Why do we see so many defects on a massive scale? Well, it doesn't take too much imagination to realize that what Henry Ford either invented or modified, that is, assembly line production, has its inherent flaws. While it allows mass quantities, one mistake can shoot out millions of products into the "stream of commerce", as it's sometimes called, and ends up in your garage, at your office, or even on your plate.

This was discussed in an interesting article that stated: " Quality problems will happen and although you are going to do everything possible to minimize them, it is something that you are always going have to deal with." This is addressed to the manufacturing communities.

Wide spread problems in automobile manufacturing point out the problems. For example, years before the Toyota vehicle self-acceleration problem that exposed the soft underbelly of unshielded electronics in sophisticated wiring systems in certain automobiles, I had a case against Ford Motor Company involving a client who had experienced massive unintentional acceleration three times: once while coming out of a car wash - before the startled driver could think to turn off the truck, he had to "stand" on the brake with the rear wheels smoking as they spun almost out of control; the second while driving at 25 mph through a residential neighborhood, when the same thing happened. Finally, after the dealership had put a "VDR", or virtual data recorder when they finally believed him after it was towed in after the second incident, he was coming out of an Outback Restaurant with his wife, and after he started the truck but before he had put it in Drive (thank God), the vehicle self-accelerated and "hung" at 4,000 RPM for several seconds before it finally idled normally. He had it towed in again to the dealer, and didn't drive it again. The VDR was a electronic port monitor that the driver was supposed to activate with a push button to "record" the electronic events gong on at the time of the malfunction, which would then be recorded in a memory bank. After we filed suit, because Ford refused to take it back, and went to trial, it was discovered the data had been "lost". After the trial resulted in the court ordering a buyback, the Ford attorney "found" the data, and guess what, it showed nothing! I don't want to get into the ugly facts of the way the court sanctioned Ford and its attorney - that's an ethics discussion for another day. How this ties to the Toyota case is interesting: during trial, after which Ford's lawyer had vehemently toed the company line that they never could "duplicate" the problem (despite there actually being electronic codes that required that the electronic throttle body be replaced after the second incident), I asked the Ford master mechanic who I called to testify under cross-examination and asked him - "Assuming the court believes the plaintiffs testimony as to how these incidents occurred - is there any explanation for what could have caused the vehicle to perform in this manner three times?" The witness looked somewhat uncomfortable, but to his credit, answered truthfully - "A stray radio frequency." Years later, that was what Toyota's people finally admitted - unshielded cables let electronic interference self-accelerate their vehicles (it wasn't driver error from allowing the floor mats to "catch" the accelerator like earlier claimed).

How a manufacturer responds is key, to me, to not only preventing perhaps life-threatening encounters between consumers and the expensive vehicles they purchase. If the manufacturer would respond, rather than stonewall, buy back rather than force the consumer to get a lawyer, and at least lend a sympathetic ear, many lawsuit would be avoidable. But, that's why I have a practice that concentrates in that area, along with personal injury - manufacturer intransigence plays a big part.