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Chevy Bolt EV, Bolt EUV Fire Investigation Closed

A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation into fires related to a manufacturing defect in the Chevy Bolt EV and Chevy Bolt EUV battery packs has now been closed.

According to a recent report from Car Complaints, the federal agency said that although the investigation is now closed, it “reserves the right to take additional action if warranted by future circumstances.”

The investigation was first opened in October of 2020 after reports that units of the Chevy Bolt EV and Chevy Bolt EUV had caught fire while charging or when the vehicles were towards the end of the battery charging cycle. General Motors initially issued a recall in November of 2020 that included software to address the issue, as well as installation of a replacement battery, if needed.

Later, an investigation from battery supplier LG Energy Solution revealed further fires had occurred with vehicles that had received the initial fix, resulting in further recalls from GM. It was eventually determined that the fires were the result of two individual manufacturing defects in the batteries themselves, specifically a torn anode tab and also a folded separator.

In response, General Motors expanded the existing recalls to include all units of the 2017 through 2022 Chevy Bolt EV and Chevy Bolt EUV to replace the vehicle battery packs. It’s estimated that the recall will cost upwards of $2 billion, with battery provider LG Energy Solution covering the majority of the recall costs.

The new replacement batteries will be covered by an 8-year / 100,000-mile warranty in the U.S., as well as an 8-year / 160,000-km warranty in Canada. Additionally, the repair includes new software that will monitor the new batteries for potential problems.

Chevy Bolt EV and Chevy Bolt EUV owners that have received a replacement battery will also be given a Chevrolet Certified Battery Update window cling to prove that their vehicle has received the fix, as GM Authority covered previously.

Subscribe to GM Authority for more Chevy Bolt EV news, Chevy news, General Motors safety news, General Motors recall news, General Motors electric vehicle news, and around-the-clock GM news coverage.

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Jonathan is an automotive journalist based out of Southern California. He loves anything and everything on four wheels.

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Comments

  1. Kill the Bolt and EUV.

    Reply
    1. They kind of already did, thanks to all the negative publicity.

      Reply
  2. Simple solution…. If you don’t trust it, DON’T buy it!!

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  3. Now that this issue is over, I expect lower prices for used Bolts. This is the time to buy them up.

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    1. Bolts will be the only used cars that have not gone up 40%. Maybe 25-30%.

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      1. I’ve seen used Bolts selling for above retail.

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      2. Ours Bolt is 5 years old, hasn’t had the battery replaced yet, and bluebells for $22k. Seems like it’s doing well to me.

        But honestly, I don’t understand why people care about resale on cars. If you’re worried about resale you’re probably buying new cars too often.

        Reply
  4. Has anyone heard of what type of vehicle caught fire last week at the Milford Proving Grounds ? Just curious!

    Reply
  5. A complete debacle for GM. I’d steer clear from the Ultium platform until they prove themselves for 3+ years. GM doesn’t know how to engineer and make reliable new technology. This is sad for me to says as a former 35+ year fan of the company.

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    1. I don’t know that this is fair. It’s a defect that didn’t become apparent until the 3rd year of production (the Bolt started selling as a 2017 model and almost all of the fires have been in 2019 models). At its heart, it’s a QA issue with a supplier. It was also a subtle defect that took some time to understand and isolate.

      I think they’ve tried to do the best they could for Bolt buyers. I know not all have had a great experience with GM’s measures, but that seems largely at the hand of individual dealers.

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    2. Though I won’t condone GM’s initial approach to this situation, the investigation concluded that it was LG, a GM outsource of the batteries (and Hyundai’s Kona provider too) the responsible for the defects and that’s why they are covering the replacements. Ultium is a different supplier from different factories. That certainly won’t mean they wouldn’t have issues but they are completely different batteries so for now, no more than with any other electric car company. This bubble got big because of the delayed and unsatisfactory initial response compared to Hyundai’s.

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      1. Worth noting that LG is a technology partner on the Ultium platform, too, which is likely why GM was able to convince them to cover almost all of the costs of the Bolt recall.

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    3. You could probably say that for any vehicle platform from pretty much any manufacturer – that the first few years of production are likely to be problematic. Right now, Hyundai/Kia are recalling almost 500,000 units which could catch fire due to problems with the antilock brake control module. Electric power train cars get a bad rap because they are all science-ey and new, so they’re scary because they are unfamiliar. On balance, EVs are about as good or bad as any other vehicles for sale.

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      1. Bill, I agree with you for the most part, but with one very major discrepancy. When you say “EVs are just as good or bad as any other vehicle” I think the statistics disagree. Statistically an EV is 60x less likely
        To catch fire than a gasoline vehicle. Based on that alone I’d say gas cars can’t come close to the safety of EVs. 😉

        Reply
  6. Now they will sell like hotcakes.

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  7. More like burnt toast.

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  8. We own a Bolt and it’s great. I’d like to point out some statistics that are often overlooked when talking about EV fires.

    EV fires occur 25.1 times per 100,000 vehicle sales.
    Hybrid vehicle fires occur 3,474 times per 100,000 vehicles sold
    ICE vehicle fires occur 1,529 times per 100,000 vehicles sold.

    So you’re 6100% as likely to have a fire in your ICE than in your EV.

    I’ll keep our bolt, thanks. I’m also looking forward to the battery swap under warranty because our now 5 year old car will get a brand new battery that has more range than the one it came with being that larger batteries are installed now compared to the 2017 battery. So when its all said and done, we will have practically gotten a new car after 5 years. I’m pretty okay with that.

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    1. That is pretty much what I was going to point out. The Chevy Bolt battery fires are extraordinarily rare relative to the number of units produced. The frequency of occurrence is almost in the statistical noise. It is a credit to investigators that the problem was identified as a trend and further that the root cause is apparently two possible manufacturing defects.

      I can say that I had my 1972 Olds Toronado dashboard burst into flames while driving on a rainy summer afternoon. The cause was a piece of rust in the rear license plate lamp socket. The lights were on because it was raining. GM had wisely used solid Teflon coated conductors in the harness under the carpet, but transitioned to thermoplastic covered wires leading to the headlight switch. You don’t have to have a high tech EV to have a nasty car fire.

      Reply
  9. For those that do not know Biden has a speech Impediment/Stuttering

    Reply

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