it, or as much as I could be convinced to pay without going legal.

Anyway, in the end VW and the dealer went halves, I paid nothing. I never bought a VW product again.

I appreciate somebody somewhere could most likely tell the same story for any other manufacturer. That much will be true. But if you're happy to keep buying from proven conmen, that's great, best of luck to you.

either there is a glitch in the matrix and I've read this post many moons ago before you wrote it or you've told us this before

not a criticism I'm just curious to know if I'm losing my mind or not

[BOF]

I'm with Bicks. It doesn't actually matter. Sure, it's a story, and it's juicy because there's deception but so what. Maybe you'll pick up a VW cheaper than you would have a month ago from some idiot. The world keeps turning while we get distracted from what actually matters.

It matters lots for the company.

 

The huge fine being touted, plus the effect on meeting their emissions targets, could have huge knock on effects.

They're probably a big enough company to cope with it though.

Yeah I get that and there'll be no end of big corporate finger pointing and fines blah blah. But it's all show with little significance to the bigger picture. What they've done, while dishonest, doesn't matter.

[BOF]

I'd also say I wouldn't be at all surprised if they weren't the only ones doing something similar. It's a largely self-policing industry after all.

[chrisp65]

Tony,

Yeah, I've probably given a few versions of that story before, it's a fave! Be interesting to find the old ones and see how much the facts have changed!

It's etched in to my brain, it was my first 'big' problem thing I had to deal with as a grown up. New family, no money and a car company trying to dick me for a few thousand pound. I'd have been happy to buy Golfs for the rest of my life rather than have to think about it. I told them that and their attitude was 'whatever'. Having been to lots of years of VW events and the like over the years it was a sickener for a while.

Obviously I'm completely over it now and at peace with the world once again!

 

[bickster]

I wouldn't be shocked if there weren't a whole load of car manufacturers shitting themselves right now. If VAG were up to it, plenty of others will have been too 

[HanoiVillan]

I remember being impressed with all of the Toyota recalls because they really didn't have to. Loads of manufacturers have issues that they choose not to recall as it's not worth their cost. Toyota don't mess about and just recall.

To me it's a positive. It's one of the reasons I chose a Toyota over anything else. They have integrity unlike lots of other car makers.

Toyota absolutely did have to recall. Famously, there was a panicked 911 audio recording of a driver in their final moments as their car began accelerating with no way to stop it. The driver died. No company could ever have avoided a recall after that. 

In general, I think there's a strange amount of underplaying the seriousness of this situation in this thread. The potential costs are enormous. First, there's going to be a fine, which is probably going to be more than $10bn to begin with. Then there's the cost of recalling half a million vehicles in the US alone, potentially millions more elsewhere. Then there's the cost of fixing the problem, which is going to be very difficult mechanically (technically, their NOx emissions are way over the limit, and NOx is reduced in other vehicles with another tank, of urea, which turns the NOx into ammonia - fitting another tank into millions of cars will be time-consuming and expensive, so they'll need to hope there's another way, but no-one else has found it yet). Then there's the opportunity cost gone - sales of 2 liter diesels have now been forbidden by the company, and they represent between 20 and 25% of VW's US sales. Then there's the inevitable class-action lawsuit, where the challenge for lawyers is not proving guilt or intentionality (already done!) but proving that these higher emissions in some way directly impact the health of the driver of the vehicle. If they can do that, you're looking at tobacco-company-level settlements. Finally, there's the enormous hit to the share price. 

People have already pointed out that manufacturers have recovered from recalls before to sell more cars, and in enough time, that will happen for VW too. But in the meantime, they're going to be spending several years' profits in costs and litigation to clean up the mess, money which would otherwise have been spent on marketing, product design and improvement, R&D etc. 

Perversely, evidence also suggests that their previous good reputation is now a liability. A couple of years ago, analysts were confused why Toyota seemed to be bouncing back from their recalls at a slower rate than GM. who also had tons of recalls. Toyota had a better reputation, so this didn't seem to make sense. The theory currently is that an essential, underlying crapness is just kind of baked into the GM brand, and customers aren't that surprised by a recall, but Toyota, because they had a reputation for quality, had more to lose. VW's reputation for quality was even higher. 

[darrenm]

I remember being impressed with all of the Toyota recalls because they really didn't have to. Loads of manufacturers have issues that they choose not to recall as it's not worth their cost. Toyota don't mess about and just recall.

To me it's a positive. It's one of the reasons I chose a Toyota over anything else. They have integrity unlike lots of other car makers.

Toyota absolutely did have to recall. Famously, there was a panicked 911 audio recording of a driver in their final moments as their car began accelerating with no way to stop it. The driver died. No company could ever have avoided a recall after that. 

 

They didn't. It was caused by a random dealer putting the wrong mat in a car and that mat getting stuck against the accelerator. I've had that happen a few times on various makes of car, because it's nothing to do with the car. You always check your mat is in the right position, because if it's not, it could get stuck against the accelerator and be dangerous.

Toyota didn't need to do anything about this as it wasn't a problem with the design of the car. That's not to say they couldn't improve it to stop it happening again in that particular way. They gave the family compensation and recalled any cars it could happen to in that particular way.

I'm no Toyota apologist, but you have to be reasonable. An incorrect car mat wedging the accelerator has always been a danger in cars and something that's happened to me a few times. I just make sure it's in the right place now.

[HanoiVillan]

I remember being impressed with all of the Toyota recalls because they really didn't have to. Loads of manufacturers have issues that they choose not to recall as it's not worth their cost. Toyota don't mess about and just recall.

To me it's a positive. It's one of the reasons I chose a Toyota over anything else. They have integrity unlike lots of other car makers.

Toyota absolutely did have to recall. Famously, there was a panicked 911 audio recording of a driver in their final moments as their car began accelerating with no way to stop it. The driver died. No company could ever have avoided a recall after that. 

 

They didn't. It was caused by a random dealer putting the wrong mat in a car and that mat getting stuck against the accelerator. I've had that happen a few times on various makes of car, because it's nothing to do with the car. You always check your mat is in the right position, because if it's not, it could get stuck against the accelerator and be dangerous.

Toyota didn't need to do anything about this as it wasn't a problem with the design of the car. That's not to say they couldn't improve it to stop it happening again in that particular way. They gave the family compensation and recalled any cars it could happen to in that particular way.

I'm no Toyota apologist, but you have to be reasonable. An incorrect car mat wedging the accelerator has always been a danger in cars and something that's happened to me a few times. I just make sure it's in the right place now.

That's the first recall. The second recall was for stuck accelerator pedals:

Accelerator pedal recall[edit]

On January 21, 2010, Toyota initiated a second recall, this time in response to reports of accelerator pedals sticking in cars without floor mats.^[9] The company had received three such complaints in 2009.^[63] In its recall announcement, Toyota stated that:

The condition is rare and does not occur suddenly. It can occur when the pedal mechanism becomes worn and, in certain conditions, the accelerator pedal may become harder to depress, slower to return or, in the worst case, stuck in a partially depressed position.^[4]

A concurrent NHTSA press release identified the issue as the "Sticky Pedal Recall" and described the problem and remedy as follows:

• The accelerator pedal becomes harder to depress or slower to return to the closed position.
• The accelerator pedal may become stuck in partially depressed position.
• Should the pedal become stuck while driving, drivers should switch to neutral and stop.
• A repair fix would be applied by the manufacturer to prevent the sticky pedal condition.
• A new pedal would later be made available to replace repaired pedals.^[64]

The January 21 recall announcement for the accelerator pedal problem covered 2.3 million vehicles sold in the U.S.^[3][4] Toyota then widened the recall to include 1.8 million vehicles in Europe and 75,000 in China.^[7]On January 26, Toyota announced that until they had finalized an appropriate remedy to address the potential for sticking accelerator pedals, sales would be suspended for selected vehicles.^[9]

On January 31, 2010 the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. regulators cleared Toyota's proposed repair for the pedals and the company would resume production by February 8.^[65] On February 1, 2010 Toyota said that its dealers should get parts to fix the sticky accelerator pedal by the end of the week.^[66]

[darrenm]

Okayyyy... but that's nothing to do with the 911 call stuck car mat recall you said about. Pedals being sticky and harder to press down didn't cause any fatalities, it was just them being overcautious in the aftermath.

[MakemineVanilla]

The VW scandal is very interesting.

I see a parallel between the regulation of exhaust emissions and the regulation of financial derivatives.

Both passed the tests laid down by regulation but both turned out to fail in the real world.

It seems that the government and pressure groups are now saying that it is not good enough to pass the tests laid down by the law, the companies must now anticipate the intentions of the regulators, even if the regulators fail to design tests to bring that about.

It remains to be seen how many other manufacturers fail in the same or similar ways. 

No doubt the extent of VW's culpability will have to be decided by legal argument.

 

Edited September 23, 2015 by MakemineVanilla

[HanoiVillan]

The VW scandal is very interesting.

I see a parallel between the regulation of exhaust emissions and the regulation of financial derivatives.

Both passed the tests laid down by regulation but both turned out to fail in the real world.

It seems that the government and pressure groups are now saying that it is not good enough to pass the tests laid down by the law, the companies must now anticipate the intentions of the regulators, even if the regulators fail to design tests to bring that about.

It remains to be seen how many other manufacturers fail in the same or similar ways. 

No doubt the extent of VW's culpability will have to be decided by legal argument.

 

The tests you refer to were always intended to reflect actual road use, not hypothetical what's-the-lowest-possible-emissions-we-can-produce under a test environment. This is obvious. In the same way, you can't design a car with fifteen airbags for a crash test and then take them all out for road usage. 

[HanoiVillan]

Okayyyy... but that's nothing to do with the 911 call stuck car mat recall you said about. Pedals being sticky and harder to press down didn't cause any fatalities, it was just them being overcautious in the aftermath.

I'm looking at the issue from a PR standpoint as well. You're right that in that car, on that day, there were no problems with the accelerator pedal's functionality, just that it was stuck to the PVC mats. But there are two further issues: firstly, there was subsequent evidence that their cars had issues with stuck accelerator pedals. Go back to the Wikipedia article, and notice the comments from the safety regulator that 'removal of the floor mats is simply an interim measure, not a remedy of the underlying defect in the vehicles'. In a situation where the regulator are claiming that you haven't fixed the problem, it's better to recall. Secondly, the publishing of that audio recording was a turning point. It was the sound of a family dying, arguably being killed by their product. In the media, the crisis became known as the 'stuck accelerator problem' or the 'unwanted acceleration problem' (not 'the floor mat problem'). In a situation where it seems like your product has just killed people and everyone's listening to it, it's better to recall.

My point is you're giving them credit for something they absolutely had to do anyway. There was pressure from the public, there was pressure from the media, there was pressure from the safety regulator. It wasn't a selfless act of corporate generosity. 

[villakram]

What about the mpg rating on cars versus the real world. Especially with regards to the monstrous things they drive over here, this kind of fudging is endemic to this industry. With all the electronics and engine mapping tech available these days, I suspect that every company (w/ complicit regulators) is up to this to some degree.

[HanoiVillan]

What about the mpg rating on cars versus the real world. Especially with regards to the monstrous things they drive over here, this kind of fudging is endemic to this industry. With all the electronics and engine mapping tech available these days, I suspect that every company (w/ complicit regulators) is up to this to some degree.

As I understand it, there's a forthcoming crackdown, in the EU at least, on unrealistic claims about fuel efficiency, although I have to say this is based on a half-heard snippet on the radio a couple of days ago and I can't find a relevant article backing that up. 

Interestingly, VW diesels always over-performed their stated fuel efficiency. Previously, nobody could understand how this could be, though obviously it's clear now. However, VW lawyers may get some mileage of their own out of arguing that while their diesels were emitting much more NOx than claimed, they may well also have been emitting less CO2 than claimed.