Let me get this straight; Tens of millions of vehicles sold worldwide. A couple hundred report some issues. Less than 20 incidents resulting in death or injury. Do I have the Toyota issues right so far?
With all this in mind, Toyota took immediate and decisive action and voluntarily recalled millions of their vehicles. Many of the models had no reports and were done as a precaution.
Toyota apparently has a similar view to mine. One death or injury is too much and all manufacturers should strive for zero tolerance however I believe that most engineers (people) make some assumptions in their design. The main assumption being that the people that purchase their cars, by the very virtue that they have a drivers license and have earned enough credit or money to purchase the vehicle, are not complete and utter morons. Evidently this has been one of their biggest errors.
All manufacturers have resisted a simple solution available for years. Re-program the computers so that when pressure is applied to brakes, acceleration reduces. Moron factor is greatly reduced.
In the interest of safety, let me propose another possible solution that Toyota put the following warning label on their vehicles;
In the event of a drive train failure, that is the thing that makes the thingy your sitting in move toward the things in the glass in front of you, follow the following steps:
1. Put foot on brake (that square pedal down by your feet that is to the left, cookie side, of the long pedal on the right, milk side.)
2. Press down on pedal you put your foot on in step 1.
3. Take that stick like thing on your right (milk side) and move it forward from being next to the D to being next to the N.
4. Looking out that glass stuff in the front, turn the big wheel in front of you slightly to right to pull off of grayish black stuff. Important: try not to hit light grey metal thingie approx 6 to 10 feet to right (milk side) of big grayish black stuff.,
Thousands of people die or are maimed or injured each years by cars that nobody claims have safety issues however are due to their own actions or inaction's. Statistically, one or two models/makes of vehicles is sure to appear on a list of these incidents and probably at a number somewhat higher than 20. Are we recalling all those.
In a period of economic hardship, where unemployment is at it's highest in decades, we need to do our best to buy American made products that employ American people with livable wages. Toyota is an American auto maker that DID NOT take bailout money and until these recent incidents was still doing quite well, and in many area still is. Even with the issues, polls show that 60% of current Toyota owners would buy one again.
Someone of a conspiracy leaning might start to wonder if GM, a company that took bailout money much of which was sent overseas for their manufacturing, may have had a hand in rigging this. Silly conspiracy theorists.
Even someone not prone to conspiracy might wonder when one of the few recent incidents reported, in a vehicle that was not on the list of vehicles with issues, suddenly was spotted by an officer weaving in and out of traffic at a high rate of speed. When a traffic stop was initiated, motioned to the officer that he could not slow down. The officer pulled in front of the vehicle and used his to slow the vehicle down. Guess it was better than the excuse "I was had to pee and needed to get to a restroom". "I have a defective Toyota. It was the big manufactures fault. There was no warning label." sounds so much better. Besides, he got his 15 minutes of fame Warhol promised, and on national TV to boot.
See? My way is the perfect solution. Moron notified, liability reduced. You still need the ability to read to get a license in most states, right?
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Why we Cache - The Experience
One of my businesses is in the auto industry. Probably don't need to mention this, but anything to do with cars and trucks is a challenge right now. I decided to work an area today that, while part of our territory, we don't travel much as it is quite a haul and a little out of the way.
Since I had to come down here, there was a cache or two I wanted to grab. Am I glad I did;
My log from Bird's Eye View.
THIS CACHE WAS MISSING! Read on.
As we pulled up, we figured "no problem, kind of obvious the few hiding places. 10 minutes later, not luck. We were behind the tree line from the road when a green Jeep pulled slowly past our geo-truck. It then stopped. Busted!
We made our way toward the end of the treeline when the jeep owner yelled out "Problem?". "No, just on on sort of a treasure hunting game. For some reason having a problem finding the object, it must be missing." we said. "It is." he replied. "Oh, your a cacher?" "No but what your looking for is back in my truck. I cleaned up all the garbage around here the other day and found it. Couldn't figure out what the heck it was, but kept it. It's in my tool box if you want to follow me back."
We followed hum back ta block or so south to his house. A house I had noticed on the way in because it was ver reminiscent of the property Baloo grew up on in Wheaton when that area was considered rural. After we went to his truck and retrieve the piece, and Baloo explained what the game was all about, the conversation turned to his little farm. He introduced himself as Floyd.
We went into a real small shed where there were several chickens. Now, we're no experts, but he said these were some sort of special breed he was cross breeding that resulted in smaller chickens that laid relatively large eggs for their size. There were about 17 chicks in the one coup he was obviously very proud of. He also showed us how he used golf balls as "nesting eggs".
As we made our way back to the driveway, Baloo in total awe, salivating over the property, the conversation turned to the cache and it's property. When asked if he minded the cache being there, he replied no. His issue is how the property is being treated. We got a short history.
It turns out that this property is an old graveyard dating to at least the early 1800's. Floyd said that sometime in the past couple decades, someone came in and buried the headstones about 4 to eight inches. It turns out that there was a church across the road to the south, hence the graveyard. In the late 1800s, there was a young pastor who cam to work at the church. When he died, he was buried in the graveyard. Many years later, his wife came back and had the body exhumed and moved to parts unknown.
He also said there were a few civil war veterans there. He mentioned that in a couple places to the south, four corners is what we remember him saying as one of them, there is also a similar graveyard in disrepair where he said he has found several coins dating back to around the time of the civil war. Apparently through the years, he has also found several arrowheads, which last month he finally had someone from one of the schools, NIU we presume, come over to look at and took some to evaluate that he is hopeful will prove to have some additional history to add to the area.
We even found out he has a daughter in the banking business up by us in the De Kalb area. We left with an invitation to stop in and visit any time we were into the area. We're betting that invitation goes for all of our extended geo-family.
We took the cache back to it's spot, signed the log and based on the hint and what Floyd had told us where he found it, replaced it.
Driving away we were reminded of cross country motorcycle trips we used to take where we would only travel "blue roads" to meet people in small towns like Floyd and, in fact, those trips are why we bought our first GPSr. We got into geocaching to use our GPSr to discover new areas, glad to see we can use it to discover interesting locals as well.
Since I had to come down here, there was a cache or two I wanted to grab. Am I glad I did;
My log from Bird's Eye View.
THIS CACHE WAS MISSING! Read on.
As we pulled up, we figured "no problem, kind of obvious the few hiding places. 10 minutes later, not luck. We were behind the tree line from the road when a green Jeep pulled slowly past our geo-truck. It then stopped. Busted!
We made our way toward the end of the treeline when the jeep owner yelled out "Problem?". "No, just on on sort of a treasure hunting game. For some reason having a problem finding the object, it must be missing." we said. "It is." he replied. "Oh, your a cacher?" "No but what your looking for is back in my truck. I cleaned up all the garbage around here the other day and found it. Couldn't figure out what the heck it was, but kept it. It's in my tool box if you want to follow me back."
We followed hum back ta block or so south to his house. A house I had noticed on the way in because it was ver reminiscent of the property Baloo grew up on in Wheaton when that area was considered rural. After we went to his truck and retrieve the piece, and Baloo explained what the game was all about, the conversation turned to his little farm. He introduced himself as Floyd.
We went into a real small shed where there were several chickens. Now, we're no experts, but he said these were some sort of special breed he was cross breeding that resulted in smaller chickens that laid relatively large eggs for their size. There were about 17 chicks in the one coup he was obviously very proud of. He also showed us how he used golf balls as "nesting eggs".
As we made our way back to the driveway, Baloo in total awe, salivating over the property, the conversation turned to the cache and it's property. When asked if he minded the cache being there, he replied no. His issue is how the property is being treated. We got a short history.
It turns out that this property is an old graveyard dating to at least the early 1800's. Floyd said that sometime in the past couple decades, someone came in and buried the headstones about 4 to eight inches. It turns out that there was a church across the road to the south, hence the graveyard. In the late 1800s, there was a young pastor who cam to work at the church. When he died, he was buried in the graveyard. Many years later, his wife came back and had the body exhumed and moved to parts unknown.
He also said there were a few civil war veterans there. He mentioned that in a couple places to the south, four corners is what we remember him saying as one of them, there is also a similar graveyard in disrepair where he said he has found several coins dating back to around the time of the civil war. Apparently through the years, he has also found several arrowheads, which last month he finally had someone from one of the schools, NIU we presume, come over to look at and took some to evaluate that he is hopeful will prove to have some additional history to add to the area.
We even found out he has a daughter in the banking business up by us in the De Kalb area. We left with an invitation to stop in and visit any time we were into the area. We're betting that invitation goes for all of our extended geo-family.
We took the cache back to it's spot, signed the log and based on the hint and what Floyd had told us where he found it, replaced it.
Driving away we were reminded of cross country motorcycle trips we used to take where we would only travel "blue roads" to meet people in small towns like Floyd and, in fact, those trips are why we bought our first GPSr. We got into geocaching to use our GPSr to discover new areas, glad to see we can use it to discover interesting locals as well.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
update: GPSMAP 60CS - Refining one of my tools
Last night I had posted a question on how to fix the date to 2 characters in the strings I posted below and got the method I posted from Clyde, author of GSAK.
I just checked the thread again and KAI team posted what I think is a better method that gives the option of leaving out the "/" to give even more real estate. The thread can be found here however the specific message I am reposting here.
From KAI Team
posted 3-MAY-09 1017 CDT
%macro gives you the most control over the format of the dates you send and won't slow the export that much (the 60CS only holds 1000 waypoints, after all). If you want to use %macro, go to Macro>Edit/Create and copy and paste the following code into the macro editor:
CODE
$DateString=DateToString($d_LastFoundDate)
$Year=Substr($DateString,3,2)
$Month=Substr($DateString,5,2)
$Day=Substr($DateString,7,2)
$_Special=$Month + $Day + $Year
Go to File>Save in the macro editor and give this macro a name (let's call it "60CSDates.gsk", without the quotes).
Now anywhere you want the date to appear in your 60CS export, just enter:
CODE
%macro="60CSDates.gsk"
You have to use the double quotes around the file name in this case.
This code will produce the smallest possible date in mmddyy format, e.g.: "050309" for today's date. If you want to change the date format, just edit the line that begins with "$_Special". For example, to add slashes as separators (mm/dd/yy), change $_Special to:
CODE
$_Special=$Month + "/" + $Day + "/" + $Year
If you want to change the year to 1 digit (not recommended, since 2010 is closer than we think), modify the $Year line to:
CODE
$Year=Substr($DateString,4,1)
The raw $DateString format is YYYYMMDD. If you want to play around with different formats, just go to Macro>Help in GSAK, click on Commands and Functions, and view the help for SubStr to learn how to modify what's extracted from the master Date String. smile.gif
I just checked the thread again and KAI team posted what I think is a better method that gives the option of leaving out the "/" to give even more real estate. The thread can be found here however the specific message I am reposting here.
From KAI Team
posted 3-MAY-09 1017 CDT
%macro gives you the most control over the format of the dates you send and won't slow the export that much (the 60CS only holds 1000 waypoints, after all). If you want to use %macro, go to Macro>Edit/Create and copy and paste the following code into the macro editor:
CODE
$DateString=DateToString($d_LastFoundDate)
$Year=Substr($DateString,3,2)
$Month=Substr($DateString,5,2)
$Day=Substr($DateString,7,2)
$_Special=$Month + $Day + $Year
Go to File>Save in the macro editor and give this macro a name (let's call it "60CSDates.gsk", without the quotes).
Now anywhere you want the date to appear in your 60CS export, just enter:
CODE
%macro="60CSDates.gsk"
You have to use the double quotes around the file name in this case.
This code will produce the smallest possible date in mmddyy format, e.g.: "050309" for today's date. If you want to change the date format, just edit the line that begins with "$_Special". For example, to add slashes as separators (mm/dd/yy), change $_Special to:
CODE
$_Special=$Month + "/" + $Day + "/" + $Year
If you want to change the year to 1 digit (not recommended, since 2010 is closer than we think), modify the $Year line to:
CODE
$Year=Substr($DateString,4,1)
The raw $DateString format is YYYYMMDD. If you want to play around with different formats, just go to Macro>Help in GSAK, click on Commands and Functions, and view the help for SubStr to learn how to modify what's extracted from the master Date String. smile.gif
GPSMAP 60CS - Refining one of my tools
After caching recently with kschu, he mentioned that through the tags feature in GSAK he had put modified hints in his Garmin GPSMAP 60.
Since he had modified the notes manually, I rarely use hints and I already have all the cache information in my Blackberry Curve using Cacheberry, this did not interest me however tweeking my GPS contained information did.
I had used the strings but was finding what I had not doing all I needed and had set it up a few years back when I first got my GPS. It was time to play. The following are my preferences, yours may vary. The tags in GSAK are a wonderful thing.
Using the tag strings, I modified my GPS to show me in the find screen the waypoint designation (sans the "GC"), the cache container, the cache type and the terrain and difficulty.
In the notes area, I show the caches given name, the status of the last four logs, date of last find and if there is a travel bug or not. The date field format is based on the short date format you use in Windows as set in the "Regional and Language Options". Have not played with these settings in Wine yet.
The two tag srings are;
Waypoint name = %drop2-%con1,%typ1,%dif1,%ter1 %notGC%code
Waypoint Description format = %smart=15 %last4 %datelf %bug
This gives me all the information I really need in the field, at least within the limitations of my Garmin GPSMAP 60CS. I hope this gets you thinking of ways to make your GPS more efficient for the way you use it.
Since he had modified the notes manually, I rarely use hints and I already have all the cache information in my Blackberry Curve using Cacheberry, this did not interest me however tweeking my GPS contained information did.
I had used the strings but was finding what I had not doing all I needed and had set it up a few years back when I first got my GPS. It was time to play. The following are my preferences, yours may vary. The tags in GSAK are a wonderful thing.
Using the tag strings, I modified my GPS to show me in the find screen the waypoint designation (sans the "GC"), the cache container, the cache type and the terrain and difficulty.
In the notes area, I show the caches given name, the status of the last four logs, date of last find and if there is a travel bug or not. The date field format is based on the short date format you use in Windows as set in the "Regional and Language Options". Have not played with these settings in Wine yet.
The two tag srings are;
Waypoint name = %drop2-%con1,%typ1,%dif1,%ter1 %notGC%code
Waypoint Description format = %smart=15 %last4 %datelf %bug
This gives me all the information I really need in the field, at least within the limitations of my Garmin GPSMAP 60CS. I hope this gets you thinking of ways to make your GPS more efficient for the way you use it.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Cache Caches everywhere. 4-26-09 cache outing
Yep, I said I would try to post here more often and, of course, I have not. A friend whom also has a blog here has inadvertently given me a kick in the head to get going.
After planning since our last outing, circumstances were such that 2 of our team (TBSM) were unavailable for the day, which left me and kschu to our own devices. Ken now has a mini van that could not be a more perfect vehicle and today was it's geo-virgin outing.
The day started at around 0800 on the west side of Wheaton with overcast skies and threatening weather. After moving my GPSr's, laptop, inverter, etc. over to kschu's vehicle, we were off. No sooner than we started so did the rain. We had decided to stop at the hinsdale oasis on I294 for coffee since 1. kschu had a discount card and 2. there is a cache series at the oasis that he had not done yet. After a quick find, bathroom and coffee (in that order) we were off.
We had intended to stop at the Lincoln oasis on the way down for another in the series, but the rain was too much. As we entered Indiana on the way to Valpo, the rain was still going strong and the conversation turned to a possible trip to Bass Pro Shops to wait for the rain to stop. Luckily it stopped before we got to the first of many caches for the day.
Kschu had one route in mind, I had another. As driver always rules as well as kschu driving this route all the time, we went his way. The first stop or two were very pedestrian caches as would have been the third if the coords did not put us in the middle of asphalt. A dnf our third cache was not desirable.
After a trip to the near by BK to get rid of our earlier coffee (remember the order I mentioned earlier?), we regrouped and went back. Reading the logs indicated it was about 30 feet from the coords. We spread out our search and it popped up. 30 to 50 feet off seemed to be the theme for the rest of the day.
Only two caches were really of note, at least for me. The first was a cache that was less than a foot off a 4 lane busy boulevard that, for the life of me, I can not understand why it has lasted.
The next was a cache at an absolutely amazing little park that is best described as a mini Arboretum. It had one of the most interesting sundials I have seen to date.
All in all it was a great day. We visited about 60 some caches, finding 57 caches (50 unique to kschu, 55 unique to me) with only 4 or 5 DNF's.
Our next group outing looks like it will be the end of May. We have several areas in mind.
Even with a mission statement that says our group is about "Fun with no schedules", Stats to date, with a total of 30 days in 2009 where at least one cache was found are; 165 YTD 1.4 per calendar day and avg 41.9 per month (only 3 or 4 were found in Feb).
After planning since our last outing, circumstances were such that 2 of our team (TBSM) were unavailable for the day, which left me and kschu to our own devices. Ken now has a mini van that could not be a more perfect vehicle and today was it's geo-virgin outing.
The day started at around 0800 on the west side of Wheaton with overcast skies and threatening weather. After moving my GPSr's, laptop, inverter, etc. over to kschu's vehicle, we were off. No sooner than we started so did the rain. We had decided to stop at the hinsdale oasis on I294 for coffee since 1. kschu had a discount card and 2. there is a cache series at the oasis that he had not done yet. After a quick find, bathroom and coffee (in that order) we were off.
We had intended to stop at the Lincoln oasis on the way down for another in the series, but the rain was too much. As we entered Indiana on the way to Valpo, the rain was still going strong and the conversation turned to a possible trip to Bass Pro Shops to wait for the rain to stop. Luckily it stopped before we got to the first of many caches for the day.
Kschu had one route in mind, I had another. As driver always rules as well as kschu driving this route all the time, we went his way. The first stop or two were very pedestrian caches as would have been the third if the coords did not put us in the middle of asphalt. A dnf our third cache was not desirable.
After a trip to the near by BK to get rid of our earlier coffee (remember the order I mentioned earlier?), we regrouped and went back. Reading the logs indicated it was about 30 feet from the coords. We spread out our search and it popped up. 30 to 50 feet off seemed to be the theme for the rest of the day.
Only two caches were really of note, at least for me. The first was a cache that was less than a foot off a 4 lane busy boulevard that, for the life of me, I can not understand why it has lasted.
The next was a cache at an absolutely amazing little park that is best described as a mini Arboretum. It had one of the most interesting sundials I have seen to date.
All in all it was a great day. We visited about 60 some caches, finding 57 caches (50 unique to kschu, 55 unique to me) with only 4 or 5 DNF's.
Our next group outing looks like it will be the end of May. We have several areas in mind.
Even with a mission statement that says our group is about "Fun with no schedules", Stats to date, with a total of 30 days in 2009 where at least one cache was found are; 165 YTD 1.4 per calendar day and avg 41.9 per month (only 3 or 4 were found in Feb).
Monday, March 16, 2009
Geocaching - It doesn't get much better than this.
Yesterday started at about 0830 meeting two friends, Mike (TheBaers) and Dave (Cobbler Guy) at the DeKalb oasis on rt.88 to plan a day of Geocaching. (See link for explanation.) The rules we set up were simple. If weather turned bad, we were done. There was no rush to do anything and the biggest one, enjoy.
The destination was Sterling Illinois, about 50 miles west of DeKalb. We had done some research and knew it was a fairly target rich area. After a Mc-something and a diet coke, we were off. Mike took the back seat with the computer for navigation. There was a preset start point, but having not really run navigation since he and I did the 100 cache run on the BoB series over 2 years ago, he decidedto familiarize himself with the set-up going out.
Three immediate locations presented themselves right as we got of the highway. These hides were almost as quickly found and, foolish optimist me decide to announce we would probably complete 40 to 50 today.
The first obstacle we ran into was a flooded park. One of the caches seemed inaccessible, however three more presented themselves so not a total loss. None of us expected to clear the area anyway. The first however was an old fire engine with so many nooks and crannies that all of us voiced the possibility of a dnf loomed. Mike however was the first to crawl under. First because "crawl" was an operative word for the day.
Our only other real "obstacle" came when we pulled up to a public park that contained three baseball fields. The cache was obviously in a large douglas fir, so we began combing it. A lady across the street, whom for the rest of the day we refered to in conversation as Mrs. Kravitz, decided that we were not going to be ther ewithout an explanation. She yelled several times when I finally tried to yell back an explanation to no avail. We decided, after she started to call for backup in the form of neighbors, that we might want to move along.
While Sterling seems more of an industrial base, there are still some spectacular sights. We finished around 1845 and headed back toward home, stopping in Rochelle to grab something to eat and then back to our respective homes with 33 new ones for me and about 35 or so new ones for the others. All in all, I call this a successful day and am anxious for the next outing.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Bailout or Christmas Bonus
If you have followed the banking debacle over the last several months, you know that the banks were given $700 billion with no oversight as to how it was spent or applied.
The automakers saw an opportunity to cache in on the governments lottery and went begging for there share. Begging usually involve asking humbly, the US automakers went in with there usual arrogance.
As part of the auto industry, I watched this with great interest. Congress seemed to have re-thought the process and told the big three to go back and come up with a plan that would make congress feel they were investing my money more wisely than they had with the banks. Chalk one up for congress.
The only problem with this process is that the auto makers were having these problems due to the irresponsible action of the banks and credit industry. Make no mistake, the "big three" have managed their industry poorly, been less innovative than other major car companies and been saddled with unions however have survived all these detriments for years.
After coming back with their plans, congress wised up and declined to help. Now rather than have to accept that and get lean and mean, dubyah decided to take money that congress had allocated for one purpose and reallocate it to a less worthy purpose. Feels like 2003 all over again. Wonder where the "Mission Accomplished" banner will be this time?
Kudos do need to go to Ford, who did not participate and of course congress, who seem to have seen the error of there ways with the banks.
GMAC however gets the bonehead award in all this. They reduced there eligibility to qualify from a credit score minimum of 700 to one of less than 620.
The automakers saw an opportunity to cache in on the governments lottery and went begging for there share. Begging usually involve asking humbly, the US automakers went in with there usual arrogance.
As part of the auto industry, I watched this with great interest. Congress seemed to have re-thought the process and told the big three to go back and come up with a plan that would make congress feel they were investing my money more wisely than they had with the banks. Chalk one up for congress.
The only problem with this process is that the auto makers were having these problems due to the irresponsible action of the banks and credit industry. Make no mistake, the "big three" have managed their industry poorly, been less innovative than other major car companies and been saddled with unions however have survived all these detriments for years.
After coming back with their plans, congress wised up and declined to help. Now rather than have to accept that and get lean and mean, dubyah decided to take money that congress had allocated for one purpose and reallocate it to a less worthy purpose. Feels like 2003 all over again. Wonder where the "Mission Accomplished" banner will be this time?
Kudos do need to go to Ford, who did not participate and of course congress, who seem to have seen the error of there ways with the banks.
GMAC however gets the bonehead award in all this. They reduced there eligibility to qualify from a credit score minimum of 700 to one of less than 620.
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