— The government has closed an investigation into Honda Ridgeline backup camera recalls and failures.
Honda issued a Ridgeline rearview camera recall in November 2022 that had dealers replacing the harnesses with harnesses that had longer protective corrugated tubing and better zip ties.
But Ridgeline owners continued to complain about camera failures after the trucks were supposedly repaired.
This caused Honda to announce another Ridgeline rearview camera recall, but the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration kept receiving complaints.
NHTSA opened an investigation and discovered the same supplier and harness materials were used, the same as the faulty components that caused the recalls. The government then upgraded the Ridgeline backup camera failure probe.
Honda said the new protected tubing wasn't good enough to protect from bending wear, and the zip ties were not tight enough to keep the tubing in place. The wire harnesses were bending and breaking due to opening and closing the Ridgeline truck tailgates.
With the harness damaged the rearview camera image won't appear.
Honda finally used a different supplier and different harness to handle wear and tear of the components. NHTSA and Honda received additional camera image failure complaints, but NHTSA determined the failures were not related to the original harness problem.
Safety regulators continued to test the replacement harnesses and owners who complained were interviewed. The tests indicated the new harness will likely last the life of the Ridgeline, and there have been no new backup camera wire harness complaints.
Based on these results NHTSA closed its Honda Ridgeline investigation.
