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Tony[_19_]

wrote:
On Fri, 12 Mar 2010 14:55:41 -0800 (PST), wrote:

On Mar 12, 5:08 pm, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Mar 2010 08:56:20 -0500, wrote:
On Fri, 12 Mar 2010 05:43:31 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Mar 11, 1:26 pm, Harry K wrote:
On Mar 11, 9:43 am, wrote:
On Mar 11, 11:59 am, "Bob F" wrote:
My '94 Caravan with an electronically controlled automatic does the same.
What, we don't have any readers here with a toyota prius?
I know a couple of prius owners and they're not willing to do a full-
throttle shift-to-neutral test on their cars.
I really want to see if the stuff I've been reading about the computer
not letting the transmission shift into neutral to protect the engine
are true.
Almosst certainly _not_ true but it would be nice to have an official
source.
Yes, I think we all would like to see a link to any credible source.
All I've seen is:
A - speculation from various individuals that it might be possible
that some of the Toyotas can't be shifted into neutral under runaway
conditions
B - some of the people driving the runaway cars have claimed they
could not shift them into neutral
C - Toyota has said at least on the Lexus that they can be shifted
into neutral at any time. They may have also said it about more cars
than the Lexus, not sure about that.
If there were an intentionally designed system to prevent shifting
into neutral while moving, I would think there is a 99% chance we
would have heard about it by now.
We are discussing cars that are malfunctioning. Perhaps not being able
to shift into neutral is connected to the malfunction in some way. Or,
perhaps not. You can't rule it out without correctly and completely
diagnosing what is causing the runaway problem.
I'm also not sure how many people, in the midst of a crisis, would be
quick to assume that turning off the key would NOT lock the steering
and make things worse.
Everone is looking for an electrical or electronic boogeyman to blame
- and I can tell you, absolutely and without any doubt, there is NO
electrical or electronic failure that could POSSIBLY make it
impossible to shift the vehicle to neutral, as the neutral control is
STRICTLY MECHANICAL.
Excuse me if I doubt that you have the personal experience with the
design of every model of Toyota made over the last 7 years to be able
to make that blanket statement. It may have a high probability of
being true, but clearly you are over reaching here and just discredit
yourself.

No need to diagnose what caused the runaway
problem, because there can be NO inter-related issues.-
Yes there is.. Because cars are not supposed to just randomly go to
full throttle by themselves. Whether it's because of sticking floor
mats, sticking throttles or an electronic problem, the root cause
needs to be found so that these cars can be fixed and the potentially
fatal problem avoided in future automobiles. Would you just sweep an
airline crash under the carpet too?

I didn't say there was no reason to diagnose the failure. I said there
is no reason to diagnose the failure to determine if any possible
electrical fault could keep the vehicle from being shifted to neutral.

There IS one transmission I am not 100% sure about - and that is the
CVT. This is only used on the Hybrids (on toyota it is still a
planetary system but has 2 motor-generator sets in it - the planetary
is a "power splitter".

Actually more vehicles use the CVT. My daughters Saturn Vue has a CVT,
not sure if they all do? I think some other american made cars have
them, but not sure. A lot of "maybes" here but I think the CVT has been
used for some time now in sub compact foriegn cars not available for
import to the US.