Honda has announced that a previously-identified airbag problem in some of its used vehicles is more widespread than initially thought, causing the Japanese automaker to expand its recall by nearly 833,000 vehicles.
In 2008, the company found a small amount of cars with incorrectly installed airbags. If deployed, the safety devices could inflate too quickly and possibly explode, which represented a danger to drivers in an accident. The company issued a small recall to address the issue
Two years later, Honda expanded the initial recall of less than 4,000 to more than 300,000 cars, as it found that the problem could affect a wider range of vehicles. At that point, Honda revealed that it had received reports of 11 injuries and 1 death in relation to the airbag problem.
Now, the recall is being expanded again to include a potential 833,000 vehicles. Honda claims that it's most likely that the airbags in these cars are unaffected. However, if a vehicle was in an accident, it's possible that a dealer installed one of the faulty airbags after the original bag deployed.
It's mostly used Hondas that drivers will have to watch for, including the 01-02 Accord, the 01-03 Civic, the 02 Odyssey, the 02-03 CR-V and the 03 Acura 3.2 TL and CL.