Verified government source

NHTSA complaint #11585544

This page summarizes an official U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration owner complaint. Use the verification links below to confirm the record directly with NHTSA.

Vehicle

2021 CHRYSLER PACIFICA

Manufacturer

Chrysler (FCA US, LLC)

Components

POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM

Dates

Incident: 06/20/2023
Filed: 04/26/2024

Owner complaint summary

I had purchased the vehicle three days beforehand. It was a lemon law buyback car. I had driven around 120 miles or so that day. The high that day was at least 90 degrees or so. It was past the halfway mark of driving that day, when I tested the Level 2 EVSE I had bought. It didn't work because the plug wasn't energized, but I did notice that the time to charge was reading 3 hours instead of the expected 2 hours. Once I got back to town, I plugged in to a Chargepoint charger, which was only charging at a Level 1 rate. I contacted the dealer to report the problem, and then went to my storage locker. On the way, the AC stopped working. When I tried to leave, the vehicle would not start. Suspecting an overheating problem, I left the hood open for a half hour or so, and after that, the vehicle started up. On my way home, the vehicle suffered a complete loss of motive power, displaying a message saying "Stop Safely Vehicle Will Shut Off Soon", leaving me stranded in a parking lot. This was followed by a message saying "Service Charging System". After another hour or so of sitting with the hood up, the vehicle worked again. This has happened multiple times since then. I have traced the problem to the battery pack reaching a temperature of 55 C, at which point the vehicle invariably shuts down. One time it did this, I was on stuck on the side of a road with no shoulder, after dark. The dealers I have taken it to could not reproduce the problem, as it takes hours of driving to trigger, and they are not willing to drive it enough to reproduce the problem. A case was raised with the manufacturer, but their protocols were insufficient to reproduce the problem. I have recently learned that the problem is apparently the same problem that the original owner had, and that the vehicle was bought back for originally. I have collected extensive CSV logs documenting the defect. The vehicle is obviously still unfixed, as they will not fix it until they duplicate the problem.

This is an owner complaint filed with NHTSA (ODI #11585544). It is not automatically an official recall, investigation outcome, or manufacturer admission unless the complaint text itself describes one.

Official record ID (ODI): 11585544. This page is the human-readable source link used across afterwarranty. The raw JSON link proxies NHTSA's public API for machine verification; prefer this page when reading the complaint.