Junk Yards Indianapolis: Honda checking Junkyards for faulty airbags

Here is an interesting article about Honda checking junk yards not in Indianapolis, but Worldwide to find their faulty airbags. Happy reading.

Chris Bruce

Honda has been working for months to recall about 5.5 million vehicles to replace their faulty Takata airbag inflators. With many of these models dating back over a decade, some of them aren't on the road anymore; instead they're sitting in salvage yards across the country as a possible source for inexpensive, recycled parts. There's a serious risk for injuries and fatalities if these bad components end up in cars still on the road, and the automaker is on the hunt to track the dangerous parts down.

According to Automotive News, Honda thinks there could be over 24,000 recalled Takata airbags in the company's vehicles in junkyards in the US. The automaker has been working with an outside business to find them and issued notices to salvage lots around the country about an offer to buy the parts back. So far, it has tracked down around 3,900 inflators.

Bizarrely, Honda is facing pushback on this safety campaign from the Automotive Recyclers Association. "The buyback program appears to be offering recyclers a price for airbags materially lower than the fair parts value," organization CEO Michael Wilson said to Automotive News. Although, under federal law it's illegal to sell faulty components to people. The trade group also has a pending lawsuit against the automaker for alleged lost value in buying vehicles with Takata inflators.

In addition to getting the word out to auto recyclers, Honda had a nationwide advertising campaign for people to get their cars fixed. However, the company and Takata are facing many lawsuits for injuries and deaths related to the faulty inflators.

Honda Information

21 Comments

Victor Hoyles
- 1 Day Ago
Very smart move. You can never underestimate the gall of some people to make money on used airbags or the ignorance of others.

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JDF
- 16 Hours Ago
@Victor Hoyles
Hmm. Spend $50 on a used airbag or $600 for a new one. The gall of people that may be fixing their own car and can't afford $600.

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Hoping the Automotive Recyclers Association president gets hit by a bus or something. It is illegal to sell defective parts. This means the part has a $0 value.

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Ken Mam
- 1 Day Ago
@srlalsd1
They may sell the components of the airbag deflator. Precious metals worth a lot of money

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@srlalsd1

That was my initial thought as well. Why would Honda need to buy the parts from the junkyards if shops aren't allowed to use the parts to begin with? But it occurred to me, shops don't (typically) buy from junkyards, regular people who want to fix their own cars/sell parts are. Sometimes people just need a "new" airbag to just to get rid of an annoying light on the dashboard. And the media doesn't care if it was a dealership or Joe the home mechanic who put in the airbag, if it goes off and causes an accident, the headlines will still be "Defect part in a Honda caused injuries/deaths".
Bottom line, with Honda taking away those defective parts from junkyards, it reduces the chance of people becoming injured. It's not so much Honda "doing the right thing" as it is Honda's lawyers/PR trying to eliminate the chances of someone being injured by a Honda product.

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@srlalsd1

Wow. Wish death upon another human. You must be a Christian republican

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This seems like something all manufacturers should be legally obligated to do. What the hell is wrong with people that they can't realize that companies MUST take responsibility for producing what turns out to be dangerous?
They should require and pay dealerships to do the work. After all, don't they crow about helping 'protect' consumers by helping both manufacturers AND consumers in the matters of recalls? Hopefully that could help augment their income after the government says manufacturers can sell direct to consumers.
They'll turn into used car salespeople, repair shops and junkyard hounds. Ha Ha Ha. At least the loser ones that can't hack it against competition. LOL

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GM doesn't even bother doing this with their ignition recall. Greedy bastards.

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Japanese Car in the Junkyard? No way.. they 'rust' for ever

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Really people....!!! You're going to compare an ignition recall with an airbag recall? I can understand why Honda is doing this. Maybe somebody had a fender bender, and you need an airbag okay cool I get it. But your going to compare an airbag recall with an ignition switch recall in my opinion, and I understand is a safety related problem/recall. But with all due respect, I think it's stupid comparing these two recalls. I mean do you really go to a junkyard to buy an ignition switch? How many of you people have been to a junkyard? Do you all realize that the majority of the keys for the cars in a junkyard lot are missing? I mean do you really go to a junkyard to buy an ignition switch? I rather go to the dealer where they can read my VIN number off my vehicle, and order a new key for my ignition switch, or replace the whole ingition switch and have them re keyed to match the rest of the vehicle. Or go to an auto parts store, and buy a new ignition switch for my vehicle if I want to carry two or more keys, because you know for a fact that you're going to carry two keys one for the ignition and one for the rest of the vehicle.

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JDF
- 17 Hours Ago
@TheMaddPCGuy
Not if they replace the entire steering column which is usually cheaper and easier than a ignition switch

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Might sound good to the jury.

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WHO
- 1 Day Ago
@normc32
Too bad GM doesn't care enough about it's customers to do the same safety campaign.

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View 1 reply

Pull-a-Part, baby.

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These companies making parts and safety devices in other parts of the world do not meet the standards as American companies do. That is the main reason that I can not sell foreign cars from specific parts of the world. I know that all companies have recalls, but American companies are beholden to the American government, where the other companies aren't. That means that they do not have to disclose what they knew and when they knew it. That provides even more suspicion on them. That's my two cents worth.

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