Several top worldwide automotive manufacturers such as Toyota, Honda, General Motors, Nissan, Mazda and BWM have had to recall cars that were built between 2000 and 2004 for faulty airbags. Reportedly, this airbag was installed in 3.4 million vehicles out of which 1.4 million were sold in the United States market. The defective airbag is capable of catching fire or injure passengers. As per sources, the faulty airbag was manufactured by Takata Corporation, which is the second largest supplier of airbags and seatbelts across the globe.
In some vehicles, this safety device may not inflate properly, which is due to a faulty propellant put in the airbag inflator. As a result of this defective part, a fire could break out or metal fragments may be released either towards the windshield or towards passengers.
Between 2001 and 2003, some 5,10,000 automobiles of Toyota Motor Corporation were built, all of which may need to be recalled. This includes models such as Toyota Corolla, Corolla Matrix, Tundra, Sequoia and Lexus SC 430. The owners who need to send their vehicles for inspection will be informed through first-class mail. Out of the total vehicles, 170,000 are expected to be carrying the problem, but for inspection of the improper inflators, all may need to be recalled. In the case a problem is detected, the faulty inflator would be replaced with the new one at no extra cost.
Another Japanese manufacturer would be recalling 5,60,000 vehicles in USA, that were built between 2001 and 2003. Model-wise, this would include 4,26,000 Honda Civic hatchbacks made from 2001 to 2003, 92,000 Honda Odyssey minivans made in 2002 and around 43,000 Honda CR-Vs made in the period 2002 to 2003. Similar to Toyota, Honda will inform its customers through the mail, so that the vehicles can be taken to the nearest company dealer for repair without any charges.
Nissan also plans to recall 480,000 vehicles, out of which 265,000 would be in the US. Models under this gambit are Nissan Maxima, Pathfinder, Sentra, Infiniti QX4 and Infiniti FX crossover, built from 2001 to 2003. Mazda also revealed that it would recall a few Mazda6 models made in 2003 and 2004, in addition to RX8 vehicles manufactured in 2004. Though the company is planning to recall 20,000 units, only 149 will be recalled from the US.
Further, 55,000 Pontiac Vibe vehicles would be recalled by General Motors across US and Canada. These were built in the year 2003. Though Pontiac has been discontinued, these vehicles would be repaired at various General Motors dealerships. Faulty airbags have also been supplied to BMW as per Takata, but the German auto maker sill does not known how many vehicles are affected by this glitch.
Industry experts are hoping that that this large scale faulty airbag problem is sorted out as soon as possible, without the vehicle manufacturers imposing any kind of conditions. So far no information has been given about vehicles sent to India.
