Toyota Motor Corp. announced a recall of 1.9 million Prius hybrid vehicles Wednesday to replace hybrid control software that could shut down and cause the car to turn off while driving, The Wall Street Journal reports.
The recall specifically addresses the third generation Prius, which began being produced in 2009. The Journal reports that the recall is the “largest ever for the model,” with 713,000 hybrids in North America alone being affected.
The recall touched vehicles worldwide, including 997,000 in Japan and 130,000 in Europe.
Toyota also recalled 397,000 of the same model in February 2010.
Since May 2011, Toyota has received 451 reports of software problems, but there were no reported injuries, according to the Wall Street Journal. With the current software settings, certain transistors could overheat, stressing and damaging the transistors, Toyota said in a statement.
Due to the mass manufacturing of standard parts across vehicles to reduce costs, recalls could increase across automakers, Hiroshi Ataka, an analyst at IHS Automotive told the Journal.
“Car makers need to bring together their wisdom to avoid recalls as they use more electronic parts … and try to share these parts,” Ataka said.
Toyota also plans to recall the RAV4, Tacoma, and Lexus RX350 vehicles for maintenance of the skid control ECU software that otherwise created an “electronic circuit condition that can cause the Vehicle Stability Control, Anti-Lock Brake, and Traction Control functions to intermittently turn off,” their release reported.