general problems of the 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid

The battery on my Honda Civic Hybrid has been failing to charge which means my car has no power to move quickly up hills or accelerate when I need to especially as I am merging onto the freeway. There have been numerous dangerous occasions where I may have been the first car at a traffic light, the light will turn green but my car has no power to make it up the hill. There has also been incidents when I am merging onto the freeway but can't get my car to accelerate to an appropriate speed as to not be a danger to the cars already on the freeway. I pray to god that there is not an 18 wheeler approaching behind me in the right lane or the driver would not be able to slow down in time to allow me to merge onto the freeway. There has also been times where my car will not start up immediately in the morning. I have already replaced the starter battery from the Honda dealership that cost me over $200. 00 after their mandatory adjustment on the ima battery. Honda will not replace my ima battery until the light comes on the dashboard. My car is not yet 4 years old but the battery is already a danger to my safety. Something needs to be done before somebody gets killed in their Honda hybrid for failing to accelerate at the appropriate times.

After the 2010 software update from Honda on the ima motor, the acceleration of the car when the ima battery is in the low meter is dangerous. I cannot get enough speed to get on the freeway or have the necessary avoidance in normal everyday traffic.

The car will not resond properly from stopped postion when acceleration is needed.

I received the software update on my 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid on August 27,2010. Immediately after retrieving it, I had problems with acceleration. A safety issue when merging onto highway traffic. The problems have not resolved since then and I am always fearful that one day I will get rear-ended as I merge because the car can't accelerate fast enough.

The contact owns a 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid. While driving 10 mph the vehicle was not responsive. As he depressed the accelerator pedal the vehicle moved slowly. The vehicle was taken to the dealer who informed him that they were aware of the problem but the vehicle was functioning the way it was designed. The manufacturer was notified and stated that they are familiar with the failure and since it was designed that way there was no way to repair it. The failure mileage was 31,000. Updated 01/12/lj updated 02/09/lj the consumer stated due to suspected battery failure, Honda offered a software update to prolong the battery. The consumer did not get the software update it may have reduced the fuel economy. Updated 03/08/11.

1. I attempted to turn left on a busy 6 lane farm to market road. When there was an opening in traffic I pressed the accelerator and the car moved out into the traffic lanes, but with greatly reduced acceleration. My hybrid had lost the electric motor assist needed to accelerate normally. I was almost broadsided by a speeding SUV because I could not accelerate out of the way quickly. 2. This loss of electric motor assist or integrated motor assist (ima) started off happening once or twice a month. Now it is happening a couple of times a week. There is no audible or visual warning light that this loss has occurred. The only evidence is the loss of acceleration and the battery charge level will drop from "normal" (6 or 7 bars) to one or two "bars" on the battery charge display. This unexpected loss of normal acceleration can be very dangerous when merging into busy traffic. It is only after the driver commits that they discover they cannot accelerate "normally" 3. I have taken the vehicle to the Honda dealership five times and opened a case at american Honda. Their position is that since they can't replicate the failure, they can't fix the problem. After doing my own research, I discovered that this loss of acceleration is due to a programmed function in their ima system. The system is designed to periodically reset the state of charge for the battery pack to a minimal value to eliminate accumulated errors. When this happens, the electric motor assist is disabled and the system uses the electric motor to recharge the battery pack. The problem is that this "reset" occurs at the worst possible time; when the vehicle is stopped and the driver needs the high torque/low rpm electric motor to provide adequate acceleration. In my opinion, this unannounced reset function at a stop is a design flaw and makes this vehicle dangerous to operate.