A Wild Ride in a Prius

Thread Tools

Search this Thread

03-13-2006, 07:55 PM

Soleil24

Active Enthusiast

Thread Starter

Join Date: Jan 2006

Location: Laval, Quebec Canada

Posts: 98

A Wild Ride in a Prius

Have you heard about that?

Might be a repost but I look for it and did not find any reference here.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news0...s_rampage.html

03-13-2006, 11:10 PM

AZCivic

Conservative Socialist

Join Date: Feb 2005

Location: Phoenix, AZ

Posts: 878

Re: A Wild Ride in a Prius

There's been a ton of those stories in the news lately. It's just thrill-seekers trying to get their name in the newspaper by making up a story about their car taking off on it's own. We had a girl get arrested here in Arizona by staging a vehicle runaway three times in a week.

03-14-2006, 06:18 AM

David Harville

Go Army!

Join Date: Aug 2005

Location: Ellicott City, MD

Posts: 178

Re: A Wild Ride in a Prius

From the FAQ of the site:

Quote:

Well, it is basically a complaint site so, yes, it's mostly complaints.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/consumerism/faq.html

03-14-2006, 06:28 AM

bwilson4web

Engineering first

Join Date: Oct 2005

Location: Huntsville, AL

Posts: 5,613

Re: A Wild Ride in a Prius

Quote:

Originally Posted by Soleil24

Have you heard about that? . . .

An interesting article . . .

Quote:

Originally Posted by article

Herbert found himself barreling down the road with the cruise control stuck wide open, running approximately 20 miles over the posted speed limit, all the while continuing to accelerate.

. . . and he still had an SUV 6" from his rear bumper flashing his lights.

The Prius NHW11 (previous model) cruise control schematic shows a switch-resistor network that signals the status to the hybrid vehicle ECU. It takes one "ground" to enable/disable the cruise control. Then it takes the next lower resistance value, "RES/ACC", to put the cruise control in accellerate mode. The key would be seeing "Cruise" indicated on the multi-function display.

Quote:

Originally Posted by article

. . . "The dealer informed me that they were able to recreate the safety issue, but they were not able to identify the cause," Herbert said. Three days later, "the Service Manager informed me that they were unable to detect the cause and stated that they would like to ship the vehicle to Cincinnati for further testing," the Prius owner said.

Finally, more than a week after Herbert's Prius was first towed into the Toyota dealership he was told that, "they could not find anything wrong with the vehicle after driving it 300 miles," and that he must return the loaner vehicle the dealer had provided and pick up his Prius.

Herbert was given no information or evidence of any testing or other effort to discover what caused his Prius to run amok.

"The manager indicated that the person who experienced the issue is a porter and was not authorized to make any technical assessments," Herbert said. . . .

Some form of intermittent short of the wire that connects to the hybrid vehicle ECU's CCS signal (again, NHW11 signal name) might do it. Hitting "Cruise" on the end of the stalk should have shut it down. Sticky "Cruise" button comes to mind too. Now if the 'smart key' technology kept the vehicle from shutting off, this could become a test of the brakes vs THS drive. Also, there should be a 'dead band' between 'ground' and the accelerate value. If not, then an intermittent resistance just at that threshould could be enough to cause the symptom. But pressing the "Cruise" button should have turned it off.

I'll try some experiments on the way into work this morning. While holding the stalk in "ACC" mode, I'll push in and hold the "Cruise" button. If it continues to accelerate, we'll have a reproducable failure mode.

One thing for sure, if it is an intermittent problem, it will return.

Bob Wilson