USA Today: Fix It Again, Toyota: More Camry pedal problems

[Omaha Steve]

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2010/12/more-camry-accelerator-problems-fix-it-again-toyota/1


By Alan Diaz, AP
Earl Stewart, owner of Earl Stewart Toyota, shows the faulty accelerator pedal on one of the recalled vehicles in North Palm Beach, Fla., Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010. Toyota's suspension of U.S. sales on an unprecedented scale to fix faulty gas pedals deals a blow to the automaker's reputation for quality and endangers its fledgling earnings recovery.


If at first you don't succeed...

Toyota must be pondering the old adage now that it has authorized dealers to make a second accelerator pedal fix on its Camry sedan if needed, Reuters reports.

Toyota sent a bulletin to dealers yesterday telling them it will foot the bill if a bracket holding the accelerator pedal was damaged during the recall repairs for sticky pedals earlier this year. Earlier this year, Toyota had to fix millions of the recalled cars, Camrys and other models. That picture, above, was taken back then.

The latest notice isn't another recall. Rather, it's classified as a less drastic action, but still plenty embarrassing. Toyota just reported lower sales in November, joining Volvo as the only two major automakers that saw sales fall off. It's spate of safety trouble and recalls, 16 so far this year, were blamed.

The sticky pedal recall resulted from a series of reported accidents in which drivers reported that their accelerators stuck wide open, creating runaway cars. Besides sticky pedals, Toyota has blamed floor mats that can jam against the accelerator.