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Hybrid Vehicles Honda Civic Hybrid Honda Civic Hybrid IMA Problems
180 messages, Last post on Nov 30, 2009 at 6:28 PM
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I happened upon this thread while searching for information that would guide my decision making process in this latest predicament. My 06 Civic Hybrid has about 73k miles on it. I have been having IMA problems for quite a while. At least once a day the RPMS will hit 4 or 5 with almost no output when I am at a stop. The gas milage is considerably worse in all driving except highway driving, in which it is only marginally worse. I get about 30-34 in the city now, and get 45 or so on the highway. In the early days of the car, I could achieve 48 city, and 50-60 highway. I have many times been endangered when the car had no power and I was making a right turn. Often times large trucks and semis are very close to hitting me. I am lucky that I haven't been a statistic yet. The other day I had a situation in which I was in a part of LA with very steep hills. I parked on the almost 45 degree angle hill, and walked away. When I returned and started the vehicle, I began to hit the accelerator. There was no power at all, which is very similar to the woman from Marin county. I tried other gears, and kept on the gas for awhile. This was a bad part of LA late at night, so I wasn't amused by the car deciding to crap out. I eventually ended up having to reverse all the way down the hill, and good thing I left enough room between me and the car behind. I have read about issues with the control arms and uneven tire wear. I think I may have had this occur, as I am now on my third set of tires, and every set gets absolutely ravaged. After about 30k miles the thumping cannot be tolerated anymore. I took the car to a dealer in Southern California, and they had the car for over a week to thoroughly examine the IMA issues. The service manager said that he had a similar problem with his Civic, and that he had not been aware of anyone else with a similar problem. They said that they spoke with Honda Techs over the phone to discuss the issue, and that they cant quite nail it down yet. They advised that I could bring it back once it was showing codes. I explained how unsafe I felt the car was and that I needed the issue to be fixed regardless. They advised to contact Honda customer support, which will be one of my next steps. Unfortunately, based upon what I read here, it seems as though that may not make much of a difference. I am going to contact the woman in Marin county first and get the full scoop of what happened with her and how they did it. After that, I will start with NHTSA, Honda's basic customer service, and work up to carpet bomb email campaigns against the CEO, letters to the Attorney General, negative media publicity, and then a full scale lawsuit against Honda if necessary. Hell, it could be a class action with it affecting so many. I see that many people are having this issue, but not may are reporting to NHTSA. I think we all need to do this as much as possible. If theres enough complaints we could wake the sleeping dragon and they the gov will get on them about it. Put the fire under their asses. I am open to cooperate as a group against Honda, or to collaborate on a solution. I will keep everyone informed about developments. |
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I was referred to this thread from greenhybrid.com I am having the same issues as many people here are complaining about. I have also been stonewalled by Honda in their attempts to claim that this is normal behavior for the car and therefore doesn't need fixed. I have filed a complaint with the NHTSA and would urge everyone with the issues to do the same as eventually, like me, you will be caught off guard in a dangerous situation. Eventually someone is going to get hurt, lets hope it never happens, but it boggles my mind that Honda is willing to wait until it does. Every time I call them i get blown off. They just dismiss the issues as if they dont exist. I have contacted local news stations and started working on a video to put on the internet (youtube etc) to show people what to expect if they buy this car. If anyone has any suggestions about dealing with this please let me know. Unfortunately we aren't collectively making enough noise for Honda to care yet. |
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Since my original post, not much has happened. My condition hasn't gotten worse, but I still have erratic IMA problems. The battery indicator never shows a full charge, and will sometimes drop suddenly. My mileage is still at 38-40 (when I work at it) and if driven without hypermiling, is more like 36, whereas I used to get 44-46. The dealer had me fill out a questionnaire to Honda's techline, but nothing has been done. My warranty is up in January, and I have a feeling, they're just going to let it ride. My dealer tells me that they will be an advocate for me, but the ultimate decision is in Honda's hands. This will be the last Honda I ever get, and I've always purchased Hondas. My next hybrid will be a Toyota. This is ridiculous. Should someone want to start a class-action lawsuit, don't hesitate to contact me at: harothberg  gmail.com. ==== Original post: === Count me in also... I own an '06 HCH that after 26K miles developed the same problem as most of you have referenced. My dealership, Honda of Concord, NC has taken a hard-line stance that they cannot do anything. My battery won't charge to full capacity and suddenly drops for no reason. My mileage has gone from 46 MPG to 38 MPG (if I'm lucky and work at it!). It is very frustrating. I owned a 2003 HCH and had no problems with it at all. I wish now I would've kept it and not purchased this model.
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Replying to: halanr (Oct 14, 2008 2:52 pm) First, I try to lay off the Assist. I find that I can completely not use it once the car is at 25mph. I use slow, smooth acceleration. I try to use at least 2 to 3 bars, but sometimes 4 cannot be helped. Second, I recharge the battery every chance I get. If I'm going down a hill, I allow 1 or 2 bars of recharge bars to show. This has been the key to keeping the battery state of charge up. I try not to rely so much on the battery pips as they are not an exact representation of the battery's state of charge (as stated in the manual). I have been able to keep the pips at 6 or 7 regularly. I used to coast as much as possible with no recharging and did not use my brakes often at all. This would cause the battery to drain and re-calibrate, causing my mpg to drop and the car to run on the engine alone. When this happens, I stay in the right lane (I drive only in the right lane anyway) and let it do it's thing. Between 5-10 mins later it' s back to normal. You have to recharge your battery whenever you can, not just when braking to a stop, but even when your coasting. The car seems to suck more energy from the battery, more so than it recharges back into it. You have to look for those opportunities to recharge it. Try it for a week or so and see if there is a difference. BTW, I've had my car for 2 years with approx 28500 miles on it. My lifetime average mpg is 54.9 over 52 tanks. My last 6 tanks have been in the low 60's mpg. I have a 30 mile round trip suburban commute which I regularly get 65 mpg. I live in Charlotte, NC and the summers can get a little toasty with mid to upper 90's w/ 100% humidity. If I use the A/C, I use the Auto A/C set at 78-79. It seems to have less drain on the battery than regular A/C. Good Luck. |
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Replying to: halanr (Oct 14, 2008 2:52 pm) As far as an update on my situation, I had Mr. Ogawa with American Honda send me a letter in writing that there is absolutely nothing wrong with my car despite my complaint. And when the letter arrived, lo and behold he stated that my dealership had inspected and driven my car and saw nothing to substantiate the claims about my car. I find that appalling since the dealership clearly saw there was a problem, had my car for over 2 days, felt the need to contact American Honda, had me fill out that ridiculous form and has been in contact with me just about 3 times a week. So how on earth could he basically claim that my concerns were unfounded?!!!!!! 
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My 07' Civic Hybrid has the IMA disease too, and I have filed a complaint with the NHTSB. My car's symptoms briefly; rapid discharge of battery (all bars gone in less than 10 seconds), occurs much more frequently in hot weather, cannot achieve 8 full battery bars anymore, reduced gas mileage (about 10%), less effective braking while malfunctioning (actually feels like the cruise control in on when you let off the throttle). Living in Louisiana my dealer doesn't see lots of hybrids, so they are at a loss but seem to want to help. My biggest problem; although my IMA might malfunction a few times a day.... or not, I cannot get the IMA to act up when at the dealer. Has anyone been able to come up with a method of getting the IMA to rapid discharge all the bars in less than 10 seconds on demand? If someone can come up with a way to get the malfunction to occur intentionally the dealers would not be able to send you home with the car saying it's working within Honda specifications and we might get some traction for a repair or the lemon laws would get our cars replaced. Has anyone found a way to get the car to malfunction on demand? |
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Replying to: freddierap (Oct 18, 2008 8:13 am) 1) There is erratic behavior of the charge/assist system. Sometimes the system charges under acceleration when it should assist and it assists when coasting downhill and it should be charging. 2) Sometimes the charge/assist indicator will bounce between charging and assisting, and a noticeable “bump” or “surge” occurs. This happens when the car is accelerating, or sometimes decelerating down a hill when it should be charging. 3) Although a new IMA battery was installed and for a couple of weeks it seemed to hold a charge, the battery has become discharged on several occasions since the installation of the new battery. The car then exhibits very degraded performance and poor gas mileage. The battery has never charged the way it did before the first IMA problem. Prior to October 2007 it would often charge fully, sometimes each day. Since the first IMA work in October 2007 it rarely charges fully. 4) Sometimes when driving on level ground or a slight downhill grade, the gas mileage indicator drops all the way down. It stays there for several seconds and then goes back up to a normal level. 5) At times it seems that the engine will race or rev up when I start to accelerate from a stop. The car engine goes to AutoStop when the car stops, but it doesn't’ seem to move immediately when it restarts the engine after I take my foot off the brake. This does not happen really frequently, but occasionally. 6) The gas mileage of the vehicle has dropped almost 15% overall. But the gas mileage has also very frequently been inconsistent. At times the MPG is up to the 50 MPG range or more. At other times it is in the 38 – 44 MPG range on the same type of road conditions, same driving patterns, and no AC use on either occasion. I drive the vehicle 30,000 – 33,000 miles per year for work, so I am very familiar with the normal performance and mileage of the car, at least before the problems occurred after the IMA warning light came on in October 2007. I have told my dealer that I am considering some options, contacting local and/or national media about the unresolved problem and American Honda's denials, and getting a magnetic sign made for the side of my car that will warn others who may be considering buying a Civic Hybrid. I would name the local dealer and American Honda and state that they cannot fix my car. The dealer has made me a decent offer to trade my car for another, and I could get a pretty good deal on a 2009 non-hybrid. I told them that there are bigger issues than just my dissatisfaction. The weather is cooler here now, so the safety issue is not as big of a problem. I hope other owners file complaints and try to put pressure on Honda. There could be some strength in numbers.
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Replying to: lectricman52 (Oct 18, 2008 9:17 am)  Thanks for the reply. I know our problem seems to be worse with heat, however the weather is cooler here now and although not as frequent it's still happening with my car. Couple thoughts; as for the gas mileage loss I really believe this is due to reduced battery voltage from it being damaged during the rapid discharges. I have some knowledge with rechargeable batteries and rapid discharges are their death. I have seen them vent or explode when rapidly discharged. Once they have experienced this brutal discharge, and it only takes one time to damage them, their output voltage under load is reduced and for us this means less assist from the IMA therefore more gas engine required to do the same amount of work. The heat caused by the car sitting in a parking lot for example might reduce the the batteries output voltage if plotted on a graph, but is not enough to be felt to the driver and is not gong to be the cause of the batteries suddenly dumping their capacity. Which gives me my greatest concern, our IMA batteries contain a lot of stored energy, when they rapidly discharge.... where is the stored power going?? To see all your bars click off in under 10 seconds requires nothing less than some form of dead short... can anyone say dangerous. I seriously doubt any system in the car is capable of using that much power in that brief period, therefore a short circuit that could cause an explosion concerns me.
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Several of you have been very helpful and are therefore familiar with the IMA assist problem occurring in our vehicles. After almost 4 months of getting the run around from American Honda, they finally attempted to be rid of me by sending me a letter stating that there is nothing wrong with my car, and that (contrary to actions taken by my dealership) Duval Honda found no evidence to support my claims that the vehicle was malfunctioning. They have since stopped taking or returning my calls. Going so far as to hang up when I call the service manager direct. I have gone to a new dealership. The issue: As of yesterday my car threw a check engine light, while accelerating, the car will buck and jerk and is really quite terrifying to be driving. This behaviour is inconsistent and I had initially thought the problem to be the O2 sensor. It will turn off my cruise control when the irradict behaviour starts up as well. However, (as I am sitting in the dealership now) I have just recieved information that this dealership thought a rat had damaged a single 2" area of my wiring harness. I of course being moderately familiar with cars, and not at all stupid went to see for myself this "rat damage" And wouldn't you know, this must be the best rat ever, because the casing around the wires was rather neatly "chewed" and almost no plastic was missing at all. Only a single black wire from within that casing was damaged, and it was almost perfectly cut. I of course took my stance that there was no way a rat came into my car decided to cut my wire casing and neatly cut a single wire. There is no evidence of any damage anywhere else in the car. FORTUNATELY, my service advisor understood my concerns, and my conspiracy theory against my last dealership and took it up with the manager. So now I am getting the wire fixed and new diagnostics done on the car, with the oil changes etc. for $90. They said they did not want to be associated with being at all like Duval Honda and did not want to behave like Duval Honda. While still not perfect, it is much better than the original cost, but I don't feel like they did the damage, and I am not taking it back to Duval Honda to try and argue that they did it, so I will be moderately content to part with the $90. I had never thought to check and see if my old dealership had "accidently" damaged any part of my car. But this is where I am now on the IMA issue, I hope that this fixes it. |
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I have recently had some work done to my 05 HCH and ever since then the mpg have dropped by 5-10. My day started out with a flat tire. It was time to get new tires so that's what I did. I took it to a tire store and while they were under there they noticed the front brakes were 90% worn so I had those replaced and the 50,000 mile check-up. Starting that day after I left the tire store I'm averaging 34-36 mpg instead of 42-46 mpg. Does anyone have any insight on why this could be? It is really bothering me. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. |
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