Mitsubishi Motors has said the overheating of lithium ion batteries used in its Outlander SUV plug-in hybrids was likely to have been caused by cells that were damaged when they fell to the ground during production.
The automaker halted production and shipments of the model in March after a lithium ion battery overheated in one of the vehicles.
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Mitsubishi Motors’ managing director Ryugo Nakao told Reuters, “It is not a problem in the batteries themselves.”
According to Mitsubishi, plant workers may have dropped certain cells, thereby damaging them. Those cells were supposed to be removed from the production line, but some may have been included in the batteries. Tests concluded that those batteries overheated when charged.
Mitsubishi Motors said it would recall all 4,305 Outlander plug-in hybrids sold since the vehicle went on sale in January, as well as 115 EVs including the i-MiEV, after it decided how to prevent the defect. Lithium Energy Japan – a venture owned by GS Yuasa, Mitsubishi and Mitsubishi Motors – supplied the batteries in the Outlander plug in hybrids.
Nakao said the company intended to resume production of the Outlander vehicles in May.
