In my blog entry Prius On Ice – What Not To Wear This Winter! I talked about the one major failing in the Toyota Prius, its traction control. The TRAC implementation is bad. It causes more problems than it solves. And it’s something that I’ve been complaining about since my first winter with my Prius.

But don’t just take my word for it. Consumer Affairs has been warning consumers about the same issue since January of ‘07, which is almost as long as I have. Take a look for yourself if you don’t believe me.

They have even gone so far as to issue a 2008 update about the bad TRAC implementation in the Toyota Prius and how Toyota not only has done nothing, but thinks the Prius is behaving admirably. It includes quotes from several Prius owners outlining the day-to-day dangers of the Toyota Prius traction control.

How Toyota can continue to blindly ignore this glaring flaw is beyond me. But even more beyond me is how an official Toyota spokesperson, Bill Kwon, can get away with the attitude that, “In my opinion, it’s better to have the vehicle stop then to have the wheels spinning and out of control.” Obviously actual Prius owners disagree with Bill Kwon. And as more articles are being written about the problem, more professionals agree that it is in fact a problem.

While I would never suggest to anyone to bypass or disable a safety measure like traction control, I have to admit that even I have begun considering disabling it myself. Which is bad. But so is TRAC.

All that I can suggest to Prius owners is that if you experience TRAC problems yourself, and were scared for your life as I have been, then at least be sure to upgrade your tires. The stock tires on the Toyota Prius (Goodyear Integrity) are crap, plain, awful, crap. I’ve heard a lot of suggestions to upgrade to Goodyear Assurance TripleTred or the Michelin HydroEdge. And while most people stick with the stock 185 width for standard and 195 width on touring, there have been people who have upgraded to 205 width without encountering problems. Just be sure if you go with a non-stock tire size that you try to best match the tire’s rotations so as to not throw off your speedometer. A little bit of research can go a long way.

If Toyota won’t fix the traction control problems on a Prius, at least we can fix the traction that our Prius gets so that TRAC is less likely to kick in.