Honda Recall Affects 1.5 Million Cars in U. S. – ThirdAge
Honda is recalling 2.49 million cars, SUVs and minivans, which includes its Accord sedan, to repair a software problem t… Read Morehat could damage the automatic transmission, reports Reuters.
A Honda recall to address a software glitch in the automatic transmission will affect more than 1.5 million vehicles in the U. S., as well as almost 800,000 vehicles in China and 130,000 vehicles in Canada, resulting in a recall of almost 2.5 million cars, SUVs and minivans.
The software bug can result in damage to the automatic transmission under certain circumstances. If the car is shifted too quickly, as when the driver is trying to get out of ice and snow by “rocking” the car back and forth, the secondary shaft bearing can be damaged. The damaged bearing could stall the engine, or make it difficult to shift into park.
Chris Martin, Honda spokesman at the company’s U.S. headquarters in California, minimized the impact of the software flaw.
“The far majority of our consumers would never really encounter this,” he said, as reported by Financial Post. “It’s software programming. It’s not a weakness in the transmission per se.”
Honda said it will begin notifying owners starting August 31. The Honda recall affects certain 4-cylinder Accord (model years 2005 to 2010), CR-V (2007 to 2010 and Element (2005 to 2008). No injuries or deaths have been reported as a result of this defect.
The news comes in the same week that the newly redesigned Honda Civic received a negative review from Consumer Reports after ten years of being the highest rated small sedan. U. S. sales for Honda in July fell 28% and for the first seven months of 2011, Honda has seen its share of the US auto market fall from 10.6% to 9.3%.