2011 Honda Civic
This year drew an ordinary 168 complaints for a Honda Civic — the model's median is 440. What they were about is the unusual part: 18.5% of them mention brakes, against 5.1% across the other years of this generation.
Last year of its generation. This Honda Civic ran from 2006 to 2011, so it had the whole run for its faults to be found and fixed. Last years are usually the most sorted of a generation.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 168 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 440 |
| Involving a crash | 22 |
| Involving a fire | 5 |
| Recalls | 9 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 3/5 |
| EPA combined | 29 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- brakes — 18.5% of this year's complaints, against 5.1% across the other years of this generation (3.6×).
- applied — 6.5% of this year's complaints, against 2.3% across the other years of this generation (2.9×). Owners wrote it as: applied, brakes failed, applied brakes, file.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
Each time I applied brakes I would hear a scraping sound in sync with a point or span of tire rotation. Then as I was attempting to stop at a red light the brakes failed. The nearest place was OR automotive and they rebuilt rear braking system yet I could hear…
WHILE DRIVING 61 MPH, THE DRIVER APPLIED THE BRAKES BUT THE BRAKES FAILED TO RESPOND. AS A RESULT, THE CONTACT CRASHED INTO ANOTHER VEHICLE. THE CONTACT'S VEHICLE WAS DESTROYED. THERE WERE NO INJURIES. THE VEHICLE WAS NOT INSPECTED FOR THE CAUSE OF THE FAILURE…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 18V661000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 18V268000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 19V502000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 19V378000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 17V545000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 17V030000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 18V042000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 16V346000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
Showing 8 of 9. The rest are on NHTSA's site.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Honda Civic was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2011 Honda Civic? What happened to yours?
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