So I just recently purchased a new 2009 HCH - car is about two weeks old. This morning I got up early to drop someone off at the airport and when I got home I mistakenly left the headlights on. Two hours later when I was ready to leave for work, the battery was dead and both the IMA and engine lights were on. Needing to get to work, I jumpstarted the HCH from our other car using jumper cables. My HCH started but the IMA and engine lights were both still on and my battery charge gauge was at zero. I drove to my office (about a 30 minute commute) and the recharge gauge never moved even when the breaks were applied. When I arrived, I turned off the car and tried to restart but no dice: it wouldn't restart and both lights are still on.

So what do I do? Does draining the battery by leaving the lights on ruin the 12V battery? Do I need to do something special to get my HCH back on track or does this require a dealer visit? I know very little about the inner workings of the hybrid engine so if anyone can offer any guidance it would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

 

Well, if anyone reads this post and is interested, I took the car to the dealer after jump-starting it again and it turns out the battery was bad. They said that leaving the lights on didn't help things but it shouldn't have caused a complete failure like this. I had suspicions that the battery might not be 100% from the beginning as the charge level fluctuated wildly even on short rides but having never owned a hybrid I wasn't sure if this was out of the ordinary. Long story-short, the new battery is in and the car runs even better than before. Battery charge level is much more constant and I'm even seeing better MPG than I was previously.

 

Congrats on your '09. You gave me something to think about... I let my new Civic Hybrid sit for just two weeks after buying it last month, and found the battery dead. Maybe the '09s sit longer on the new car lot and the batteries suffer for sitting so long? Haven't had a problem since, but I'm going to keep this thread bookmarked in case of further issues.

 

For what it's worth, the service rep at the dealer did speculate that this car may have been sitting idle on the lot for quite some time which may have led to the battery problem. He couldn't give a definitive answer as to what the malfunction was as the battery was dead-as-dead can be without hope of recovery but he made it sound like inactivity could be the culprit...