Aussie airbag recalls about to crash through 1m cars

Honda adds 90,000 cars to the 850K Australia-wide already earmarked for a fix

THE number of vehicles plying Australia's roads with potentially dangerous airbags is racing towards one million, with Honda adding another 90,000 cars to the list of affected models overnight.

Honda's 92,274 recalls pushes the overall tally related to Takata airbags that can either split on inflation or fire bits of plastic and metal at occupantsin a crash to about 940,000 – almost the same number of all recalls across all makes in 2014, which itself was a 10-year high for the industry.

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Most of the latest round of recalls relate to versions of the Honda Jazz light city car sold between 2006-12, including three Jazz hybrids sold in 2012, and the Honda CR-V small SUV sold between 2007-11.

Also affected is every Honda Insight sold in Australia between 2010-12, and the Honda City compact sedan.

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“As a result of investigating parts returned from the market, some driver's front SRS airbag inflators were confirmed to have wide ranges of density variation within propellants,” Honda said in a statement.

“Although the cause has not been determined and since there is a risk of abnormal airbag deployment, relevant inflators will be replaced with new parts as a precautionary action.”

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Last month, Mazda and Nissan added their tally to what has become the biggest recall in Australian history related to a single component, identifying almost 195,000 vehicles on top of the 640,000 already earmarked by carmakers as needing the airbag unit replaced.

Even more are expected to be added as the impact of overseas recalls – in the US alone, the tally has pushed beyond 33 million vehicles – continues to trickle through to other markets, including Australia, and as brands here source enough replacement parts to issue a recall.

Affected Honda Australia models and number of units:

• 2010-12 Insight: 1,298 units
• 2006-12 Jazz (petrol): 43,743 units
• 2012 Jazz Hybrid: 3 units
• 2009-12 City: 7,737 units
• 2007-11 CR-V: 39,493 units

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