2023 Honda HR-V: What to check before buying

The rear hatch glass shatters with no impact. It happens on the highway, at traffic lights, and in parked cars, usually with a loud pop like a gunshot. Glass often keeps falling in as the car moves. Many reports follow rear defroster use, and a few mention a burning smell first. One injury is reported. Several failures happen early, some under 6,500 miles. Replacement glass is often back-ordered for weeks or months, and owners report disputes over warranty coverage. A separate complaint says the low beams look like high beams to oncoming drivers.

Rear liftgate glass breaks without impact, often while the car is parked and turned off. Closing a door or running the rear wiper sometimes seems to set it off. Many owners had used the rear defroster shortly before, often on cold mornings. Reported mileages run from about 6,610 to 17,000. There are no warning signs beforehand. Dealers frequently send owners to glass shops or their insurer instead of diagnosing the car, and some say the glass is on backorder or not covered by the warranty.

The wheel feels sticky. It resists small corrections, then jerks or ratchets past the resistance, so the car wanders in its lane and the driver keeps correcting. It happens at all speeds but is most noticeable on the highway and in cold weather. Turning off lane keeping assist does not fix it. No warning lights appear, and dealers often cannot reproduce it. Onset is early, often under 10,000 miles. Three crashes and two injuries are reported. In one, the wheel locked in a bend, the car left the road, and it was totaled. That owner tied the failure to a federal recall campaign.

These reports also describe the rear glass shattering for no visible reason. It happens on freeways, at red lights, in garages, and as the ignition is turned on. Some failures come within 48 hours of purchase. Several follow defroster use on cold mornings. Owners say no recall existed when it happened. Dealers covered the opening with plastic while waiting for parts, did not provide loaners, or pushed owners toward their own insurance. Police at some scenes found no sign of impact.

Most of these complaints are about the rear window bursting, and owners blame the rear window heater. Some smelled burning or found the glass hot just before it broke. A safety recall arrived later, but replacement glass is back-ordered and loaners are scarce. Other problems include no-starts that need repeated jump starts, a car that shut off while driving and needed a new alternator and battery at 36,000 miles, a flickering screen, and windows that stop and reverse. In one report, rodents chewed the wiring harness and the repair was not covered.

Failures here are few and scattered. One valve cover leaked at about 15900 miles, and the dealer fixed it by retorquing the cover and applying sealant instead of replacing it. Another car stalled 5 times in less than a year, both while accelerating and while stopping, and the dealer found no fault. Another showed a charging system warning, and the owner found a loose belt and pulley. One owner reports a new noise under acceleration and suspects the catalytic converter. None of these shows up often enough to call it a pattern.

In one crash, the air bags deployed but only partly inflated. The car hit a tree head-on at 35 MPH while swerving to avoid a deer, and no warning lights had appeared beforehand. The driver later went to a hospital with chest and abdominal pain, and the car was a total loss. The other complaint in this category is really about the rear window shattering. With only 2 complaints, no wider pattern shows.

In one crash, the car lunged forward while pulling into a parking space and went over the parking stop, onto the sidewalk, and into a storefront window. The driver says their foot was over the brake, not the gas, and firmly braking did not stop the car in time. No one was hurt. The other complaint describes a check engine light for the emissions system and a tire pressure warning. Two complaints are too few to show a trend.

One original Hankook rear tire blew out without warning at about 16,500 miles. The tire pressure monitor stayed silent before and during the failure and lit up only after the spare went on. Another owner says the original tires had no tread left by 31,000 miles, even with every rotation done at the dealer. With only 2 complaints, this is a thin record. It still points to checking tire wear and the pressure monitor.