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Fisker Karma Reportedly to Blame for House Fire

Photo: Fisker Automotive

After a fire engulfed a Fisker Karma owner’s garage in Sugar Land, Texas, last week, officials claim the plug-in hybrid sedan was the cause of the blaze.

According to a report from Autoweek, Robert Baker, the chief fire investigator for Fort Bend County in Texas, says the “Karma was the origin of the fire, but what exactly caused that we don’t know at this time.”

Baker says the driver parked the Karma in the garage and minutes later, the Fisker was on fire. The sedan was not plugged in at the time and no injuries were reported from the incident.

In a statement released by Fisker, the automaker says the cause of the fire “is not yet known and is being investigated,” going on to state that “multiple insurance investigators are involved, and we have not ruled out the possibility of fraud or malicious intent.”

The release also states that, “We are aware that fireworks were found in the garage in or around the vehicles. Also, an electrical panel located in the garage next to the vehicles is also being examined by the investigators as well as fire department officials. Based on initial observations and inspections, the Karma’s lithium ion battery pack was not being charged at the time and is still intact and does not appear to have been a contributing factor in this incident.”

The automaker will not comment further on the matter, “until all the facts are established.”

The fire comes less than two months after Fisker and its battery partner, A123 Systems, recalled 640 vehicles due to a possible battery defect. The Karma that supposedly started the fire was reportedly a post-recall vehicle.

Via Wired Autopia: http://www.wired.com/autopia/

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Fisker to Replace Battery Packs on Nearly All Karma Sedans

Image: Fisker Automotive

Fisker and its high-voltage battery supplier, A123 Systems, have identified a fault in the battery packs fitted to the Karma sedan and are beginning an initiative to replace all affected vehicles in the coming weeks.

The issue involves a manufacturing defect in some of the prismatic cells produced by A123 Systems at its Livonia, Michigan facility, which could result in “battery underperformance and decreased durability.” Fisker believes this is the same issue that affected the Consumer Reports Karma and was discovered by Fisker’s “Quality SWAT Team.”

Around 640 Karmas are likely affected, although Fisker has only seen the issue manifested in a “handful” of its vehicles. Roger Ormisher, Fisker’s director of global communications, tells Wired that as soon as A123 Systems can produce the fault-free packs, “we will install them as quickly as possible.” Naturally, the replacements — which A123 says will cost the battery supplier approximately $55 million — will be free of charge to existing Karma owners.

Fisker is also extending the warranty of current Karmas from 50 months/50,000 miles to 60 months/60,000 miles in North America, with European Karmas getting a warrant extension from 48 months/100,000 km to 60 months/100,000 km.

Fisker will begin alerting affected owners in the coming days, and also plans a vehicle software update to improve all aspects of the Karma — from powertrain to infotainment — later this week.

Via Wired Autopia: http://www.wired.com/autopia/

Did Consumer Reports Show Its Cards in Coverage of the Fisker Karma?

Consumer Reports deals in trust – particularly when it comes to vehicle testing. Unlike other automotive outlets, CR puts its money where its mouth is, purchasing its test cars from dealers to ensure that it’s getting the same car, and the same level of service, that an average consumer would get.

But in a recent test of the $107,000 Fisker Karma, Consumer Reports may have tipped its hand with a blog post.

The publication was putting the Karma through its initial battery of tests earlier this month when the plug-in hybrid displayed a fault on the dashboard. The car was eventually rendered immobile, unable to shift into neutral, with less than 200 miles on the odometer.

Consumer Reports shipped the car off to the nearest Fisker dealer, and CR’s Tom Mutchler told the whole story on Consumer Reports’ blog, including video of the Fisker being pulled onto a flatbed truck. “We buy about 80 cars a year and this is the first time in memory that we have had a car that is undriveable before it has finished our check-in process,” he wrote.

After two days of service, technicians were able to reproduce the problem. They found a fault in the battery and its associated inverter carrier and “both were replaced as a unit,” Mutchler wrote in a follow-up story. The car made its way back to Consumer Reports’ testing facility in East Haddam, Connecticut.

But at the time of the initial blog post, Thursday March 8, the vehicle was still in the shop, confirms Gabriel Shenhar, Consumer Reports’ electric vehicle expert. Doesn’t that mean Fisker knew full well that it had a particularly important Karma under repair?

Shenhar contends that Consumer Reports’ Karma hasn’t been tampered with, saying that it holds the same amount of charge and contains the “same brains” as it did before it went in for service. “We’ve been in touch with the company and we know that we didn’t get special treatment,” Shenhar says, “And if we did, we’d make some noise about that.”

We’ve contacted the two closest Fisker dealerships to Consumer Reports’ testing facility – Fisker of Great Neck, NY and Miller Motorcars of Greenwich, CT – to determine if the Consumer Reports car was serviced at either dealership. Fisker of Great Neck claims the Karma wasn’t there, while Miller Motorcars wouldn’t disclose what vehicles have been in for service, but did say that it has not replaced a battery pack on a Fisker Karma.

Image: Consumer Reports

Via Wired Autopia: http://www.wired.com/autopia/

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Via Wired Autopia: http://www.wired.com/autopia/