Toyota Cars Reissues Recall

Toyota recalls 1.6M cars for Takata airbags in Europe, Japan - Toyota said it was reissuing a recall for around 1.6 million cars in Japan to check for possible faulty airbag inflators.

Toyota said it was asking owners of roughly 20 domestic models produced between 2004 and 2008, including the Vitz, to have their cars re-inspected for airbag defects, following an initial recall in May and June.

Bloomberg reported that the previous recall had prioritized vehicles found by dealers to have leaks in the inflators, but that testing since then had shown that a component apparently without a leak had ruptured in a Nissan vehicle, injuring a passenger.

This month, Toyota, which is world's largest automaker by vehicle sales said it would stop using inflators containing ammonium nitrate manufactured by Takata, which U.S. regulators believe can cause air bags to explode with excessive force, spraying shrapnel inside the vehicle.

Honda, Nissan, Mazda and Ford have also said they would not use Takata airbag inflators containing ammonium nitrate. Dow Jones reported that the products had so far forced 12 automakers to recall 19 million vehicles in the U.S. alone.