Toyota Brakes Don’t Take The Cake

A lawsuit against Toyota Motors has been formally filed in California after the IIHS issued a failing grade to the Prius V’s pre-collision auto-braking system. The plaintiff’s Tae Hee Lee and Alan Quan filed their complaint at the California Central District Court in Los Angeles, claiming Toyota’s front-to-rear collision-avoidance system failed to decelerate quickly enough to avoid collisions as advertised.

The lawsuit points to the IIHS test result that found the collision avoidance system gives only a “negligible reduction in speed,” a 1- or 2mph reduction when the car is travelling between 12 mph and 25 mph. The lawsuit continues on to contend with another direct quote from the IIHS stating “Despite the PCS [pre-collision safety] being marketed and sold by (Toyota) as an accident mitigation system that provides adequate braking in unavoidable frontal collisions, it provides no real safety benefit to consumers who paid for the option through either a sale or lease,”.

The IIHS gives Toyota's forward collision warning zero points, claiming the $1,000 option, which is part of a $5,650 “advanced technology package," is effectively useless.  http://www.iihs.org/ http://www.ibtimes.com
The IIHS gives Toyota’s forward collision warning zero points, claiming the $1,000 option, which is part of a $5,650 “advanced technology package,” is effectively useless. http://www.iihs.org/
http://www.ibtimes.com

According to the IB Timesdespite their unfortunate lawsuit, Toyota still claims to be moving forward with autonomous driving. This past Friday, Toyota announced it had developed a PCS with automatic steering and stronger braking force to help avoid collisions with pedestrians.

Hopefully this technology works like it should and doesn’t cause any more problems for the general public.