Genesis is recalling more than 65,000 vehicles over exploding seat belt pretensioners that could send shrapnel flying around the cabin in the event of a crash.
For those who don’t know, pretensioners are the mechanisms that take up slack in the seat belt, pulling passengers close to the seat during a collision. Most use a gas charge to deploy within milliseconds. But some of Genesis’ pretensioners are working so fast that they’re exploding.
“An exploding seat belt pretensioner can project metal fragments into the vehicle, strike vehicle occupants, and result in injury,” Hyundai, parent company of Genesis, said in a letter to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Impacted vehicles include the 2021-2023 Genesis G80, 2023 GV60, 2022-2023 GV70, and 2020-2023 GV80.
To fix the problem, Genesis dealers will “secure the seat belt pretensioners with a cap,” the automaker says.
Of course, this issue isn’t entirely new. In 2022, Hyundai recalled more than 200,000 vehicles for the same problem. It sounds like they’re still trying to resolve it.
If you have customers with these cars, let them know. Yikes!
Leave a Reply