[Enobarbus]

Originally Posted by ph03n!x

The Start-Stop button won't work when the car is in motion

This means that in a car equipped with a start stop button and an auto gear box, you cannot cut the engine once the car is in motion. Is this not a safety issue?
No doubt you need to prevent fiddling passengers from cutting the engine inadvertently. But surely the driver should have some option of cutting the engine in an emergency. For example, if there is a fire, there should be some way of switching everything off even if the car is in motion. In a car with a key start, one can pull out the key.

[vharihar]

Originally Posted by Enobarbus

This means that in a car equipped with a start stop button and an auto gear box, you cannot cut the engine once the car is in motion. Is this not a safety issue?

Per http://www.wikihow.com/Handle-a-Stuck-Accelerator-Pedal , if you keep the START/STOP button pressed for 3 seconds, the engine should stop.

[Enobarbus]

Thanks Harihar. So this confirms that there was a start stop button malfunction and that, this is not likely to be a case of a stuck accelerator pedal. This puts the blame squarely on the electronics of the car.

[humyum]

RIP to the man in question, but I find it extremely improbable to imagine that everything in the car stopped working so much so that he had no option to stop the car/slow the car down.

I mean, beat this, accelerator got stuck at more than half way throttle position, start stop button stopped working, he could not brake (I find this next to impossible), he did not even pull the handbrake (or had no courage to maybe) and lastly all the option he had was go inside the back of a truck at 120 miles.

Sounds like a suicide, which he attempted to show as a car malfunction leading to his death.

[narayans80]

Quite an unforntunate incident. To his bad luck, he was in much higher speeds. So hitting the handbrake though possible might have created more disastrous scenario than what happened.

A similar story happened in Australia in a Ford Explorer where cruise won't disengage. He however lived to tell a story. Here's the article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...w-traffic.html

I remember another incident from the late 2000s which resulted in a fatal accident with stuck cruise controls.

Originally Posted by Arjun Reddy

Didn't Toyota have a similar problem in America ?

That was an 'sticky' accelerator problem, once you remove your foot off the A pedal, the car wouldn't decelerate. I guess happened in 2008 or 2009.

Originally Posted by humyum

Sounds like a suicide, which he attempted to show as a car malfunction leading to his death.

Sounds like a bad way to attempt suicide. I mean why would you call emergency services and leave audio evidence?

[SDP]

Originally Posted by MSAneesh

Scary!! Though this could be termed as one of the rarest of rare cases, ...

Unfortunately, this is not rare at all. Google for "sudden unintended acceleration" or "unintended acceleration Toyota".

Originally Posted by SchumiFan

...
There is no mention of the driver pressing the brake pedal at all. Very confusing why they would go for the handbrake option when there is a primary one available.
....

Do you really believe that the driver didn't try the brakes for stopping the car, but was alert enough to call emergency services and explore possibilities for 8 minutes?
Sorry Sir, but that's not what happens. The brakes obviously failed. What happens in such a scenario is that, with the throttle stuck wide open and the drivetrain engaged, the car is surging ahead like a locomotive. Applying brakes in such a case would wear your brakes COMPLETELY in a matter of minutes if not seconds.

Check the following video (rather audio recording) out and compare the similarities.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03m7fmnhO0I

Originally Posted by greatestmj

...
Once in my Duster I accelerated and my accelerator got stuck with a metallic designor part of floor mat and accelerator was pressed full when I wanted to slow. I panicked for two seconds, not knowing what to do, I slightly pressed breaks to slow but engine making o much sound with full 100% accelerator pressed, I immediately pulled keys out and car stopped. It was scary. I threw away the door mats and got a basic one.

The mats getting stuck and causing the throttle to remain stuck wide open is the common cause for "sudden unintended acceleration", but the story does not end there. Toyota, Honda and Ford has recalled vehicles in the past for software issues (among others) which could lead to unintended acceleration.

Originally Posted by Arjun Reddy

Didn't Toyota have a similar problem in America ? I guess something seriously went wrong. ....

Bang on! Here's the link -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009%E...ehicle_recalls

Also check this out:
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/toyota...ry?id=22972214

A deferred prosecution agreement, filed today, forced Toyota to “admit” that it “misled U.S. consumers by concealing and making deceptive statements about two safety related issues affecting its vehicles, each of which caused a type of unintended acceleration.”

Toyota “put sales over safety and profit over principle,” according to FBI Assistant Director George Venizelos.

“The disregard Toyota had for the safety of the public is outrageous,” Venizelos said. “Not only did Toyota fail to recall cars with problem parts, they continued to manufacture new cars with the same parts they already knew were deadly. When media reports arose of Toyota hiding defects, they emphatically denied what they knew was true, assuring consumers that their cars were safe and reliable…

Check out the underlined portion ... 6200 complaints!

EDIT: The Toyota information is sort of OT on this thread, but sharing it anyways so that we understand that its not a one-off incident and are able to draw parallels.

[greatestmj]

Mod Note : There are several spelling & grammatical errors in your posts. This negatively affects the forum experience for other readers.

Kindly ensure that you proof-read your posts prior to submission. Also, it would be a good idea to use a spell-checker.

[pixantz]

Originally Posted by Enobarbus

But surely the driver should have some option of cutting the engine in an emergency. For example, if there is a fire, there should be some way of switching everything off even if the car is in motion. In a car with a key start, one can pull out the key.

You are forgetting a critical point here my friend. Most or all of the major controls for driving and controlling a car including steering, brakes, clutch and accelerator are almost always dependant on the car being ON to function. Either they are electrical or then hydraulic.

So that means that they completely or partially(in case of hydraulic) cease to function if the car turns off. And if that happens in motion then it effectively means you will not have any control whatsoever to stop your car safely in a position and/or direction as intended to be safe. It will just continue on its path and stop in whatever logical path it was going. That might be off of a bridge, or head-on into a truck, or under the belly of some large vehicle or some other unfavourable position. So this idea doesn't seem ideal at all.

[invidious]

RIP to Mr. Gandhi. That's a terrible way to go. I was talking to an older pilot and he said the dependency on electronics in avionics too has resulted in a decrease in the skills of pilots. That is fine in 99.9% of the cases but it is that 0.1% where the problem arises. Of course cars are safer now then they were earlier - just try and remember the completely squashed Maruti 800s of the 1980s - they were basically glorified golf carts. But yes - if you pretty much automate every conceivable part of a car, once in a while, things can go horribly wrong. It's just bad luck that he was on a motorway when it happened and all things he rammed into a Scania truck. I can't begin to imagine the panic and the horror - I thought he might have jumped off the car but it can't easy at such high speeds and your car does tend to give you a sense of security. As the expert in the article states, the handbrake would have helped. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

[racer_ash]

Originally Posted by racer_ash

Guys. Just saw this horrifying news. Apparently this guy tried changing drive modes from Sport to Normal and the car stopped responding to his inputs and even refused to turn off.
........

I had posted about this in the Skoda Octavia official reviews thread because the accident happened in the UK and does not necessarily fit into the 'Indian Car Scene' domain.

Anyway. in the link I posted, there is another bit that seems to be missed out. It seems the controls stopped responding after Mr. Gandhi switched from Sport to Normal mode. This seems to be overlooked somehow. This may be a bug in the software programming in the ECU.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...hed-lorry.html

[itwasntme]

Cruise control and automatics can be lethal when things do go wrong. Thankfully it is very rare else it would be a subject of major regulatory and safety reviews/recalls/prosecution across the world.

I regularly (at least 3 times a week) engage cruise control @81 km/hr on my morning commute on Bellary Road, and really enjoy the feeling of the TSI+DSG combo.

I have used it only once or twice on my long distance drives though. I noted that cruise control really comes into form on undulating terrain, or any road with multiple flyovers because it superbly modulates on both uphill and downhill stretches.

RIP Mr. Gandhi

[Shanmd]

This is a scary scenario..

http://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/m...w/55629598.cms

[Mohan Mathew A]

Originally Posted by Shanmd

This is a scary scenario..

http://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/m...w/55629598.cms

Oh My God. This is really scary. Poor guy. Think of what he went through for those 8 (or more) minutes. I dread to think of it

What surprises me

1) Engine not switching off seems to suggest a larger electrical issue or is it some safety mechanism which prevents the engine from shutting down when the car is moving even if the switch is pressed.

2) The car not going into neutral. The car was obviously a DSG but you still should be able to move it into neutral or does the electronics in DSG stop you from moving into neutral at speeds

Maybe a combination of brakes + hand brake would have slowed him down somewhat to be able to try and do a controlled crash.

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Terrifying! Cruise control + DSG can be a killer combination!

Re-posting from the accident thread. Maybe some of you who have an Octavia knows the answer to my 2 question

What surprises me

1) Engine not switching off seems to suggest a larger electrical issue or is it some safety mechanism which prevents the engine from shutting down when the car is moving even if the switch is pressed.

2) The car not going into neutral. The car was obviously a DSG but you still should be able to move it into neutral or does the electronics in DSG stop you from moving into neutral at speeds

Maybe a combination of brakes + hand brake would have slowed him down somewhat to be able to try and do a controlled crash.

[--gKrish--]

Originally Posted by Mohan Mathew A

Oh My God. This is really scary. Poor guy. Think of what he went through for those 8 (or more) minutes. I dread to think of it.

Same thoughts here.

Can be anything from malfunctioning ECU+DSG controller/BCM/CC module to intermittent connection losses with a very small chance of engine runaway. There should be manual override atleast for the brakes and engine shutdown. This is why I'm not a big fan of these new age gizmos and auto piloted cars. The biggest difference between electrical and mechanical components is that the latter gives signs of wear before actually failing unlike electrical assists which may give up without any obvious signs.

Even though I'm growing up to be an engineer I don't trust total automation in vital control systems. This was one of my biggest fears turning into reality. I don't understand why these manufacturers overlook the vulnerability of these electronic modules.

Some more details here.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/736...-speeds-police

[greatestmj]

Today I tried a few things in my Honda City Automatic. I went to low traffic 4 lane road and at speed of 70-80 kmph I pressed start stop button once. Nothing happened. I then pressed twice and my car shut off. But I could still steer a bit and safely went off lane to sides while car was slowing down due to friction maybe. Then I tried brakes too, it was partially braking as well. I didn't have much guts to slowly try hand brake as I thought its risky.

At 70-80 I also tried using paddle shifts and downshifted slowly from 7th to 6th, 5th eventually till 3rd and each downshift was slowing down the car. If someone is in trouble downshifting can help, it may hurt the gearbox if you downshift to 1 or 2 but atleast person can be safe?