The innovative Chevrolet Volt suffered a setback when some battery packs caught fire days or weeks after government safety tests. The company has found that National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) crash tests caused a puncture in the side of the battery pack allowing coolant leakage into the pack. Later, the coolant’s interaction with electronics inside the pack ignited the battery cells.
In addition to strengthening an existing portion of the vehicle’s safety structure to further protect the battery pack in a severe side collision and adding a tamper-resistant bracket to the top of the battery coolant reservoir to help prevent potential coolant overfill, a sensor is also part of the solution. The added sensor in the reservoir of the battery coolant system monitors coolant levels to warn the owner if a problem develops.
