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All new Toyotas will include an electronic device to stop their accelerators sticking, the company's New Zealand boss said yesterday.
Chief executive Alistair Davis said the device, which cuts petrol to the throttle as soon as the brake is applied, would be introduced with the next new model, due for
release next year.
Though it would not be welcomed by the boyracer community, which likes to smoke its tyres, more conservative motorists would welcome the added safety feature, he said.
"For the majority of people, they would rather know that if they touch the brake, it's going to stop the car."
The add-on was likely to make just a "minuscule" difference to the price.
The New Zealand division has recalled 321 vehicles since the beginning of this year - 61 Avensis Wagons for a sticky accelerator and 260 Prius for a brake software upgrade.
Of the 61 Avensis vehicles, 28 were customer recalls, Mr Davis said. The rest are in stock, and will be refitted over time.
The customer fix-ups, which involve fitting a machined metal "shim" to prevent the accelerator sticking, were due to be completed today.
The Prius recall affects 260 privately owned vehicles, and requires the uploading of a software "patch", a procedure that takes about 15 minutes.
That recall is expected to be completed by early next month.
Mr Davis said that although a recall often led to a short-term loss of confidence in a brand, Toyota's overseas problems had not yet had much impact on the New Zealand car-buying public.
His comments came just hours after Toyota Motor Corporation president Akio Toyoda appeared before a United States congressional committee to answer questions about Toyota products sold in the United States.
He told the committee he intended to reorganise the company to streamline all quality decisions.
Rapid expansion in recent years had resulted in lower quality which had affected some models, he said, particularly in North America.
TOYOTA'S NAME
* Toyota president Akio Toyoda is the grandson of Toyota founder Sakichi Toyoda, and the company traded under the family name until 1936.
* It was then discovered that writing "Toyota" in Japanese required just eight brush strokes, compared with 10 strokes for "Toyoda", Japan-America Society of Washington DC president John Malott told the Washington Post.
* The new name had the added advantage that while 8 is considered an auspicious number in Japanese culture, the number 10 is not.
