I seen a few posts about 2016 Pilot Touring’s to be stalling out. This started for mine June 2019. I would be in idle at red light and car stalls out. Need to switch to park, press brake, restart and back into drive. You can imagine the happy New England drivers behind me!
Most recently, on 25 degree day, the car stalled at idle and would not start back up. This was the breaking point because happened on a very busy road and cars whipping by and my and my family’s safety was at risk. When AAA came they restarted car with battery.Brought it to have battery checked and they said battery was good.
Wondering what the latest outcomes have been? What has worked to fix, what has not. Is it truly a battery issue or an issue with the auto restart that can be disabled. Also has anyone had any luck contacting Honda? I feel this is a safety recall that should be fixed.
It's definitely not just the battery. Check out the other threads on this forum - "Elite shuts off at stop light." This happened to my 2016 pilot. They replaced battery in August 2018 and everything was fine until Fall 2019 when it started happening again. Other posters have had the problem re-occur even after replacing the battery.
I did open a case with American Honda the first time it happened and filed a complaint with NHTSA. After it happened again this fall, I took it back into the dealer. They said next thing to try would be to replace the starter motor. But they quoted me $1660 and said it was 50/50 chance it would solve the problem. They said it solved the problem with some cars but others still have had the problem after replacing starter motor. I submitted another complaint to NHTSA and called American Honda again. I told them I wanted them to cover the cost of replacing the starter motor. They agreed to cover all the cost except wanted me to pay $100. So I did that.
Important things are (1) keep all service records from dealer whenever you bring it it for this problem so it is documented; (2) file a complaint with NHTSA; and (3) call American Honda. It may not actually do anything to solve your problem and it will be a frustrating experience. But that's pretty much all you can do. NHTSA is aware of all the complaints but they haven't been able to figure out why it's happening and it seems very difficult for them to force a recall where they can't diagnose the problem.
American Honda did issue a bulletin about this in July for cases like yours where the car would not restart -
NHTSA ID Number: 10163414
Manufacturer Communication Number: APaS07302019905
Summary
Dealer Message - American Honda Motor Co., Inc. (AHM) is investigating certain 2016-2017 Pilot Tourings or Elites with a customer complaint of a no auto re-start condition after going into an auto idle stop. Customer should have been able to re-start the vehicle by placing the gear into the Park position and pressing the Start button. To better understand the cause of this condition, AHM would like to inspect the vehicle prior to you attempting a repair of any kind.
