So I have a 2006 HCH that I bought in December 2008 as a "dealer driven" certified used car with about 30,000 miles on it. Its been a great car until the last year. I always had about weekly recals but the last 6 or 8 months it went to daily then multiple per day until the last 2 months its been about every 5 or so miles. Of course the dealer had loaded the software update that "disables" the IMA light . The last few months I have been trying everything I could to kill the pack and get the light to come on. Making sure that I always parked it for the night with a dead battery, never giving it a chance to recharge, hard starts from the stoplight to use max assist, everything I could think of, but the **** light just wouldn't come on.

Just before Christmas I was going to take it to the dealer to get the IMA battery checked out because I was getting close to the 80,000 mile warranty, but got sidetracked when I got rear-ended by a F150 pickup while sitting at a stoplight. Got the car back from the body shop at 79900 miles so I up to the dealer. Took the car in at 79950 and the service person said that while they couldn't get to it that day she would write the service ticket with today's mileage on it (after I said that simply driving the 30 miles home and 30 miles back again would put me over 80k). Took it back monday on the coldest day of the winter so far (<10 degrees) and told the service person to leave it sit outside all night, start it (and it would start off the regular starter motor) and drive it about 10 minutes and I promise you'll get at least 3 recals right of the bat. Got called back 2 days later and was told "we see exactly the same things you described. We called the engineers and they said 'you have a bad battery pack, replace it' so we talked to the regional manager and ordered a new battery under warranty, it will be here in a few days."

After all the stories I read here and other places about dealers and corperate basically saying "no light , no battery for you" I was prepared to spend days or weeks arguing with the dealer and Honda to replace my battery even though the IMA light wasn't on, but in the end it was just that easy. I hope I get another 80,000 miles out of it, or at least long enough to pay off the other car.

 

As a result of a lawsuit the IMA battery warranty has been extended to nine years and 92,000 miles.

 

Hmmm, are you sure? Does it vary by state? If so thats great. I remember when I bought the car I was told I had a 7 year/70,000 mile warranty which with the extension would make 80,000 miles. And on the service managers computer when they looked up my car it said "80,000 mile hybrid warranty campaign" or some such wording.

 

Certain states it's 10 years/150k miles: CA, NY, ME, VT, MA, CT. The remainder it was 8 years/80k miles, but have been extended to 9 years/92k miles. It was never 70k in any state.

 

"Certain states it's 10 years/150k miles: CA, NY, ME, VT, MA, CT. The remainder it was 8 years/80k miles, but have been extended to 9 years/92k miles. It was never 70k in any state."

Hi, I just registered because I was so excited about this statement. I'm in California and my car is sitting "Non Op" and dead right now for 6 months because I don't have the money to replace the IMA battery. If this is true, I'm just under 150,000, I can get it replaced, and have my much needed car back. I looked and couldn't find any information on this on the internet. Are you sure? I would love to know your source of information.

Thanks!

 

For my model year--Honda. Likely the same for others:
http://automobiles.honda.com/news/pr...=2006082973025

And I stand corrected about the 70k warranty, looks like it was used in CA in certain circumstances.

 

Thanks for all the info. I picked my car up Tuesday evening and its been great. Havent had one recal in three days, which is a big change from 5 or 10 a day and my average mpg is creeping back up towards 40, i hope to be back to 45 after I fill up I did forget to ask the dealer what the warranty on the new battery is, but I assume one year. I'll have to check with them, although they are the ones who told me 70,000 + 10,000 extension so I dont know what kind of answer I'll get.

 

Is there any way to intentionally fail honda civic ima battery to get replacement under warranty?
I am confident that some of the recalls and updates are intentionally implemented to prevent the battery from failing under warranty by severely limiting is assistance making it pretty much useless :/
My IMA light came on and when I took it in to the dealership they reset it, did a software update and said nothing was wrong. Honda has terrible customer service!! They don't stand behind their products. I wouldn't intentionally seek to fail my battery if they hadn't patched the software from allowing to fail under warranty just to save their asses from replacing thousands of batteries under warranty.
I get sudden and complete drops in battery meter, recals and all that jazz :/

 

I have been getting 6-10 recals per day for the last 6 months that I have been tracking the behavior of my hybrid battery. My first visit to a nearby dealer yielded nothing. They said there was nothing wrong with my battery, even though I gave them a log of recals. Started a case with American Honda, who essentially repeated what the dealer told me. The IMA light never turned on, and the dealer said they wouldn't do anything without the light.

After 4 more months of tracking recals and taking intermittent pictures and videos, I decided to take pictures of every recal I got for 3 continuous days. Took the pictures to another dealer today, a sample is attached. They did a new software update (I already had the 2010 update) and took the car for a test drive. Got recal within 4 miles, 15 mins. Came back and said the battery is bad, and are ordering a replacement battery!

I hope to have the new battery installed next week. When that happens, you can add my story to that of the OP of this thread!

Interestingly, this dealer said replacement of the battery would cost only $1200 without warranty, which is a lot less than what I have read in the forum...

 

IMA Battery changed. I have driven 25 miles since with two stops in between including an overnight stop, and not a single recal! I had forgotten how a normal battery behaves! For more than a year and a half, I would get a recal immediately after starting the car if it had been stopped for more than three hours and a recal every 15min or every few miles... Now the battery charge went down to 4 and 3 bars without triggering a recal. Looks like this battery is better than the one it replaced.

I still got only 34mpg, but these 25 miles were all in the city, in heavy traffic, with the A/C on. I can't wait to take it out on the highway and see what I get.