Recall and reboot

Toyota´s recent recall of almost half a million Prius and other hybrid cars to fix an issue with their braking system is hugely important to the motor industry. It´s partly down to the sheer embarrassment to Toyota the company that pretty much invented lean manufacturing. Recent high-profile problems with Toyota and Ford cars have involved software fixes, not mechanical ones. This paper investigates if the boom in vehicle electronics mean modern mechanics need laptops as well as spanners.