According to the latest report on total cost of ownership (TCO) from Edmunds.com, Toyota has the lowest TCO in the most commonly desired body styles: coupes, sedans, vans, and trucks.
Total cost of ownership is, obviously, not just the purchase price of the vehicle. It includes things like the cost of expected maintenance, oil changes, and the like. That means that you can expect to pay less for your Toyota over the long-term.
The Toyota Yaris comes in both coupe and sedan body styles, and took the title for both classes. The Toyota Sienna took the title for lowest TCO van, and the Tacoma claimed top marks for trucks.
If you want to keep your fleet costs down, then, Toyota is the name of the game.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Thursday, March 31, 2011
What's your opinion?
Free market economies are supply and demand driven, creating pruduct competition and price. But what if you take advantage of the market to gain profit out of ficticious fear and instability? Especially knowing there is no fear, or the waters muddy just to gain an edge. Some dealers are charging more for 2011 Prius, some even increased to $4,000 over MSRP when the market is not unstable.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Entune! Vehicle MultiMedia System!
It’s a match made in heaven: On the one hand, “Consumers have grown accustomed to having the world at their fingertips through their mobile phones,” according to Jon Bucci, vice president of the Advanced Technology Department at Toyota. And on the other, those buyers also have grown accustomed to Toyota meeting all their transportation needs. Now the automaker is putting both those expectations together with the Toyota Entune multimedia system, recently introduced at this year’s International CES consumer electronics show.
“And unlike other industry solutions, Entune allows the driver to interact with informative and entertaining mobile content without fumbling with their phone,” added Bucci. “We offer features that our customers demand and integrate them seamlessly in the vehicle.”
Among those features will be:
* Mobile Apps—Entune will launch offering the Bing search engine to help drivers find more than 16 million points of interest, with destinations sent directly to the vehicle’s navigation system; OpenTable, capable of making reservations at any one of 15,000 restaurants across the country; MovieTickets.com, providing access to film tickets and reviews; and the ability to get customized, real-world information about traffic, fuel prices, weather, stocks and sports.
* Music—Tuning into Entune will deliver more than 750 local radio stations via iheartradio, access to the Pandora music-streaming service, XM satellite radio, HD radio and USB connectivity for personal media players.
* Voice Recognition—Entune’s best-in-class voice-recognition system is able to respond to conversational speech commands, so there’s no need to worry about memorizing thousands of specific voice directions to operate the system.
In addition, Entune can be upgraded wirelessly, so it always packs the latest applications and functionality, and it was designed to be compatible with a wide range of current cell phones.
“Toyota has always been a leader in the automotive industry, so it makes sense it would bring the latest in mobile technology to the car,” said Chris Daniels, general manager of Bing for Mobile, Microsoft Corp. “By bringing Bing Maps and Bing for Mobile technology to the car, we are helping Toyota enhance the overall in-vehicle experience to be as rich and robust as possible, which means personalizing the information to each driver’s needs.”
The new Entune multimedia system will be available in select Toyota vehicles beginning later this year.
From Toyotainthenews.com
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Governement Finds No Flaws in Toyotas!
Government: No electronic flaws in Toyotas
AP
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110208/ap_on_re_us/us_toyota_recalls
Ray LaHood AP – Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood speaks about the Toyota recalls, Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2011, at the Transportation …
WASHINGTON – Electronic flaws weren't to blame for the reports of sudden, unintended acceleration that led to the recall of thousands of Toyota vehicles, the government said Tuesday.
Some of the acceleration cases could have been caused by mechanical defects — sticking accelerator pedals and gas pedals that can become trapped in floor mats — that have been dealt with in recalls, the government said.
And in some cases, investigators suggested, drivers simply hit the gas when they meant to press the brake.
"We feel that Toyota vehicles are safe to drive," declared Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.
The investigation bolstered Toyota's contentions that electronic gremlins were not to blame and its series of recalls — involving more than 12 million vehicles globally since fall 2009 — had directly addressed the safety concerns.
Transportation officials, assisted by engineers with NASA, said the 10-month study of Toyota vehicles concluded there was no electronic cause of unintended high-speed acceleration. The study, launched at the request of Congress, responded to consumer complaints that flawed electronics could be the culprit behind complaints that led to Toyota's spate of recalls.
Recalls to fix sticking accelerator pedals, gas pedals that became trapped in floor mats, and other safety issues have posed a major challenge for the world's No. 1 automaker, which has scrambled to protect its reputation for safety and reliability. Toyota paid the U.S. government a record $48.8 million in fines for its handling of three recalls.
Toyota said the report should "further reinforce confidence in the safety of Toyota and Lexus vehicles" and "put to rest unsupported speculation" about the company's electronic throttle control systems, which are "well-designed and well-tested to ensure that a real world, un-commanded acceleration of the vehicle cannot occur."
Toyota reported a 39 percent slide in quarterly profit earlier Tuesday but raised its full-year forecasts for earnings and car sales. The financial results and government report boosted shares of the automaker on Wall Street by more than 4 percent, to close at $88.57.
Analysts said the report would help Toyota's reputation but the company would still need to work hard to regain its bulletproof image of reliability. Toyota was the only major automaker to see a U.S. sales decline last year at 0.4 percent.
"This is really something that is going to take years and years to recover," said Rebecca Lindland, director of automotive research with consulting firm IHS Automotive.
Federal officials said they thoroughly examined the acceleration reports and could not find evidence of an electronic problem. Instead, investigators with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said the evidence showed that cases in which owners complained about ineffective brakes were most likely caused by "pedal misapplication," in which the driver stepped on the accelerator instead of the brakes.
Many of the complaints involved cases in which the vehicle accelerated after it was stationary or at very low speed.
LaHood said NASA engineers "rigorously examined" nine Toyotas driven by consumers who complained of unintended acceleration. NASA reviewed 280,000 lines of software code to look for flaws that could cause the acceleration. Investigators tested mechanical components in Toyotas that could lead to the problem and bombarded vehicles with electro-magnetic radiation to see whether that could make the electronics cause the cars to speed up.
Electronic problems can include buggy software, circuitry influenced by electrical interference and electrical shorts. The problems are often difficult to spot and can surface when combined with environmental factors like a blast from a heater vent or moisture from the road.
A preliminary part of the study, released last August, failed to find any electronic flaws based on a review of event data recorders, or vehicle black boxes.
Not everyone was convinced. Rhonda Smith, of Sevierville, Tennessee, who last year testified before a congressional committee that her Lexus raced up to 100 miles per hour without her control, said Tuesday there had to be a cause other than floor mats or sticky gas pedals because she said neither happened in her case.
"There is a defect in that car whether they want to believe it or not," Smith said. "They need to keep searching."
NHTSA administrator David Strickland, however, told reporters that the agency conducted extensive tests on Smith's vehicle and found "no other vulnerabilities" beyond trapped floor mats.
Consumer advocates and safety groups have raised concerns that flawed electronics could be causing unwanted acceleration in the Toyotas. They have questioned the reliability of the event data recorders studied by the government, saying they could be faulty or fail to tell the whole story of the individual crashes.
Joan Claybrook, a former NHTSA administrator who previously led consumer group Public Citizen, said the government investigation discounted research conducted by plaintiffs' attorneys.
"The facts are still quite substantial that there's a problem and I think they could have done a lot more in terms of gathering more expertise," Claybrook said.
To promote safety, LaHood said NHTSA was considering new regulations. They include requiring brake override systems on all vehicles, standardizing keyless ignition systems and requiring event data recorders, or vehicle black boxes, on all new vehicles.
Transportation officials said they would also consider conducting more research on electronic control systems and review the placement and design of accelerator and brake pedals.
Since the recalls, Toyota has installed brake override systems on new vehicles. The systems automatically cut the throttle when the brake and gas pedals are applied at the same time.
The company also created engineering teams to examine vehicles that are the subject of consumer complaints and appointed a chief quality officer for North America amid complaints its U.S. division did not play a large enough role in making safety decisions.
Toyota's safety issues received broad attention from the government after four people were killed in a high-speed crash involving a Lexus near San Diego in August 2009.
NHTSA has received about 3,000 reports of sudden acceleration incidents involving Toyota vehicles during the past decade, including allegations of 93 deaths. NHTSA has confirmed five of them.
Congress considered sweeping safety legislation last year that would have required brake override systems, raised penalties on auto companies that evade safety recalls and given the government the power to quickly recall vehicles. But the bills failed to win enough support.
The National Academy of Sciences is conducting a separate study of unintended acceleration in cars and trucks across the auto industry. The panel is expected to release its findings this fall.
___
AP Auto Writers Tom Krisher and Sharon Carty in Detroit contributed to this report.
AP
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110208/ap_on_re_us/us_toyota_recalls
Ray LaHood AP – Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood speaks about the Toyota recalls, Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2011, at the Transportation …
WASHINGTON – Electronic flaws weren't to blame for the reports of sudden, unintended acceleration that led to the recall of thousands of Toyota vehicles, the government said Tuesday.
Some of the acceleration cases could have been caused by mechanical defects — sticking accelerator pedals and gas pedals that can become trapped in floor mats — that have been dealt with in recalls, the government said.
And in some cases, investigators suggested, drivers simply hit the gas when they meant to press the brake.
"We feel that Toyota vehicles are safe to drive," declared Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.
The investigation bolstered Toyota's contentions that electronic gremlins were not to blame and its series of recalls — involving more than 12 million vehicles globally since fall 2009 — had directly addressed the safety concerns.
Transportation officials, assisted by engineers with NASA, said the 10-month study of Toyota vehicles concluded there was no electronic cause of unintended high-speed acceleration. The study, launched at the request of Congress, responded to consumer complaints that flawed electronics could be the culprit behind complaints that led to Toyota's spate of recalls.
Recalls to fix sticking accelerator pedals, gas pedals that became trapped in floor mats, and other safety issues have posed a major challenge for the world's No. 1 automaker, which has scrambled to protect its reputation for safety and reliability. Toyota paid the U.S. government a record $48.8 million in fines for its handling of three recalls.
Toyota said the report should "further reinforce confidence in the safety of Toyota and Lexus vehicles" and "put to rest unsupported speculation" about the company's electronic throttle control systems, which are "well-designed and well-tested to ensure that a real world, un-commanded acceleration of the vehicle cannot occur."
Toyota reported a 39 percent slide in quarterly profit earlier Tuesday but raised its full-year forecasts for earnings and car sales. The financial results and government report boosted shares of the automaker on Wall Street by more than 4 percent, to close at $88.57.
Analysts said the report would help Toyota's reputation but the company would still need to work hard to regain its bulletproof image of reliability. Toyota was the only major automaker to see a U.S. sales decline last year at 0.4 percent.
"This is really something that is going to take years and years to recover," said Rebecca Lindland, director of automotive research with consulting firm IHS Automotive.
Federal officials said they thoroughly examined the acceleration reports and could not find evidence of an electronic problem. Instead, investigators with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said the evidence showed that cases in which owners complained about ineffective brakes were most likely caused by "pedal misapplication," in which the driver stepped on the accelerator instead of the brakes.
Many of the complaints involved cases in which the vehicle accelerated after it was stationary or at very low speed.
LaHood said NASA engineers "rigorously examined" nine Toyotas driven by consumers who complained of unintended acceleration. NASA reviewed 280,000 lines of software code to look for flaws that could cause the acceleration. Investigators tested mechanical components in Toyotas that could lead to the problem and bombarded vehicles with electro-magnetic radiation to see whether that could make the electronics cause the cars to speed up.
Electronic problems can include buggy software, circuitry influenced by electrical interference and electrical shorts. The problems are often difficult to spot and can surface when combined with environmental factors like a blast from a heater vent or moisture from the road.
A preliminary part of the study, released last August, failed to find any electronic flaws based on a review of event data recorders, or vehicle black boxes.
Not everyone was convinced. Rhonda Smith, of Sevierville, Tennessee, who last year testified before a congressional committee that her Lexus raced up to 100 miles per hour without her control, said Tuesday there had to be a cause other than floor mats or sticky gas pedals because she said neither happened in her case.
"There is a defect in that car whether they want to believe it or not," Smith said. "They need to keep searching."
NHTSA administrator David Strickland, however, told reporters that the agency conducted extensive tests on Smith's vehicle and found "no other vulnerabilities" beyond trapped floor mats.
Consumer advocates and safety groups have raised concerns that flawed electronics could be causing unwanted acceleration in the Toyotas. They have questioned the reliability of the event data recorders studied by the government, saying they could be faulty or fail to tell the whole story of the individual crashes.
Joan Claybrook, a former NHTSA administrator who previously led consumer group Public Citizen, said the government investigation discounted research conducted by plaintiffs' attorneys.
"The facts are still quite substantial that there's a problem and I think they could have done a lot more in terms of gathering more expertise," Claybrook said.
To promote safety, LaHood said NHTSA was considering new regulations. They include requiring brake override systems on all vehicles, standardizing keyless ignition systems and requiring event data recorders, or vehicle black boxes, on all new vehicles.
Transportation officials said they would also consider conducting more research on electronic control systems and review the placement and design of accelerator and brake pedals.
Since the recalls, Toyota has installed brake override systems on new vehicles. The systems automatically cut the throttle when the brake and gas pedals are applied at the same time.
The company also created engineering teams to examine vehicles that are the subject of consumer complaints and appointed a chief quality officer for North America amid complaints its U.S. division did not play a large enough role in making safety decisions.
Toyota's safety issues received broad attention from the government after four people were killed in a high-speed crash involving a Lexus near San Diego in August 2009.
NHTSA has received about 3,000 reports of sudden acceleration incidents involving Toyota vehicles during the past decade, including allegations of 93 deaths. NHTSA has confirmed five of them.
Congress considered sweeping safety legislation last year that would have required brake override systems, raised penalties on auto companies that evade safety recalls and given the government the power to quickly recall vehicles. But the bills failed to win enough support.
The National Academy of Sciences is conducting a separate study of unintended acceleration in cars and trucks across the auto industry. The panel is expected to release its findings this fall.
___
AP Auto Writers Tom Krisher and Sharon Carty in Detroit contributed to this report.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Fuel Economy the Solution to Rising Gas Prices in 2011
Gas prices will go up this year, so why not get a fuel efficient car from Desert Toyota? Don’t be mistaken, gas prices will rise in 2011. We are seeing the prices rise as you are reading this. The World is constantly demanding more fuel, and consequently it is getting harder to find. Because of this, fuel economy will continue to be more and more important. Moving forward, we must all do our part to conserve and reduce our dependence on foreign oil.
What happened to oil and gasoline prices?
* The world is growing and using more and more fuel.
* Exploration is expensive, and the Great Recession of 2008 has compounded these financial hardships for major oil companies.
* BP’s oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico also contributed to the hike in gas prices.
What can we do?
* Keep your car tuned to its highest possible level to insure you get the best gas mileage. In the complicated world of engine design, it is good to know that Toyota has worked hard to keep maintenance and service economical to help you keep driving efficiently.
* Keep your tires rotated and properly inflated to give it the best contact and least resistance with the pavement.
* Change your oil regularly to help your car engine run smoothly and to maximize gas mileage.
* Change your filters to help your engine running cool and economically.
Desert Toyota's top notch service department can help keep you rolling cool and efficiently with any of the service needs.
There is a lot of talk about OPEC controlling the price of oil and our dependence on this foreign oil. These are real causes for concern and can cause real problems such as the 1973 oil crisis. That was when the move toward more fuel efficient cars first began. Some companies, like Toyota, started making smaller, more economical cars that could be sold in the USA. Since American car companies did not move as quickly toward this solution and instead continued producing big, powerful, fast (and inefficient) cars, European and Japanese car manufacturers gained popularity. This popularity of foreign cars (as well as their dedication to energy efficiency) continues today. This is evident by the continuous development of hybrid vehicles. Most notably the Toyota Prius.
Price of Oil
At the end of August 2010, oil cost $71.92 a barrel. The start of January 2011, it costs $89.25, up nearly 25% in 4 months! We have seen the change the pumps from $2.50 a gallon now crawling to just below the $3.00 mark. Furthermore, the price of oil is projected to hit $100 per barrel by end of 2011. Another 21% price jump before the end of the year! We have all witnessed the price of gasoline increase more recently, and it’s easy to see why. Now it’s time to do something about it.
Is $4.00 per gallon for unleaded gasoline possible in Arizona?
The possibility of $4.00 gas is real and should prompt everyone to consider not only the impact on their budget, but also America’s dependence on foreign oil imports. The more control we can gain over our oil consumption with efforts like increasing automotive fuel economy, the more control we will have over gas prices. You can do your part by considering a new fuel efficient car and checking out the Certified Hybrids backed by Toyota.
Desert Toyota is a local dealer that works hard to stay up to date on what it takes to save fuel. We have a full line of New and Certified Pre-Owned Prius, Corolla, Camry, Camry Hybrid and other fuel efficient vehicles to help you take back control!
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
What's The Plural Of Prius?
Toyota is expanding the Prius Hybrid lineup with the addition of the Prius V multi-purpose vehicle as well as a plug-in hybrid variant. While not production ready, Toyota’s newly revealed Prius C Concept also hints at a “value-oriented” Prius that’s expected to arrive in early 2012. With these additional models, Toyota is asking the same question that plenty of people are probably asking themselves: What is the plural of Prius?
To help stir debate, Toyota has created the video above. While certainly humorous, we must warn that the song will get stuck in your head.
From: Toyotainthenews.com
Enjoy,
Ray
Monday, January 10, 2011
Weekend Tucson Tragedy
We are deeply saddened by the news about the tragic deaths of those in last weekends shootings. Our deepest condolences to the friends and families impacted by the tragic events of this weekend. Our heartfelt wishes go out to everyone.
Please remember the victims are in our thoughts and prayers.
Regards,
Ray and the Desert Toyota family
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