Toyota advances plans to replace flawed Takata airbags
TOYOTA Motor Corp is advancing by a year plans to replace Takata airbags in about 65,000 Toyota and Lexus vehicles in the United States it had previously replaced.
Its US subsidiary said the recall is being announced a year ahead of the December 2019 timeline and would involve replacing Takata airbags that it previously recalled and replaced, with non-Takata airbags at no cost.
Takata and its US entity TK Holdings Inc filed for bankruptcy in June last year after recalling more than 100 million of its air bag inflators worldwide as they could inflate with too much force and spray metal fragments.
The recall affects certain
At least 23 people have died worldwide due to the problem caused by inflators made by Takata Corp., resulting in the largest series of auto recalls in US history.
Toyota Corolla, Sequoia, Tundra and Lexus vehicles which were made between 2002 and 2005.
At least 23 people have died worldwide due to the problem caused by inf lators made by Takata Corp., resulting in the largest series of auto recalls in US history. They cover 37 million vehicles and about 50 million inf lators in the US. About 100 million inf lators are being recalled worldwide.
Last June, Takata and its US entity TK Holdings Inc filed for bankruptcy after it said it was recalling more than 100 million of its air bag inflators.
Meanwhile, Toyota has just confirmed its own belief in the future of the automobile, and stated that it has no intention of abandoning that side of the market. This new declaration came from Bob Carter, executive vice- president for Toyota in North America.
Carter pointed out that, in the United States alone, it’s expected that consumers will buy four million cars next year. He brought home the importance of that number by adding that the American ‘passenger car market is bigger than the market in most countries.’ For Toyota, he said, ‘cars are very important.’
Certainly this is reassuring news for those who fret about the future of the automobile. It comes even as new sales numbers show the inroads being made by utility vehicles shows no sign of slowing down.
At Toyota, as of the end of October, year- to- date sales figures for Toyota show a 12 per cent decline in car sales, accompanied by an eight per cent increase in sales of SUVs.