Toyota suspends Lexus GX 460 sales after rollover risk report

agree. 100% :) I don't get how anyone can choose this crap. There's so many (much) better, good looking SUVs...

the Americans are at war again, and this time with the Japanese over car sales. Toyota has murdered GM in sales recently, and if the American government has any hope of keeping GM alive it's by destroying the credibility of companies like Toyota. i don't think the problem is anywhere near as serious as it's being made out. this is pure propaganda to stop Toyota selling cars. i would like to point out that my views are the views of a person who hates Toyotas. but i don't think it's fair that they should suffer for the political mess that is the fault of the Americans in the first place.

check your facts... in the USA toyota is now averaging about 85,000-90,000 vehicles every month. GM and Ford on the other hand are up around 130,000-140,000

@ sub39h: totally agreed. since Toyota took down GM... all of sudden (not sudden at all, predictable) with all problems about Toyota's vehicles? face it, tell me how many Toyota on the road today including new & old? how many satisfied buyers out there? how many "problems" on Toyota vehicles? conspiracy spell all over on all these bull...just like, the "recall" episode over, news kinds of quiet down about Toyota & so far didn't hurt too much about their sales, then came this... the U.S. Govt just don't want to give a break to Toyota, take it down 'til it die... once again, this is wrong stratagies... it maybe useless & couldn't help Govt. Motor at all. nothing can destroy the real reputation & word of mouth from Toyota owners...so, it may hurt a little but can't help Govt Motor. even people are not buying Toyota, it doesn't mean they'll go for GM, there are Honda, Nissan, VW, Mazda, Hyundai, Subaru......etc etc. but JUST NOT GOVT MOTOR. btw, do they paid off the bailout money from taxpayer yet?

@Limon I hate that typical American point of view. the world cosists of more countries than just the USA, and this is a worldwide battle.

sub39h: Limon just answered your statement that Toyota murdered GM in sales, that used to be the case IN THE US, NOT WORLDWIDE, so it was not about a "worldwide battle". You are contradicting yourself just for the sake of being anti-american.

@sub39h: well said! thats exactly what I was thinking.

Like the Mazda CX-9

agreed.

Except in the Gulf. European cars still find it hard to cope with the punishing climate; engines overheat, A/C fails. Not so Toyota.

Actually, if you look at the other reports, you will find that it's not America only. For example, Toyota is dealing with the potential of another safety fine because the company itself notified it's European and Asian markets about the accelerator problems BEFORE it notified the American market. For a while, I thought it was just American drivers, until I saw that Toyota even recognized the problems in other areas first.

youy comments are ridiculous. Stop trying to blame this on the Americans. Prejudice is bad even here in the car forum. Toyota is suffering from their own mistakes and there were recalls in Japan about these issues BEFORE Toyota got into trouble into the USA. This forum is called World Car NOT European Car...stop hating.

what do you mean nothing happens like this in Europe...you mean like the history of Opel ? or Renault ? or what about England's MGs or the British Supercar which ended production due to the Engines catching on Fire and buying the cars down to the frames... or the Yugoslavian Yugo automobiles...shall I go on ?

Because in Europe we know that if you drive fast, turn hard in to a corner and lift off the gas, the back of the car is SUPPOSED to go to a slide. I would say that a car that doesn't kick its tail out in a situation like that, handles poorly. It is supposed to happen, for gods sake. Are people really so accustomed to driving cars that have all kinds of stability controls and crap like that, that when a car actually behaves like a car is supposed to behave, everyone is scared and wonders how this could happen.

Kepex, thats not the test. The test is a car travelling at a set speed, around a long steady bend in such a way that the car is stable and not sliding, and all the driver does is lift off the accelerator suddenly. Its not 'a hard turn', and its not something that would be deemed as uncharacteristic behavour for a driver to lift off the accelerator when they come across an obstacle whilst going around a steady bend in the highway. If a car had ABS but the wheels locked up when you applied the brakes in normal conditions, would that not be deemed as dangerous? If the car was advertised as not having ABS then a driver would know to brakes more steadily and to expect wheel lockup. The problem here is the GX460 is marketed as having stability control, however the test shows its not effective.

Genie, stability control can not bend the laws of physics. Did you see the video? It's not a "long steady bend". The driver does a sharp turn to the right and lifts off the gas pedal, and keeps the wheels turned to the right until the car slides out of control. Stability control helps you to a certain point, but as I said before, it can't change the laws of physics. If you turn too hard and lift off the gas, any car will either oversteer or understeer.

This is just utter BS. I didn't see any risk of the vehicle rolling over at all. Tail kicks out because of driver error, so what? You can do that with any car. Going in a 4-wheel slide doesn't mean that there's a risk of the car rolling over. Unless you hit a curb as is stated on the video. Pretty much any car can be rolled over when in a slide and hitting a curb. I can't believe how stupid this whole debate is. If you're a horrible and idiotic driver, perhaps you deserve to roll over in a car and die. You can get killed in any car, no matter how good and safe it is, if you drive too fast and don't know anything about handling a car.

Besides, the GX 460 doesn't even lean to its left that much in the video. That only tells that there is a smaller risk of rolling over than in a car with a softer suspension setup that allows the car to bank more in these kinds of situations.

Kepex: "Going in a 4-wheel slide doesn't mean that there's a risk of the car rolling over." Maybe not if you're sliding on a sheet of ice in a 10 acre parking lot with no obstacles but any other time there's a risk. "Unless you hit a curb [or if a wheel went off the pavement] as is stated on the video." And since most people don't drive their luxury SUVs in the middle of the Bonneville Salt Flats it's a distinct possibility that they might come across a curb from time to time. "If you're a horrible and idiotic driver, perhaps you deserve to roll over in a car and die." And whom shall we appoint to be the judge of the driving skills possessed by your friends and family... Michael Shumacher?

"Maybe not if you're sliding on a sheet of ice in a 10 acre parking lot with no obstacles but any other time there's a risk." There's no risk unless you're a total idiot and drive like crazy. Obey the speed limits, use your head; you'll be fine. Whatever happened to any basic sense of humans? At least in the US. If you do something completely stupid and get hurt, you sue the manufacturer of whatever hurt you and get millions just because the manual didn't say that you can't drive in to a corner of a street at 100mph even though the car has stability control. "And since most people don't drive their luxury SUVs in the middle of the Bonneville Salt Flats it's a distinct possibility that they might come across a curb from time to time." Tell me, when do you hit a curb in a 4 wheel slide with such speed that the car might roll over? When you're driving TOO FAST. It's not the car maker's fault if you are an idiot. "And whom shall we appoint to be the judge of the driving skills possessed by your friends and family... Michael Shumacher?" You shouldn't have a license if you don't have any feel to what's going on when you're driving. Too many people don't have that sense of what's going on. They just turn the steering wheel to the direction they want to go, and assume that the car turns that way, no matter what the speed or driving conditions are.

@ Kepex: you're wasting your time debate/ argue with EDavis, who is a pure-pro-American-car-is-the-best-of-the-world kind of person, which maybe only driving/ driven American car only the whole life. so, forget it...oh, btw, why bother to argue with a person who EVEN believe BS like cosmic rays affect Toyota vehicle! amazing, huh? the cosmic rays ONLY pick on Toyota...LOL. trust me, this will never end...the U.S. Govt & Govt Motor will do whatever it takes, no matter how ugly & stupid they'll look, until Toyota hits its rock bottom...in the U.S.

Now hata0101, Kepex was not was not wasting his time in debating/arguing with me because we weren't arguing, we were having a nice, friendly, adult level discussion about automobiles. If you insist on talking about cosmic rays and a non-existent company called Govt Motor then maybe this site just isn't for you.

yes hata0101, because only American cars have to obey the laws of physics, Japanese cars are exempt. If you read the report you'd know that the incident was repeated four times and didn't take 100MPH, it occurred at highway speeds, ie 60MPH through a turn and all that the driver did was take their foot of the pedal, with resultant lift-off oversteer. This is something that could occur to anyone when an animal runs onto the road or there is a fallen tree. On the 95 other SUV's they tested it on, they have never had a car that got as sideways as the GX460. If any car is sliding sidewards and hits an unmoveable object (like a gutter) then it can tip, as the sudden increase in friction at the tyre creates a decelerative force at the tyre great enough to overcome the force required to rotate the centre of gravity point of the car over the pivot point, which in this case is the outside tyres. Hence why its a safety issue, its a hazard thats repeatable in conditions that can occur whilst driving normally. This car has a system which is sold to the consumer as being able to maintain stability of the car whilst being operated in normal conditions, the consumer report test found that wasn't the case.

Genie, are you saying that a situation where stability control has to save you from wrapping yourself around a tree is a normal driving situation? When you're driving / cornering so fast that the tires lose their grip of the road, it is not a normal driving situation. It's either a special occasion when you're taking evasive action to try and not to hit something, or you're just driving too fast. If you look at the video, it's quite obvious why the car oversteered. It's because it entered a corner with too much speed and the driver lifted off the gas pedal. If other SUVs understeered in the same test, it just shows that the GX 460 has snappier handling than the others. Stability control is meant to HELP you control the car in extreme situations, not to drive for you. It can't change the laws of physics or turn the wheels for you. A cars tendency to oversteer instead of to understeer is a feature, and personally I'd rather drive a car that oversteers in extreme situations than a car that understeers.

The ISSUE is with the TC ON the TC did not intervene to STOP this slide or drift as it should do..it is the Traction Control that is the issue. BTW Toyota Australia are saying their PRADO (same car) has a different TC unit to the US one and the Japan made Australian Prado does not have any TC problem?

"This only tells me that they have given up trying to match Japanese quality" Most reliable cars for 2010: 1) Porsche 2) Lincoln 3) Lexus and Buick (tie) 4) Toyota 5) Mercury. I'm fairly certain that at least one of those is American. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/18/most-reliable-cars-2010-t_n_504221.html#slide_image

http://www.anusedcar.com/ Here you go. Top 10 of 2009 has two euro-spec Fords, two Porsches and the rest are Japanese, mainly Toyota and Mazda. It all comes down to the country the results are from, and the kind of cars that are made. Porsche only makes expensive sports cars, so its no wonder they are the #1.

And let's not forget which cars will remain reliable after 5 years; Porsche, Lincoln and Buick? I don't think so.

well said, fast_lane!! now that's what i call FACTS. EDavis, you hear that? never mind, you'll never "understand" anyway...LOL

"True that Lincoln, Buick, and Mercury are on the list" "well said, fast_lane!! now that's what i call FACTS" Oh hata0101, it just warms my heart that you agree with me.

"women, who don't complain much"...What a load of Rubbish, WOMEN are the Worst when it comes to new vehicle complaints, they have NO Idea on what they are talking about when it comes to any new vehicle issue. Having worked in new car Servicing Departments the Women complains the most definitely, like squeaky brakes, cant change gear or jerky shift, cant see over the hood, cant see over trunk, cant see out side glass, car gets dusty inside quickly...I have heard them all from WOMEN!