TOKYO: Toyota will suspend production of Lexus HS250h and Sai hybrids at the weekend after it announced a recall of hundreds of thousands of hybrid vehicles globally, a company spokesman said Wednesday.
It will stop producing the two models from Saturday through to Feb. 20, a Toyota spokesman told AFP. The company on Tuesday expanded its global recall to over 400,000 of its Prius and other petrol-electric hybrid models. The world’s biggest carmaker has now pledged to fix 8.7 million vehicles worldwide.
The move covers the newest petrol-electric Prius as well as the plug-in Prius, the Sai sedan and the Lexus HS250h. The company will halt sales of the Sai and Lexus HS250h in Japan while it works on how to repair them, the spokesman said.
“Once we decide exactly when we can make changes (to the vehicles), we will decide when to resume production,” he added. “We have to adjust our production because we cannot sell the models even if we make them.”
Toyota dealers in Japan have started fixing software problems that can make brakes slow to respond in the third-generation Prius, the company’s flagship hybrid.
A Toyota executive says dealers have so far reinforced the sticking accelerator on more than 220,000 recalled vehicles, with repairs continuing at a rate of about 50,000 vehicles a day.
“Nothing is more important to Toyota than the safety and reliability of our vehicles, and right now we are completely focused on fixing the vehicles that have been affected under this recall,” Bob Carter, Toyota group vice president said at the Chicago Auto Show on Wednesday.