Didn't find this posted elsewhere -- if it is, apologies. Per Toyota's website -- the part devoted to recall info says: "The shape of the accelerator pedal will be reconfigured to address the risk of floor mat entrapment. For the Camry and Avalon models involved, the shape of the floor surface underneath will also be reconfigured to increase the space between the accelerator pedal and the floor." That sounds to me like quite an involved fix ... and could mean that the drivers of those two cars had problems greater than most others. (It's a lot easier to move an accelerator from under a floor mat than to try to do that while fighting the contour of the floor as well.) Perhaps the recall could be done by banging the heads of Toyota top execs on those floors until a big enough dent (in the floor) is made and some sense is beaten into the execs' heads.
Can't wait to see the TSB issued for that one. I am envisioning Joe Mechanic with a sledgehammer... Hopefully though, this is just a question of removing some sound insulation under the carpeting.
Using the factory carpeted floor mat on either car presents no hazard as long as the factory retaining clips are used on the driver's side. The problem exists when a non-factory/generic floormat is used and/or the retaining clips/hook is NOT used, or stacking more than one floor mat on top of another. The fix to the pedal and floorboard involves replacing and reshaping some of the insulation underneath the carpet directly under the pedal and reshaping and removing a fraction of an inch off the bottom of the pedal. Combined it provides an extra .75 inch worth of clearance.
