General Category > Accident File

Sudden unintended acceleration

(1/3) > >>

agj:
I recently had an accident with my new CX-5 2018 Automatic Petrol which I believe is a vehicle fault - Wondering if anyone has encountered this issue before?

My wife was parking the car slowly into a wide bay (parent and child one) at the local supermarket - As usual, she had her leg on the brake and slowly moved into the bay, but just as it was coming to a halt, the car suddenly accelerated forward and crashed into a parking barrier, smashing a front headlight, bonnet, etc. We have had the car for about 3 months and never observed any such issue. Very strangely, the car's parking / proximity sensors which are usually very good didn't go off at all and neither did the smart brake assist which would indicate a BRAKE!!! warning on the dash.

I have raised it to the dealer, but beyond doing a basic diagnostic test (which in opinion only indicates faults that the computer can see easily) and a quick road test, weren't interested in checking further - No investigation of EDR logs to confirm vehicle / driver fault, no check of sensors or the parts that could cause sudden acceleration issues to confirm all clear.

Has anyone encountered anything like this? Any ideas of how to take this up further with the dealer? It is not just the cost of repairing the damage, but also the worry that if the car does something like this again, with cars or people in front, it would be really terrible.

In most such cases, people tend to write this off as "accidental slip of leg to accelerator" or other driver error, but this is really not driver error. Other friends have also observed similar issues, but on other car makes. The Mazda CX-5 has similar reported issues of sudden unintended acceleration, but in the US.

dunhill1984:
How can your wife have a foot on the brake in an AUTO when accelerating forward?  i suggest she pressed both pedals at once by accident and braked/moved forward at the same time..........and rather blame herself blamed the car instead to avoid a row ;)          just a possible theory

Mary Hinge:
Like the OP says there's plenty of other people had the same issue, a tad concerning I'd say.

https://www.google.com/search?q=mazda+cx+5+sudden+acceleration&oq=mazda+CX-5+sudden+acc&aqs=chrome.2.69i57j69i60j0.13573j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Willpower:
Does anyone else find it strange that the first two failure reports on the link above, have every indication that they were written by the same person.   Look at the words used, the language construction and phraseology. They are too similar to have been written by two individuals.

I'm not saying that there is possibly a inherent problem here, but my impression is that the reporting of it in the link is being exaggerated. This diminishes the validity of the report entirely.
   

agj:
@dunhill1984 - When you enter a parking bay with enough movement, you'd bring it to a halt by applying the brakes slowly and then finally braking fully. I understand your point - Sometimes (esp. when you need more power), you use accelerator to move within the bay and apply brakes at the very end. I understand the whole "sudden unintended acceleration" thing is quite unexpected and difficult to believe till you experience it yourself, and I frankly quizzed my wife many times initially :) She is a very safe driver, btw with a clean driving record and this was an easy to park bay, being a wide "parent and child" parking bay.

@Willpower - Yes, the failure reports look very strikingly similar. Infact, I read the first one when we were at the dealer's immediately after the accident, getting the car checked for faults. The similarity with what we encountered was very striking to be frank - Almost like this only happens in supermarkets and during parking! It is the similarity that further concerns me and convinced me that there is indeed a vehicle fault at play. There is an NHTSA complaint (DVSA equivalent in US) as well for this - I think we need to take the complaint as a serious one. No one would really bother with all this energy on raising NHTSA/DVSA complaints, etc. if they were simply trying to cover up driver error (Honestly, from experience, these conversations with the dealer and the company suck out all energy you have and I would have given up if not for the concern around risk and feeling of being treated unfairly just 3 months into ownership).

Mazda UK and my local dealer (Brayleys Harpenden) have conveyed they are "unable to find any faults that could cause the accident", but refuse to give me more evidence of what they have checked and also refuse to confirm if the vehicle is safe to drive - Really shocking considering I just bought the car from them 3 months ago! The dealer I bought the car from (about 50 miles away in Croydon) was initially all warm and ready to help, but as we got into the detail, said they would only do the same diagnostics as the local dealer and strangely said that "they can do more tests but cannot change the outcome". I would really have expected them to instill confidence in the customer by 1. doing a check of the EDR log to confirm how crash happened and 2. do a check of the parts that are likely to cause issues (starting with the oft-repeated 'loose mats', pedals, etc.) and confirm that the vehicle is safe and road-worthy. If they cannot do more, in my opinion, they are only passing on the risk to the customer, a bit like Boeing had just refused to acknowledge issues with its 737 Max planes, till fatal accidents occurred.

I am in the process of raising this with the Motor Ombudsman and the DVSA, but if you have any suggestions or additional evidence (other reported issues), that would greatly help.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page