NHTSA Complaint #11431814 — 2014 HONDA ODYSSEY

I’m writing about a concerning experience I had with our 2014 Honda Odyssey EX-L vehicle. We’ve had this vehicle for about 5 years and haven’t had any issues until recently. On Monday, June 14th approximately at 5:30pm PDT we were starting to accelerate on the freeway onramp when our Honda vehicle stayed in a low gear. I was unable to accelerate and eventually the dashboard lights started to flash and the HondaLink system restarted while this was occurring. The instrument panel then displayed the words “Failure” and I proceed to the emergency shoulder of the freeway. Prior to this incident there were no indicators that there was an issue with the vehicle. After turning off the vehicle, I was no longer able to get the vehicle started and it had to be towed to our long-time auto repair shop. After they ran a diagnostic test and checked the vehicle, they said everything passed except for the battery which was still good prior to the incident. For safety, the battery was replaced and we drove the vehicle home on Tuesday, June 15th. The next day, June 16th, while my wife was running an errand and after returning to the car it turned over very “sluggishly”, the HondaLink system restarted again, and then it began losing electrical power as well. My wife didn’t want to take any chances with having the vehicle shut down again while driving and ended up having it towed again to our mechanic. The auto shop ran another diagnostic and thoroughly checked the vehicle and couldn’t find anything wrong right away. They had to do some additional troubleshooting and found that the alternator was defective even though the Honda diagnostics didn’t report any issues with the alternator. The alternator was replaced and we haven’t experienced any additional issues to date. This incident is extremally concerning as the outcome could have been worse or tragic if this would have occurred while driving at a higher rate of speed on the road or freeway. Dashcam - https://youtu.be/5-Za-Mf5BdI