Radiator or coolant leak on the 2005 Honda Odyssey
1 fire 1 of the 18 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 radiator or coolant leak gets reported
Owners of the 2005 Honda Odyssey report radiator or coolant leak at a median of 60,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 35,000 miles and a quarter after 160,000 miles, from 17 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 98,000 miles. It is the 16th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 15,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 170,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 154,300 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
41% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 14,500 miles | 32,709 miles | 61,000 miles | 160,000 miles | 168,800 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, 1 a fire is 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 $350–$1,900 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 2001, at a median of 1,100 miles, and latest on the 2003 at 160,000 miles.
By volume the 2005 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
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.
Road debris or small rock came through the air dam in the lower valance on the front bumper, striking the air conditioner condenser and piercing a hole in it. This resulted in a leak of the air conditioner coolant and required replacement of the condenser unit at approximately $700. American honda will not cover under their vehicle warranty because they claim it is due to a road hazard and not from a manufacturing defect. I respectfully disagree and believe this is a latent design defect, that from a quick internet search, appears to be occurring regularly on several honda models. This damage is also causing the release of potentially harmful air conditioner freon into the atmosphere. Most importantly, in 30+ years of driving, I have never heard of a pebble causing such damage on a vehicle. It is unconscionable for american honda to take the position that this is a road hazard and to direct their customers to file with their insurance carriers for relief. *tr
I was driving my 2005 honda odyssey and noticed that the car was leaking antifreeze. I took it to the dealer and they said that a rock hit the radiator and that they would need to put a new one in. It was not covered under warranty because it was caused by a rock. The dealer said that they see a lot of these cases and it should be recalled. *tr
Air conditioning (A/C) problem was diagnosed as having a hole in the A/C condenser which honda dealer stated was caused by road debris which was not covered by the warranty. After researching further the obvious cause of this was an engineering design flaw .- the A/C condenser was completely exposed to all the elements of the road with no grille/protection in front of it. Honda should recall these vehicles and install a grille in front of the condenser to protect it, and reimburse those of us who have paid to have condensers replaced due to their error. This design flaw also left the radiator exposed which was a safety hazard. Note, the 2008 odyssey appeared to have a grille for protection.*ak
Also reported on the 2005 Honda Odyssey
Other body or interior problem
Other engine problem
Other powertrain problem
Air conditioning failure
Other brake problem
Other steering problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 18 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 radiator or coolant leak happen on the 2005 Honda Odyssey?
Across 17 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 60,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 35,000 miles and a quarter after 160,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is radiator or coolant leak on the 2005 Honda Odyssey?
18 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.1 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