I decided to change the oil myself in my car, since I wanted to save money and I knew what I was doing. Instead of draining the oil, I accidentally drained the transmission fluid. I didn't figure out that it was transmission fluid because it looked like oil! so, this is what happened after; I drove home (not knowing there was no tranny fluid in it) and I noticed that the car wanted to take off by itself. It kept doing tis two or three more times when it became stuck in 4th gear. I managed to safely get home, and figured out what happened. I am reporting this because this is a design flaw!!! the transmission fluid drain hole is where the engine oil drain hole should be! luckily, after I put fresh tranny fluid in it, the car was fine. I wonder how many other people this happened to.

- Gladstone, MI, USA

I was turning onto a local busy street when my accelerator stuck to the floor and quickly shot up near 50mph. I had to quickly weave through traffic to not hit anyone while it stayed in a high speed. When I'd press the brakes, the car would slow down but still be going. When I let off the brake pedal, it quickly shot back up to 50mph. I was lucky to be able to turn onto a side street maybe 1 minute later and avoided hitting anyone else. I am beyond surprised that I was able to avoid hitting anyone with the amount of traffic. The pedal only came up when I put my foot under it (going slower/braking on the side street). It was normal after that. Extremely scary experience with an otherwise flawless vehicle that I have owned for going on 4 years.

- Northglenn, CO, USA

The car (VW Passat tdi 2005) began accelerating on its own. The gas pedal would depress beneath my foot (without my pushing it) and the car would accelerate without stopping. When I hit the brake, sometimes it would jerk out of the "accelerating mode" (as if I had pushed the brake in cruise control), but then it would resume its acceleration within 30-60 seconds. Sometimes when I pressed the brake it would rev against the brake and I would have to shift it into neutral and then brake to get it to slow down and keep it from revving. This happened 3-4 times in the past 1-2 weeks. I made sure the cruise control was off during each of these episodes (since the car seemed like it was trying to go into cruise control when this problem occurred, but with no maximum speed set -- I.e., accelerating indefinitely). Some things that may or may not be related: The air conditioning was on full blast. Each time it happened, I had been on the freeway going above 60 mph for at least 5-10 miles. At the end of the last episode, the car was producing smoke from the front wheel wells (likely because of braking against the acceleration). The dealership is examining the car right now, so I can't report what repair was done yet. (right after the last incident I had the car towed to a local VW shop, but they couldn't figure out the problem, so I'm having the car brought to the dealership tomorrow - 6/28/2010).

- Boulder City, NV, USA

My Volkswagen Passat has experienced scary acceleration without me pushing on the accelerator. This has happened twice, both when on the highway. I checked my mats, but they were not obstructing anything. I was so surprised to see the news tonight on channel 5 boston covering this story!

- Norwood , MA, USA