CarComplaints.com Notes: 1997 is the last model year in the 5th generation of Accord. Which means it's also the last model year before problems like widespread transmission failure, subframe rust and peeling paint took over.
Does the 1997 have problems? Sure it does. Any car this old will. Some owners say their engine started to cut out around 147,000 miles. That's still not bad, and getting to 200,000+ miles isn't out of the question.
Does anyone believe a newer Accord will reach 200,000 miles?
10.0
really awful
Crashes / Fires:
1 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
0 / 0
Average Mileage:
0 miles
About These NHTSA Complaints:
This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.
So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.
This is a general complaint for the front seat belt buckles used on a wide variety of Honda vehicles over multiple production years being able to unlatch during a collision. To keep this complaint form brief, only the main topics will be discussed. The defect consists of the seatbelt failing to fully latch in place if a small amount of a beverage (usually soda pop) is spilled into the seatbelt housing. After drying, the beverage residue becomes sticky and the design of the seatbelt buckle prevents the buckle from latching securely. The failure mode can be either the seatbelt not latching at all or the buckle giving a 'false latch' condition meaning that the seatbelt tongue clicks and seems to hold in place normally to the occupant but if pulled firmly it will release. Obviously, this is a major safety concern to occupants. Honda has known about this defect and even has returned warranty parts (estimate over 1000 failures have been returned by customers) that it has categorized as bsr (brown sticky residue). This problem goes back at least as far as 1994 (with the 1994 style design being especially prone to this failure). As stated, Honda has received many failures of this type back but has taken no action to correct the problem. It is unknown how many people may have been wearing their seat belt but when in a collision it unlatched and allowed them to be injured. Furthermore, with Honda placing a cupholder just inches away from the seatbelt buckle (and with the buckle designed in a funnel shape), it is obvious that Honda knew beverages would be in close proximity to the buckle. This is a very serious problem and I hope that an investigation will be conducted to help save lives. Forcing Honda to present the information about the warranty claims it has received for seat belt buckles over the past several years would show that Honda has known of the defect but has taken no steps to correct it or inform its customers of the danger.
Vehicle was involved in a collision. Upon impact, rear lap belt unbuckled where an unoccupied child restraint was located. Dealer has been notified. Feel free to provide any further information.
Passenger side front seat belt gets stuck. Passenger must unbuckle seat belt and retract it completely and then rebuckle it. This always happens whenever a passenger is in the vehicle since the vehicle was new.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Marysville, OH, USA