[Hockeydad]

Has anyone had issues with their battery? My full charge is only 60km now and when I called my dealership they said that I'm basically screwed. They can take out the battery and send it to get fixed but I was told to find a place on my own. Does anyone have any recommendations and estimates on what it would cost to get my battery fixed?

I also don't understand why we can't take a better battery that's lighter or carries more charge. I understand the software issues but that sits after the battery. What I'm talking about is changing the box of power itself, not the interface on how it delivers the power... at some point it needs to come down to just a connection to a power source and that's where I was wondering why we can't just put in a new power source. Even if the power source gave a different voltage or amperage, you could put something that changes it to karma spec just before the karma power interface, couldn't you?

Anyways, any suggestions on where to get my battery to get fixed would be really appreciated.

 

[8AVGMPG]

Hybrid Support Solutions does battery repairs and/or can source you a new pack.

www.hybridsupportsolutions.com

 

[Hockeydad]

do I need a new pack or can they repair mine? I mean, 75% of it is still good.

 

[8AVGMPG]

They would need to do some diagnostic work and determine what is actually wrong but it sounds like a module may be bad.

 

[8AVGMPG]

pm'd you

 

[Weird Fishes]

Has anyone had issues with their battery? My full charge is only 60km now and when I called my dealership they said that I'm basically screwed. They can take out the battery and send it to get fixed but I was told to find a place on my own. Does anyone have any recommendations and estimates on what it would cost to get my battery fixed?

I also don't understand why we can't take a better battery that's lighter or carries more charge. I understand the software issues but that sits after the battery. What I'm talking about is changing the box of power itself, not the interface on how it delivers the power... at some point it needs to come down to just a connection to a power source and that's where I was wondering why we can't just put in a new power source. Even if the power source gave a different voltage or amperage, you could put something that changes it to karma spec just before the karma power interface, couldn't you?

Anyways, any suggestions on where to get my battery to get fixed would be really appreciated.

@HockeyDad: Really sorry to read about your problem. I too woke up one morning to discover that my battery has a bad module. I haven't taken any steps yet to have it replaced or repaired, but Lormax has been helpful in discussing options with me. Apparently, there are people who exist who can repair bad modules which saves you the cost of replacing an entire battery. Good luck, and let us know how it turns out!

 

[Hockeydad]

I'll definitely keep everyone up on what happens. Can you recommend someone that can fix my battery rather than replace it? I need to tell my dealership where to either ship my battery or how to fix it.

 

[steven]

Does the car still work when this happens? If so. I would wait to see what happens to FA before doing any repairs... also is there any possibility A123 (or whatever there name is now) will replace it and you just need to do the labor?

 

[Hockeydad]

yes, the car works fine. I just woke up one day and a full charge had dropped from 80km to 60km so it wasn't like the cells were breaking down one at a time. I'm afraid, even if FA found a buyer, they'll still drive the company through restructuring which will result in all of us losing our warranties so I might as well fix it. I was hoping to get some names of companies that do repairs on our batteries and get some pricing information. I'll definitely post whatever information I find as I have a feeling all of us are going to be needing work on the batteries soon. I have 10,400km on my karma and from looking at the polls, there are relatively few of us up above the 10k mark so looking at the issues we're having is a likely sign of things to come for others...

 

[Michael]

is it always now you only get 60km charge or was only one time?


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[Hockeydad]

it's every time I charge it now...

 

[Harleyguy]

You need to find a dealer and get a screen shot of the Live data from the battery .

 

[smoothoperator]

I saw this glitch on a Karma and we ended up pulling the 12v cable after the car slept for 5 mins or so and then reconnected the 12v. We also pulled the HV battery disconnect underneath the driver side rear seat. This luckily ended up fixing the issue. The car apparently had a battery calibration issue. Hopefully this is the same issue with your vehicle if not then it is probably a bad battery/module. It is worth a try though. Are there any warning lights or check engine lights illuminated on the IC?

 

[8AVGMPG]

I saw this glitch on a Karma and we ended up pulling the 12v cable after the car slept for 5 mins or so and then reconnected the 12v. We also pulled the HV battery disconnect underneath the driver side rear seat. This luckily ended up fixing the issue. The car apparently had a battery calibration issue. Hopefully this is the same issue with your vehicle if not then it is probably a bad battery/module. It is worth a try though. Are there any warning lights or check engine lights illuminated on the IC?

No, I wouldn't recommend disconnecting the 12 volt battery. You're going to lose any pending or set DTCs, even if the engine light is not on. This can mask the problem & make repairing the car difficult.

It's one thing to try this if the car is stranded on the side of the road but from what I understand the car runs and drives fine, just has decreased range.

 

[Lormax]

The correct way to fix this is what Harleyguy said, get the live data pulled and find out what's going on with the battery. Pulling the 12V trick fixes very few things now with the latest software.

 

[non sequitur]

Am I missing something? The OP says electric range is 60Km, meaning he is probably in Canada. 60Km is equal to 38 miles, which is full electric range more or less on my karma (40 miles). I don't know why hockeydad's car ever said 80Km, but it sounds like THAT was the glitch reading, not the 60.

 

[Stefan]

Not sure, whether Canada has different Km.

In Europe, the Manual reads 80 km... I see 81 or 82 in the morning...

(1 mile is about 1.61 km)


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[fiskerjim]

Kilometers

Not sure, whether Canada has different Km.

In Europe, the Manual reads 80 km... I see 81 or 82 in the morning...

(1 mile is about 1.61 km)


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I'm in Canada and was getting 81 Km on a full charge. One morning I dropped to 60Km after a full charge period then within one minute I got a "High Voltage Battery Fault" light display and the car froze. Am getting some diagnostics on the problem and will post when I get some direction.

 

[dennis]

We have now seen 5-10 owners reporting HV battery faults here in the past month. So it appears that if you are still driving on one of the defective batteries produced at A123's Livonia MI factory, at some point you will end up with a failed module/battery. My failure happened at around 6000 miles but I was fortunate to get a replacement under warranty.

 

[Makis]

There seems to be half a dozen serious design flaws with the Karma most if not all of us will have to deal with at some point in time. Does it not make sense to seek permanent solutions to the problems rather than just keep replacing expensive parts over and over?
How much would it cost to fix the mess we were left with once and for all?