Other electrical problem on the 2014 Chevrolet Volt
4 crashes 1 fire 5 of the 19 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When other electrical problem gets reported
Owners of the 2014 Chevrolet Volt report other electrical problem at a median of 50,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 25,000 miles and a quarter after 60,000 miles, from 13 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 85,000 miles. It is the 1st most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 300 miles at the tenth percentile to 95,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 97,147 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.
31% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 253 miles | 25,000 miles | 48,600 miles | 61,000 miles | 97,400 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 4 a crash and 1 a fire are mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $250–$2,000 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 9 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2018, at a median of 30,000 miles, and latest on the 2012 at 80,000 miles.
By volume the 2017 carries the most reports, with 177; the 2014 has 19. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
I received the chevy volt 2/20/14 at around 10:45 am. My partner and I had a very important meeting at 12:30 p.m. In jersey city, nj so we left directly from the dealership in the brand new volt, 7 miles on the odometer. At approximately 12:00 p.m. The car alarmed with two messages: 1. Engine not available and 2. Propulsion power reduced. The alarms/engine failure came at the most inopportune time---while on the new jersey turnpike in a construction zone and no available shoulder. With semi-trucks bearing down on us, we luckily made it to a construction pull off area and called on star. On star informed us the turnpike is a restricted zone so they could not send anyone, they were helpful and got in touch with the turnpike authority which sent a tow truck. While I was on the phone with on star my partner called the dealership where we got the car. They were helpful and contacted the dealership where the car would be towed?malouf chevrolet. After waiting over 30 min for a tow truck to arrive, all the while fearing I was going to be mowed down by a semi-truck on the shoulder, the brand new volt, my partner and I were off the…
Saturday on 09/5/2015 around 12:00 noon while driving our 2014 chevy volt, while I was passenger, my wife who was driving the car suddenly noticed the car computer program has gone crazy and started throwing all kinds of errors starting with 1) program cluster error 2) ice may be possible 3) washer level low 4) some other kind sensor errors 5) battery level started showing zero ( it was full ) 6) fuel level was zero ( had over 1/2 tank fuel) 7) odometer indication had changed on its own to km from miles 8) no proper vehicle speed indication.9 ) suspension need adjustment etc all these errors kept repeating over and over while driving causing a big panic to driver and passenger (me) besides resulting in distracted driving. Both driver and passenger seat heating kicked in on its own. For a short period we were not sure whether the vehicle is moving under our control or not. On the center panel also the information system was showing all kinds of errors like, battery was showing empty, the ambient temp was showing - 27c although it was quote hot at that time and the miles had changed to l / km etc. Looks like all the units changed in…
Ignition shut off on massachusetts turnpike when trying to change from normal (electric) to hold (gas) mode. Mode button is too close to ignition power button. I had to stop in rush hour traffic to put car in drive and restart, could have been hit. I called onstar emergency service in the moment, but they were not aware of a way to restart the car while it was rolling. Discovered later that there is a 3-step process to restart the car while it's still moving, but it is complicated and difficult to remember while panicking about the danger of being hit. There is no automatic way to restart in case of accidental shut off. This should be fixed or someone will get hurt or killed. This has happened to me several times on the highway and I have been very lucky not to have been hit while figuring out how to restart the vehicle. I commute daily into boston and have to keep eyes on the road at all times; with the mode button next to the power button, there is constant danger of shutting the car down at precisely the moment when I expect and need to be accelerating.
Also reported on the 2014 Chevrolet Volt
Other fuel system problem
Other engine problem
Airbag warning light or occupant sensor fault
Other steering problem
Other body or interior problem
No-start or intermittent start failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 19 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does other electrical problem happen on the 2014 Chevrolet Volt?
Across 13 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 50,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 25,000 miles and a quarter after 60,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other electrical problem on the 2014 Chevrolet Volt?
19 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 2.7 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed