Toyota Motor Corp.’s (TM: Quote) tryst with recall continues. The automaker Wednesday indicated recall of more than 1.2 million cars in the U.S. for reasons ranging from airbag snags in Corolla vehicles and wiper problems with Lexus IS luxury cars.
Toyota will conduct two safety recalls involving about 752,000 Corolla and Corolla Matrix vehicles made in the years 2003 and 2004, and about 270,000 Lexus IS vehicles from 2006 through early 2012.
The airbag control module in the Corolla and Corolla Matrix vehicles could have been made with application-specific integrated circuits that are prone to internal shorting and may lead to increased heat. If this occurs, the circuits may get damaged, and in some cases, the front airbag and/or seat belt pretensioners could inadvertently deploy. The second recall pertains to the front wipers on certain Lexus IS vehicles where the wiper arm nut might not be sufficiently tight. The wipers may become inoperative if their movement is restricted by an external load, such as a buildup of heavy snow on the windshield.
Toyota in the past has had resorted to huge recalls in the U.S., due to issues of faulty brakes and gas pedals. In December, Toyota agreed to pay up to $1.4 billion to settle a U.S. class action suit by owners whose vehicles were prone to abrupt and unexplained acceleration. That settlement is the largest in U.S. automotive history.
Otherwise, things appear to be going well for Toyota which ousted U.S. rival General Motors Co. (GM) to regain its place as the world’s top automaker, with total vehicle sales of about 9.75 million units. The company has managed to recover its production base that was hampered by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan and has been posting impressive sales, even as others in the industry, especially European companies, find the going tough.
Toyota is trading at $95.80, up 0.21%, on the NYSE.
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by RTT Staff Writer
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