This is going to be a longer post, so I’ll leave a brief TL;DR:

Some 2023 Honda CR-V Sport Hybrids were sent out without the blindspot system that comes standard on them. These cars evidently have dummy sensors on the rear end that will write a permanent error code to the gauge cluster if a non-dummy sensor is installed, requiring the gauge cluster to be replaced.

Earlier this year my wife and I bought our first new car in preparation for our coming baby. We got a 2023 CR-V Sport Hybrid, but when we bought it we were informed that due to a parts shortage some of the cars were being sold at $500 below MSRP, because they did not have the blindspot system that came standard on that trim. Ours was one of them. No biggie, it wasn’t a deal breaker for us, and we wanted to get the car before the baby arrived.

A month and a half ago my wife accidentally backed into someone leaving work, which resulted in some minor damage to the back quarter panel and bumper. Sucked, but we assumed it would be a quick repair, whatever. Very quickly, however, things started to get tricky with the repair. After a few days the collision place we dropped it off at informed me there was an error code they could not get cleared related to a damaged blindspot sensor on the rear end. I told them it’s very odd they had to replace a sensor, as our car does not have the blindspot system, and explained what we were told by the dealership when we bought it. They had someone from the Honda dealership I bought the car from come take a look, and decided to hand it over to Honda to let them handle it. This was over a month ago.

A week goes by, and I received a video from Honda that was meant for the collision place, explaining that when they installed an actual blindspot sensor in place of the dummy sensor it essentially tricked the gauge cluster into thinking that a blindspot system is installed on the car, and it started giving an error for all of the other missing components to the blindspot system. On the video they said that it is not possible to clear this error, the entire gauge cluster was going to have to be replaced, and they would need to send the original gauge cluster and a new one to a shop out-of-state to have the original’s information written over.

It has now been over a month since receiving that video, and after hearing some mixed messages from the collision place on the status of my car, I decided to call Honda and find out what exactly is going on and why it is taking so long, as I heard they got the new gauge cluster in nearly a month ago. I was told the guy at the shop they need to send it to is unsure if he is even able to program a 2023 CR-V cluster, and they’re waiting for him to finish the 2021 they’re currently working on to see if that shop can do it.

I’m writing this post partially as a warning to anyone who works on or owns one of these specific CR-V’s, and partially because I’m at a loss for what to do. This is fortunately (and I guess unfortunately) the first auto repair I’ve ever needed done, and I’m just being told to wait it out with no end in sight for what I view as a mistake by the collision place, and an an oversight by Honda sending these cars out with no way to handle this error without replacing the entire gauge cluster.