Automotive manufacturer BYD has begun a recall process involving 88,981 units of the Qin Plus DM-i plug-in hybrid sedan in the Chinese market. The procedure was initiated after the identification of a critical anomaly in the lithium battery packs, which could compromise the safe operation of cars. The examples affected by this determination left the assembly lines between January 2021 and September 2023. The model in question is one of the brand’s sales pillars, responsible for attracting consumers seeking the transition from traditional combustion engines to affordable electrification.
Origin of the electrical defect and the dangers of failure while driving
The Chinese regulatory body, known as the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), has made official the documentation that details the structural problem and demands immediate action. The failure originates from an inconsistency during the manufacturing of the electrical harness responsible for capturing the battery voltage. This variation in assembly causes the wires to suffer abnormal pressures within the high voltage compartment, damaging the durability of the component over months of severe use on urban roads and highways.
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With continuous wear caused by vibration and physical pressure, the vehicle’s management system begins to receive incorrect data about the state of charge and the health of the energy cells. In complex hybrid systems, this communication failure abruptly cuts off power to the electric motor, resulting in the car suddenly stopping in motion. Extreme overheating situations were also mapped by the company’s engineers, increasing the risk of serious thermal incidents if the anomaly is not corrected in time. The high-voltage architecture requires millimeter precision when reading data to avoid short circuits.
The automaker’s action plan combines remote technology and mechanical inspection
To mitigate risks without immediately overloading the workshops, the company structured a solution divided into two complementary service stages. The initial phase uses the vehicles’ native connectivity to apply a software update remotely, a technology known in the industry as OTA. The new programming code refines the energy management system’s algorithms, allowing the on-board computer to identify electrical variations early and issue visual and audible alerts on the instrument panel before loss of traction occurs.
More on this story: Battery defect leads to recall of almost 90 thousand BYD vehicles in the Chinese market
The second stage of the schedule requires the physical presence of the car at an authorized dealership within the brand’s service network. Technical professionals will partially disassemble the floor to thoroughly assess the integrity of the electrical harness and battery pack. If mechanics find any sign of undue compression, dryness or wear in the high voltage cables, the entire assembly will be replaced at no financial cost to the consumer, guaranteeing the restoration of the original factory standards.
- Owners must wait for official contact from the manufacturer via cell phone applications or direct messages.
- Checking the need for repair can be anticipated by entering the chassis number into the customer service portal.
- Software updates occur automatically via mobile networks, but exchanging parts requires prior scheduling on the accredited network.
Chinese government authorities are increasingly monitoring the safety of lithium-ion batteries, given the massive volume of electrified cars circulating across the country’s provinces. The standardization of assembly processes has become the main focus of inspection by bodies such as SAMR. The state objective is to ensure that large corporations maintain global technological leadership in the export of green vehicles without sacrificing the physical integrity of drivers in the domestic market.
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Sequence of calls exposes challenges in the accelerated expansion of production
The current call for the hybrid sedan adds to a recent history of mass revisions promoted by the Asian company, reflecting the bottlenecks of a very rapid industrial expansion. Just in the previous October, the manufacturer had to recall more than 115 thousand units of Tang DM-i and Yuan Pro sports utility vehicles. The reason for that intervention was also linked to components of the energy storage system that presented a potential risk of fire due to insulation failures.
Weeks before this episode, in September, a batch of more than 96 thousand Dolphin and Yuan Plus cars returned to specialized workshops to correct chronic overheating in the power converters. When grouping all these safety campaigns carried out in a short space of time, the volume of vehicles repaired exceeds the mark of 300 thousand units. This scenario highlights the enormous logistical difficulty of maintaining impeccable quality control in the face of a manufacturing scale unprecedented in the history of the modern automotive industry.
Learn more: BYD automaker announces recall of 89,000 cars in China due to serious lithium battery failure
Brand commercial performance ignores technical setbacks
Despite frequent news involving assembly failures and safety recalls, the company’s registration rate continues to record successive records on several continents. The global sales balance for the month of October included the delivery of more than 441 thousand new cars to end customers. This volume represents a significant jump compared to the same period of the previous year, consolidating the company’s position of absolute dominance in the energy transition sector and overshadowing the negative impacts of repairs.
Plug-in hybrid vehicles, the exact category in which the recalled model falls, led buyers’ preference with more than 214 thousand units sold, which points to robust growth of thirty-one percent. Models powered exclusively by batteries also showed strong demand at dealerships, totaling around 223 thousand deliveries in the same thirty-day interval. The combination of extended autonomy by the combustion engine with electrical efficiency continues to be the most commercially successful formula, guaranteeing cash flow to cover warranty costs.