November 2, 2012
Headed to the top of the Early Warning Reporting charts with a bullet: 2012 Ford Focus steering failures. In the last four quarters, which includes the first half of 2012, there have been about 13 injury claims. Randy Whitfield of Quality Control Systems Corp., who regularly trawls this data, says that it is unusual to see so many steering-related claims in the 2012 model year, given the total for this very large fleet – one of the top-sellers for 2012 – so far.
The 2012 Ford Focus, is an all-new redesign, with – you guessed it: Electronic Power-Assisted Steering (EPAS). Electronic Power Steering (EPS) is one of our favorite automotive technology advancements plagued with failures when introduced – just ask Honda, GM and Toyota. All three have battled EPS malfunctions. The latter two prompted defect investigations which prompted one Technical Service Bulletin and one recall. The EPS issue is yet another example of automotive technology advancing without functional safety standards and beyond the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s ability to regulate or enforce.
A Ford video on the Focus EPAS purrs about how the sensors achieve steering “that feels just right” and “helps keep you firmly planted and in control.” (Watch)
Perhaps Ford’s EPAS keeps drivers planted a little too firmly – once the steering goes, it’s pretty hard to turn the wheel, according to owner reports. Consumer complaints show that the problem is a right-out-of-the-box phenomenon, with drivers generally reporting that within a few minutes of starting operation, power steering fails and Steering Assist Fault displays on the dash. (There’s another category of high-speed wander-type complaints, too.) Some had their first loss-of-steering-control incident within the first week of ownership, and many have had multiple occurrences. The failure usually occurs at low speed, and yet, there are situations in which losing steering is mighty dangerous, like when turning into traffic. About 20 owners of 2012 Focus vehicles have lodged complaints with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administrations. One West Virginia owner reported: “While backing out of a driveway the steering system failed. I rolled down a hill and into a wooded area. The system gave an indicator light of steering system failure and also the braking system did not engage. I lost complete control of the vehicle.”
October 24, 2012
For now, Company Doe – the first to launch a court challenge against the publication of a complaint in saferproducts.gov, the publicly accessible database mandated under the 2008 Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, will remain anonymous. A July ruling by a U.S. District Court judge, made public yesterday, maintains the seal on any records that identify the company, the product or the facts of the dispute.
October 22, 2012
Question for the lads and lassies over at the Office of Defects Investigation: Are you going to penalize Toyota for waiting three years to recall a variety of models in the U.S. for power window switch fires, after it launched recalls for 770,540 substantially similar vehicles of the same model years in China, New Zealand and Japan in August and October of 2009?
The power window door fire issue got our attention February, when NHTSA opened Preliminary Evaluations into power window switch fires in the General Motors 2006-2007 Chevy Trailblazers and several 2007 Toyota models, including the Camry, the RAV4, the Highlander Hyrbrid and the Yaris. Consumers were reporting spontaneous burn incidents emanating from the power window switch area, starting – but not always ending – with smoke and noxious odors. Few injuries; but many of the incidents happened while the vehicle was underway, and let’s face it, interior compartment fires are very distracting while driving.
It was NHTSA’s preliminary theory that perhaps the two automakers shared a common window switch supplier that would explain the defect trend. And, both investigations proceeded together closely in parallel – like VPA1 and VPA2 circuits on the Accelerator Pedal Position Sensor in some early model Toyota Camrys. (Sorry, we can’t resist a little Unintended Acceleration humor.) In mid-June, ODI bumped both PEs up to Engineering Analyses, and it turned out that GM and Toyota did not share suppliers.
GM was the first to concede the need for a recall. On August 17, GM recalled 249,260 2006 Chevrolet Trailblazer EXT and GMC Envoy XL, 2006-07 Chevrolet Trailblazer; GMC Envoy; Buick Rainer; SAAB 9-7x; and lsuzu Ascender s in a slew of states because fluid could seep into the door module, causing corrosion and a short that could render the power window or door locks inoperable, and in some cases, ignite.
October 15, 2012
When is a safety recall not really a safety recall? When the manufacturer submitting the Part 573 Defect and Non-Compliance Report (49 CFR Part 573) says it isn’t.
The Recall Management Division’s files are dotted with many such non-admission admissions. For example, in February, Goodyear recalled nearly 41,000 of its Silent Armor Tires in six sizes. The company conceded that these tires had high rates of warranty and property damage claims, and that the tire’s lack of robustness could result in a partial tread separation and a crash. Three months earlier, two Texas college students died in a rollover crash, after the left rear Silent Armor tire on the pick-up truck suffered a tread separation.
Goodyear, however, “found no safety issues” and deemed its recall a “customer satisfaction campaign,” to NHTSA.
If NHTSA’s proposed changes to the recall regulations are eventually adopted, the practice of manufacturers making signing statements will end. The agency is also proposing to require automakers to file defect and non-compliance reports via the Internet, including notices of foreign recalls. The agency is proposing asking manufacturers to submit the specific Vehicle Identification Number for each recalled vehicle, so that consumers can search a recall by their vehicle’s specific VIN. Unfortunately, there appears to be no such provision for the Tire Identification Number (TIN). Manufacturers will continue to submit TIN ranges only, and there will be no Web portal, which the public can use to determine if a specific tire has been recalled.
October 10, 2012
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is proposing amendments to the Early Warning Reporting system, ostensibly to sharpen it as a tool in the Office of Defects Investigation’s back pocket, but outside researchers who regularly parse EWR data say that the proposal misses huge opportunities to actually make the system better.
In 2000, Congress passed the Transportation Recall Enhancement, Accountability and Documentation (TREAD) Act in the wake of the Ford Explorer/Firestone tire fiasco. The Early Warning Reporting system, a major component of the legislation, requires manufacturers to submit reams of death, injury, property damage and warranty data to the government on a quarterly basis. The information was supposed to help government investigators identify defect trends before they become full-blown debacles.
And yet, nearly a decade later, EWR did nothing to prevent the Toyota Unintended Acceleration disaster that has resulted in deaths, injuries, property damage crashes, 11 recalls related to floor mat entrapment, trim panel interference and sticking accelerator pedals, the alleged causes of the unintended acceleration complaints. So, you might expect that the agency, which could never have seen that one coming – what with the numerous consumer petitions pleading for answers, serial investigations into the problem, and recalls that never seem to make the complaints go away – would adjust its EWR reporting categories accordingly.
October 5, 2012
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is considering a policy change to the way it publicly confirms that it has opened a defect investigation, leading the manufacturing community to issue a DEFCON 1 alert.
Currently, under the Section 6b of the Consumer Product Safety Act, manufacturers have a lot of control over what negative information the CPSC can disclose about them. The CPSC cannot disclose information that falls within the envelope of trade secrets or “misleading” and “inaccurate” information. The CPSC can disclose the existence of an investigation, under procedures designed to ensure the accuracy of whatever information is made public. The CPSC gives manufacturers 10 days to review any statements about their products, and typically the two entities release agreed-upon language.
“What is very important to take into account is that we adhere to 6b,” says CPSC spokesman Scott Wolfson. “It is not a wall to disclosure. It’s a hurdle. As the Chairman (Inez Tennenbaum) has stated: “We do follow that law and we follow it in very prescribed ways.”
In the past, the CPSC waited until the press took an interest in an alleged defect to initiate the 10-day review period. The proposed policy change, explained to manufacturers and their trade associations at a CPSC Safety Academy held in Bethesda, Maryland late last month, was an alternative to “approaching a company in a rushed situation, in which the media is asking for immediate confirmation, which at times we cannot give because the company is given 10 days to respond. We are considering a policy approach that starts the clock at an earlier stage. The same rights are given, but we prepare ahead of time for potential requests.”
The National Association of Manufacturers, lost no time in firing off a letter with apocalyptic overtones:
October 3, 2012
An examination of NHTSA records surrounding a June recall for floor mat interference in 2010 Lexus RX350 vehicles shows that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration used mischaracterized data to buttress its request that Toyota recall the floor mats. Further, NHTSA ignored obvious clues that there might be an electronic root cause for the unintended acceleration complaints consumers filed with the agency.
These documents affirm the pattern that has characterized NHTSA’s Toyota Unintended Acceleration investigations – both informal and official — since 2004:
SRS has been examining the factual underpinnings of NHTSA’s actions in Toyota Unintended Acceleration since 2009. As we have in the past, we submitted a Freedom of Information Act request for all records related to Toyota’s most recent floor mat recall. We received 58 pages of documents, some of which were redacted under FOIA exemptions for confidential business information, personal identifying information and sections deemed “deliberative process.”
As we don’t know what information lies behind the redactions, we cannot assess the totality of the evidence behind NHTSA’s decision to seek a floor mat recall. However, what the unredacted portions show is there is scant evidence of a widespread floor mat interference problem and there is even less logic in the complaints NHTSA claims support its argument that a problem with the mats exists. But, there is much more evidence in the narratives of consumer complaints suggesting electronic causes of UA in 2010 Lexus RX 350.
September 26, 2012
In late October 2011, Connecticut was hit by a rare early-season snowstorm that left more than 860,000 businesses and homes in that state without power. And some state residents who didn’t or couldn’t wait for the power to be restored, tried to survive the outage with the use of a portable generator. From the day of the storm until November 9, the Department of Public Health received 143 reports of carbon monoxide poisoning – nearly nine times the number of reports – 16 – for the previous three years combined. Five individuals died and 41 required a hospitalization; the majority of incidents were caused by portable generators for home use.
In writing about this surge in the Connecticut Epidemiologist, the researchers noted: “Outbreaks of CO poisonings following winter storms are well documented and continue to be a problem.”
Carbon monoxide (CO) is a potentially deadly gas found as a byproduct of internal combustion engines that is odorless, colorless and tasteless. According to the latest figures from the CPSC, from 1999 to 2011, 695 – nearly 80 percent – of the 881 fatalities from 513 incidents were associated with generators. And CO poisonings from home generators will continue to be a problem, because the only countermeasure mandated by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission are warnings. While other engine-manufacturing industries, such as automotive and marine generators, use available technology to significantly reduce their CO emissions, makers of portable generators for home have been relying on capital letters and pictograms to avert injury and death.
The data suggest that dramatically worded warning labels don’t do enough to depress the injury and mortality rate. According to CPSC spokesman Scott Wolfson, there was a noticeable decline in CO incidents involving generators after the recent Mid-Atlantic derecho and Hurricane Issac. Nonetheless, the CPSC has been exploring technical solutions to the CO hazard since 2006.
September 6, 2012
If the Toyota Unintended Acceleration has taught us anything, it’s the importance of examining NHTSA’s process before accepting its conclusions. The authority of the federal government automatically confers, in large measure, a public (including the mainstream media) acceptance of its pronouncements of scientific certitude. Few take the time to study their foundations. To this end, SRS has devoted more time and resources to obtaining the agency’s original source documents, data and communications around investigations, rulemakings and NHTSA-sponsored reports than we care to count. We have filed numerous Freedom of Information Act requests in pursuit of these informational bases.
Another thing we have learned: NHTSA really doesn’t want the public to know how it does what it does. Our FOIA requests have morphed into FOIA lawsuits (three and counting), as the agency either denies us information that is public or claims to have none, even when the crumbs NHTSA’s FOIA staff toss to us show unequivocally that, in fact, they do have the information.
And that brings us to Pedal Application Errors, NHTSA’s last nail in the Electronically-Caused UA coffin. This report made a number of strong claims regarding who is likely to make a pedal application error and how it is likely to occur. They do not bode well for any woman of a certain age who has the misfortune to be behind the wheel of an electronically caused UA. The report’s writers based on a variety of data sources, including crashes from the Motor Vehicle Crash Causation Survey (MVCCS), the North Carolina state crash database, a media review of pedal misapplication news stories and the insights garnered from a panel of rehabilitation specialists. Naturally, we wanted to look at all these data, and we requested them.
The response from the government, to put it kindly, was less than complete. NHTSA claimed that it didn’t have any of the underlying data, except the list of crashes from the MVCCS. It sent us the transcript of the one-and-a-half day meeting of rehabilitation specialists and Dr. Richard Schmidt, that prodigious peddler of the all-purpose, wholly unsupported and unscientific pedal misapplication theory the auto industry – and NHTSA – loves.
August 29, 2012
In May 2011, everybody at Toyota North America joined hands and sung Kumbaya – it was the release of the much-vaunted A Road Forward: The Report of the Toyota North American Quality Advisory Panel. The report was part of a public relations blitz to restore consumer confidence in Toyota products in the wake of the Unintended Acceleration debacle. And, within the 60 pages of corporate soul-searching was the way back home – and it ran right through Toyota’s customers. The glossy document was laced with admissions that Toyota had failed to heed the voices of its customers such as this:
“Toyota has recognized that many of the challenges it faced in 2009 and 2010 were a result of failures to adequately listen to and incorporate external feedback from various stakeholders, including consumers, third-party rating agencies, and regulators.”
A company personage no less distinguished than Stephen St. Angelo, Toyota’s North American Chief Quality Officer, promised the dawn of a new day:
“Right from the outset, we told them we wanted them to be straightforward with us, because we seriously want to keep improving our processes and our transparency. It is important to note that the Panel focused primarily on how we operate and communicate. While I am glad they’ve recognized the positive changes we’ve already made, I also appreciate how they want us to keep at it. I’ve told them we intend to do just that.”
So, how have they been doing with that listening stuff? Well that depends.
If you are a Toyota or Lexus customer who has merely complained about a UA event, you may not get beyond conversations with their customer care folks or a visit from the SMART team, who will tell you that your car’s just fine.
But, if you are a consumer who has been drawn into the multi-state litigation, Toyota will listen to you in a day-long deposition, in which Toyota wants you to bring every scrap of communication you made or received about Toyota – including with your family.
Toyota sought to depose at least eight consumers who experienced a UA in their Toyotas, most of them named by the plaintiff’s attorneys as “absent class members.” Although the plaintiffs withdrew some of their names, experts relied on a few of those incidents in formulating their opinions. Naturally, Toyota wants their own crack at these folks. Earlier this month, Judge Selna, who is overseeing the Multi-District Litigation in Orange County California, ruled that it saw little point in compelling a deposition since the absent class member is not going to offer any evidence to support class certification. Toyota has challenged this ruling. The legal tug-of-war continues.