Photo: GM and Vermont State Police
GM has found an intriguing way to deal with the Chevrolet Bolt EV fires. Instead of admitting that the first recall was not enough to solve the issue, it announced that LG Energy Solution helped it to discover something else. According to the two companies, they jointly found “two rare manufacturing defects in the same battery cell as the root cause of battery fires.”
We will ask the company again about which rare defects affect the same cell. Unfortunately, GM was already secretive enough about the first issue. For the customers, the critical part is that the defective battery modules – not the entire battery packs – will be replaced to ensure they finally have some peace of find and stop worrying about charging or parking these cars at home.
GM already updated its recall page. There, it informs the affected clients that it will warn them about when the replacement parts are ready so that they can schedule the service. Until that is settled, they will still have to charge the battery packs to only 90% of charge capacity. That can be made by selecting the Hilltop Reserve mode (for 2017 and 2018 model years) or Target Charge Level (for the 2019 model year units). The automaker said that people in doubt about these procedures should go to a Chevrolet dealer to sort that out.
A new recommendation is that customers charge their cars immediately after each use and avoid letting the Bolt EV with less than about 70 miles of range. Curiously, the issue may also have to do with lack of charge when everybody was concerned about charging to the total capacity.
The recommendation to keep parking the vehicles outside is still valid. In GM’s words, “out of an abundance of caution,” which is not the case at this point anymore. Cars that had the previous recall caught fire, so it is fair to say anyone that owns these cars will not be overly cautious about doing that.
Hopefully, GM will also assist the people that had the car and were told the carmaker would only do something if it were sued, such as Scott, the first affected customer. According to Electrek, he still owes $12,000 for a car he no longer owns.
GM already updated its recall page. There, it informs the affected clients that it will warn them about when the replacement parts are ready so that they can schedule the service. Until that is settled, they will still have to charge the battery packs to only 90% of charge capacity. That can be made by selecting the Hilltop Reserve mode (for 2017 and 2018 model years) or Target Charge Level (for the 2019 model year units). The automaker said that people in doubt about these procedures should go to a Chevrolet dealer to sort that out.
A new recommendation is that customers charge their cars immediately after each use and avoid letting the Bolt EV with less than about 70 miles of range. Curiously, the issue may also have to do with lack of charge when everybody was concerned about charging to the total capacity.
The recommendation to keep parking the vehicles outside is still valid. In GM’s words, “out of an abundance of caution,” which is not the case at this point anymore. Cars that had the previous recall caught fire, so it is fair to say anyone that owns these cars will not be overly cautious about doing that.
Hopefully, GM will also assist the people that had the car and were told the carmaker would only do something if it were sued, such as Scott, the first affected customer. According to Electrek, he still owes $12,000 for a car he no longer owns.
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