Death by floor mat?

Leslie Gordon June 23rd, 2009

Who was it that said everything is in the details?

A few days ago, I was driving a 2009 Ford 150 Supercrew 4 x 4 truck. It was one of the vehicles us editors get to try out and then write about in Machine Design. Anyway, I was minding my business, driving a sedate 60 mph in the right-hand lane of a busy freeway. Suddenly, the vehicle took off, speeding faster and faster….65, 70, 75, 80 mph. I thought the accelerator was jammed, so tried quickly kicking it – an old trick to free mechanical linkages (I’ve since found out everything now-a-days is controlled by electronic sensors.) Alas, the behemoth did not stop. Then I turned off the cruise control thinking it was struck. No luck. Now I’m thinking, look for a soft spot to crash land. Luckily, I didn’t downshift to low gear (after all, this is a $40,000 truck we are talking about), but the thought did pass through my head.

So I pushed and pushed on the brake and sloooowly the vehicle stopped. I stuck it in neutral and shut it off. I had parked within inches of the white line that marks the edge of the freeway, so huge semis continually rattled the 4 x 4 as they whizzed by going around 100 mph, or so it seemed. To make matters worse, I had my little dog with me. Luckily, a nice cop pulled over and used his patrol car to push the truck to a grassy area away from the freeway. He also called a tow truck. The hot sun beat down and my little dog was panting like crazy. The tow truck showed up after awhile and $90 later we were dropped at the nearest Ford Dealership. It was a Saturday, so of course Service had already closed and I had no way to get home. Couldn’t even get a rental car. Luckily, dealership personnel gave me a ride home.

Monday morning I took a cab back to the dealership. They eventually figured out what had gone wrong – not a stuck accelerator pedal and not a stuck cruise control. Someone had installed the driver’s side floor mat upside-down. This meant that the cut-out area intended to accommodate the accelerator was in the wrong location. Unbeknownst to me, the mat had literally bunched up over the accelerator pedal, pushing it to the floor. I found out later the Ford people had delivered the vehicle like this so the floor mat would not be dirty. They had forgotten to turn the mat back around.

Readers, do you have a similar story? We would love to hear it! Send us your comment, and you might win a Machine Design thumbdrive!

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7 Comments to “Death by floor mat?”

1. Muhammad Farhan Says:
   

   July 10th, 2009 at 7:31 am

   Sounds frightening! I could never have imagined that a floor mat could cause so much trouble. I think they should be properly checked to see if they are aligned with the contour of the floor, and that none of the edges of the mat are at a risk of getting caught up in the pedals while you are driving.

2. Howard Gibson Says:
   

   July 17th, 2009 at 11:52 am

   I have a new Honda Fit. On about day three of owning the new car, it would not start. I tried jumping the battery. I called the dealer and asked if anything could be wrong.

   I called the dealer again, and I got a different person who asked me if I had installed an after market floor mat. Manual Honda have an interlock that prevents the car from starting if the clutch is not depressed. The floor mat was in the way.

   With the floor mat removed, the car started fine.

3. Scott Prost Says:
   

   July 17th, 2009 at 11:56 am

   I remembered a case in Illinois that a Lexus car had runaway accelerator due to the floor mat being properly installed, but sliding a little and pushing down on the accelerator. The woman driver totaled the car. I googled it, to make sure I got the make right, turns out the Toyota Prius might also have the same problem.

   Of course you can get that problem with any car/truck with loosely installed floor mats, or improperly installed mats (as the author here indicates), however, some cars appear to have propensity for this problem. Perhaps there needs to be a warning sticker on the driver’s side window? Or one on the steering wheel? Why stop there? One on the instrument panel, one on the LCD screen on the radio…the possibilities are endless!

4. Dale Coad Says:
   

   July 26th, 2009 at 5:06 pm

   I have a 1980 Corvette that resulted in a similar problem with the cruise control. It has a single button on the end of thedirectional signal lever. A push of this button sets the speed and a touch of the brake pedal turns it off. Very easy to use.
   I used this car every day, even in the winters of Northern Ohio with no accidents.
   One summer day, on a three lane high which was heavily patrolled by the OSP, I set the speed at 50mph. As I approached a traffic light, a tap of the brake pedal was supposed to turn the cruse off. It didn’t. The more I pressed on the brake, the more the engine would work to maintain the speed. I could feel the whole frame twisting to react against the high torque. As a last effort to stop this, I switched off the ignition. This worked, but it also locked the steering wheel. Never used cruise control again on this car.
   It taught me a good lesson… always have redundent STOP.

5. arnold horowitz Says:
   

   August 12th, 2009 at 1:07 pm

   I had a 1990 Cadillac Sedan De Ville that I bought new. It was a good car for 4 years (120,000 miles ) Then one afternoon on Sunrise Highway in Valley Stream, NY, it took off. The cruise control was not on and I was going about 40 MPH in moderate traffic. At 60 MPH I turned off the ignition and moved through a lot of honking to the right shoulder. Opened the hood and saw the accelerator cable was slack. I moved the pivot on the throttle body and heard a loud click, almost like a cracking sound. Started the car and drove home. Never had the problem again and gave the car to a charity at 245,000 miles. It was still running well. Cadillac claimed that they never heard of that problem before or since.

6. Leslie Gordon Says:
   

   August 17th, 2009 at 9:24 am

   Dale Coad — please email me your physical address — your answer was the winning entry and I would like to send you the prize — a Machine Design flash drive.
   Leslie Gordon, leslie.gordon@penton.com

7. Leslie Gordon Says:
   

   October 2nd, 2009 at 12:41 pm

   I read with interest the story about the 1980 Corvette with cruse control because I had one myself. Being a private pilot, I also had some interest in this story because as pilots, we are constantly going to safety seminars to keep current on new discoveries. For any given event that could happen in the cockpit, we have either had training ,will receive it in the future, or learn about it at a safety seminar. People that drive motor vehicles don’t get much training past their initial driver training course.
   As the head electrician for our organization , I use the lessons learned in aviation safety and find ways to put them to work at work. The most applicable lesson I’ve found applies to flying, driving a car, and safety at work. The lesson starts with the question: “ What size deer are you willing to take on directly without veering off the road?” What ever the answer is , it should be made before the event and not during the event. Training by “ what if” scenarios will cut reaction time to almost nothing. That’s because the decision of how to react had been made prior to that particular event, if the training was there. What size deer are you willing to take on?

   Prentice Adler
   Saint Gobain Coated Abrasives
   2600 Tenth Ave
   Watervliet NY 12189
   ph 518 266 2247
   fax 518 266 2773

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