Toyota’s mass recall of models affected by a sticking accelerator pedal will now extend to Europe.
The problem has previously believed to be isolated to models built and sold in the US, where more than eight million cars have so far been recalled. Details of the European recall will be confirmed later today or tomorrow.
A Toyota spokesman told Autocar that Toyota was working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible and safety was the firm's primary concern at this moment.
"Recalls are nothing new, but the size and volume of this one ensures it's going to be big news," said the spokesman. "It's important to get this sorted as soon as possible."
Accelerator pedal mechanisms in certain Toyota models have stuck in a depressed position or returned slowly to idle. This has caused several accidents in the US, but an exact number hasn’t been released.
The Wall Street Journal claims Toyota first noticed problems with accelerator pedals in March 2007 in the Tundra pick-up. The problem surfaced again in the December 2008, where faults were discovered in right-hand drive Yaris and Aygo models, both of which are a common sight on UK roads.
The Journal also said a Toyota investigation found condensation from the affected models' heaters had caused friction in the accelerator pedals causing them to stick. From August 2009, Toyota fixed this problem in Europe by lengthening the arm of the friction lever and changing materials on all affected models.
Toyota has so far declined to comment on claims that more than two million European models would need to be recalled to fix the problem.
In a statement, Toyota said: "The details of corrective action and implementation will be communicated directly to customers with vehicles potentially affected. The models and exact number of potentially affected vehicles is under investigation.
"A running change in production using different parts has already been implemented model-by-model in the European production. Therefore there is no need or intention to stop production in Europe.
"Whilst this condition is rare we advise customers who have concerns to contact Toyota GB Customer Relations (0800 1388744) for assistance ahead of the recall instructions being issued."
Yesterday, Toyota suspended sales of eight models sold in the US that have been affected by the problem. Although Toyota maintains this was a voluntary decision, The Detroit News said the decision was required to be taken by law.
Discussing the US recall, Toyota vice president Bob Carter said: “Helping ensure the safety of our customers and restoring confidence in Toyota are very important to our company.
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Re: Toyota recall extends to Europe
This is bad for Toyota, but not so sure it will be bad for it's customers, exept those who had accidents.
What i mean is that they learned their lesson, that quality is better than quantity, so maybe in the future we will see Toyota vehicles living up to the quality standarts they were known for 10 or more years ago.
Re: Toyota recall extends to Europe
We urge owners who have a concern to call Toyota GB Customer Relations (0800 1388744) for assistance.
As said in previous post, ideally we would normally delay announcement until we had full info on which models and how many, etc, but speculation from or based on USA situation, which is not the same as Europe (i.e. different models, no stop to production) was starting be used by media. We felt this was potenatially more worrying for our customers than the incomplete info we had, hence today's statement.
We will post updated information as we get it, both via media and on our blog (www.blog.toyota.co.uk)Re: Toyota recall extends to Europe
Scott - thank you for your reply. Are you making information public (and more importantly easy to find) on the internet etc, as well as the phone number, for what owners who experience this problem should do? - Edit to clarify this point, information for owners on what action to take if their accelerator pedal becomes stuck. US and Canada media was reporting yesterday that Toyota UK had experience the same faults (and therefore knew about them) and yet it took until today to act - is that having your hand forced by the media or just coincidence?