Clarity Issues

Yannick, any update on your issue.. I had this high rev power loss last week.. just go back from he dealership.. and found nothing.. I will ensure I do not run down the EV .. i'm pretty sure that is when it happened to me.. the EV battery went to 2 bars pretty much dealer response.. unless the engine light come on .. they can't find anything. if you have any more info.. let me know

 

My clarity has 7K miles.. I limped home after dealer #1 said there was not issue.. I got home on hi reving going top speed of 50.. plugged it in and for 20 miles EV charge and vola back to normal.. when battery drained again .. no issues either.. just got back from dealer I bought I from and they could find nothing.. i'm reading all 24 pages of info very informative.. found this site when waiting for the flatbed by the side of the road appreciate all the info. will not let my car go to 0 when on highway again

 

who were you asking this question to? my trip on beltway was about 36F so it was raining but prior to that it was snow and sleeting

 

I am not sure that the transmissission was really the issue on the 2006 Prius. I have no faith in that Toyota dealer. However, the limp, caused my daughter to feel that she needed to get a new car. When you have a tight commuting schedule delivering child to school, commuting with toddler to day care going to job, picking up toddler, commuting to school to pick up child, you cant have an unreliable car. The upshot was that I gave her my 2012 Prius Plugin and went to buy a new one with all the gadgets to protect us from our own foolishness only to discover it had ONLY 4 SEATS!

So "limping" is how I ended up with a new Clarity.

 

I agree. If you’ve got a few HV trips occurring then the algorithm can meet its schedule for System Checks without the need to operate the ICE during EV driving. And you burn and replace gas often enough not to worry about gas getting old.
I’m an edge case where I don’t go out of town more than twice a year so gas can sit in my tank for 6 months or more. Guess I’m a home body.
But I do like to sometimes check the Trip B (set to gas fills) and see how many thousands of miles I’ve gone without buying any gas.

 

It’s happened a few times, but it is concerning. The gas engine kicks on with a full charge, already been explained to the cause. The issue is that the car runs very oddly when this happens especially when coming to a stop. On multiple occasions when I have had to come to a complete stop the car jerks forward. If I did not have my foot firmly on the brake it would have pushed me into the intersection. I think it’s time to take it in...

 

Hello, sorry for not adding comments I was going through arbitration against Honda and did not want to put anything online that could hurt me. So I had the extreme high revs 6 times now and twice with loss of speed (along with a multitude of HV/ Electronic issues), provided 6 videos, photos, copies of complaints from other Clarity owners and all my notes with dates, details, etc... Honda denied everything, found bogus excuses for every single issue and regarding the High rev/ loss of speed since it says "high revs" in the manual which is very vague they managed to fight it saying that road conditions, temperature and operation of vehicle are ala factor. They even lied but could not prove it so I was denied reimbursement and now I am stuck with the same car that has issues every day. I have an appointment with dealer #3 next week.
I have filed a complaint with NHTSA, please do the same. The car might have a recall is we all complain about his major safety issue!!!
Also: WE NEED TO ALL GET TOGETHER ON THIS. My email is [email protected]. If you have High revs, loss of speed, HV or HV charge not working please email me so we can do a class action.
Thank you

 

All of this is quite disturbing. The loss of speed is a real safety issue. I think pressing that is your best option.

 

I don't know how related this may be but my experience is a little different. For about 9,000 miles, I have been in awe with the smoothness of the powertrain and then I had the recent service bulletins installed, one of which had to do with the EVTC Valve Software that I believe have changed the behavior of my powertrain for the worse in every way. Prior to the bulletin, my engine only purred on the highway no matter if my battery was full or on 2 bars empty. Now on the highway, my engine screams and revs like crazy with a full battery and I get way less mpg as result. I am able to keep pace at all speeds but it sounds like my engine will be worn out in the next 9,000 miles. I am going to ask my dealer if they can take the software bulletin update off my car and put it back how it was originally. I have no idea if that can be done but something is way off with my engine now.

 

My post relates to driving in HV mode.

 

Thank you to everyone who has posted on this forum. The information provided has been valuable beyond words. I’ve wanted to get my hands on a Clarity for months. I have the Touring model on order and it was to be delivered next week. But after actually driving one today, and then reading 25 pages of this forum, I’m cancelling my order. I love the car, but its technology is cutting edge, and there are still too many serious issues and teething pains. I will grant that likely ninety percent of Clarity owners have nothing but praise for their experience, but the thought of losing power at a critical moment is a deal breaker. I experienced the mysterious overreving and hesitation for myself during the test drive. New technology always requires a huge evolution and learning curve. I have faith in Honda, but will wait for the next iteration of the Clarity. It’ll be a winner, eventually.

 

It's too bad that the silent majority of owners who have never experienced any problems with their Claritys haven't spoken to you. It is appropriate that the problems some owners have with their Clarity PHEVs are brought out in this forum, but those owners are in the vocal majority.

It appears you must have test-driven a Clarity with a discharged battery or perhaps you dodged a bullet by not purchasing that particular Clarity if it had a fully charged battery but wouldn't run in EV drive mode. After 50 weeks, my opinion is that my Clarity is the best car I've owned in 50 years. I haven't experienced any of the problems reported on this forum other than the HV Range overstatement, which Honda addressed with a software update.

It's a shame you couldn't drive a Clarity traveling on battery power to experience the feature that draws most people on this forum to this car. What car will you choose instead of a Clarity?

 

Orbiter, to add a bit of clarity to my Clarity. Yes my engine is working harder than it has for the first 9,000 miles but if I had the choice to buy the car again, I would without question. It is an awesome vehicle and I am 95% happy with it. In the world of academia, that's a A grade. I believe the dealers lack of understanding the vehicle contributes greatly to the majority of the concerns people are having and a small sampling of owners experience issues. There is not a car manufacturer on this planet that produce perfect cars .if I gave an indication that the Clarity is not a great vehicle, my apologies. It is such a special car that I do not feel it gets it's due and most of the service bulletins do what they are designed to do. I really think I need a reflash or something related to the EVTC bulletin. To be clear, I would buy this car again for sure if I had a choice.

 

I appreciate your posting this experience. I'm tracking this type of thing closely to decide whether or not to ever get software updates on my car. I had a really awful experience with a Honda Civic Hybrid a few years ago and I really don't want to repeat that. On that car, after a year of ownership, Honda did a software update that gutted the "hybridness" to reduce the use of the battery which was failing in many Civics. The car became undriveable with almost no power (tiny gas engine). I sold it a huge loss. As I've posted elsewhere, I sure hope that doesn't happen to my Clarity.

 

Thanks for your comments. I understand the low battery issue, but it needs correcting and I’m sure Honda will get it straightened out. My Acura missed a shift one time and it near killed me. To Acura’s credit, they immediately plunked in a brand new transmission. I now have two Hybrid Toyotas, a Camry and a Highlander. My Camry was the first one delivered here in the north woods. Without a doubt, it is one of the finest cars I’ve ever driven. To this day it’s still smooth, quiet, powerful, and darned near bullet proof. In April, 2016, and with a bad case of “newcaritis”, I ordered a Tesla 3 to replace the Camry. However, Elon Musk isn’t shipping what I want yet; hence the Clarity. I love tech and have been privileged to experience a lot it, having spent 27,000 hours in the cockpit. I’ve marveled as the planes I flew morphed from using cables, pulleys, bell cranks, and analog gauges, to fly-by-wire and the incredible computerized cockpits of today. Along the way I learned that some glitches are just annoying, while others can really ruin your day.

 

Yes it is a major safety issue and it is not normal that Honda is playing the game that nothing is wrong. IF YOU HAVE THE HIGH REV WITH LOSS OF SPEED please put a complaint with the NHSTA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) and the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board). If we all do the same maybe Honda will stop ignoring the issue or recall the vehicles that are affected. I used to love Honda, had multiple Civics, still own one, also had of motocross bikes and never had issues. I am so disappointed in the way they are handling "us" that I will never ever buy a Honda again. maybe once someone gets killed and they will have to pay millions of $$ in lawsuits they will do something about it?

 

Haven't had a chance to keep track in this thread but how many other people are having this same issue? It sounds more like a faulty car (lemon law apply?) if its just one or two people having these issues.

 

Also please go to https://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Clarity_Plug-In_Hybrid/ .
We need to get together on this. I would love to have a car that works the way it is supposed to but between Honda that is denying everything and the dealers who have absolutely no clue and cannot duplicate we are stuck with faulty vehicles that are not being fixed.