2014 Chevrolet Volt

While driving 50mph on a 4 lane highway, propulsion reduced speed and engine unavailable message came on and the car immediately shut down, a car almost hit me because of it. I had to hurry up jump out and try and push it off the road out of oncoming traffic! After about 15 minutes of turning car off and then back on. It finally started again, I then drove 1/4 mile and it did it again this time as turning left across a 2 lane highway with traffic oncoming, once again had to hurry up and jump out and push it out of the road! This was such an extremely scary situation for me and I thank god my wife wasn’t driving with our daughter and grand kids! This is the 2nd time because on 8/1/2025 it did the same thing while driving on a major 4 lane toll road, was able to pull off to side of the highway BUT had to be towed home!

I was slowly maneuvering my car into my garage when the vehicle suddenly and unexpectedly surged forward, despite only lightly tapping the brake and not touching the accelerator. The car had been displaying the warning, “Propulsion Power is Reduced” and was not holding an electric charge in the days before the incident. No malfunction indicator lamp ever turned on. Per the owner’s manual, the vehicle did not need to be serviced because the malfunction indicator light never came on at the same time as the propulsion power reduced message. This led me to believe the vehicle was safe to drive. The unexpected surge caused the car to strike and cause considerable damage to the garage wall. Fortunately there was no one in the garage at the time and I, myself, was not injured. My car was deemed a total loss by the insurance company.

Loss of propulsion. Vehicle will not start/move. If vehicle does turn on , it will not turn off. Vehicle has been having reduced propulsion issues for multiple years (taken to dealer many times) that dealership has refused to do a HV battery capacity test while under warranty, even after leaving with them for multiple months they claimed they could not replicate error. On day of pickup error presented itself and I showed service advisor and left vehicle for additional testing. Dealer provided explanation of reduced propulsion when in mountain mode as cause even though vehicle was not in mountain mode when error occurred. Dealer performed customer satisfaction GM Program # N172130462 update 11/2021 on HV system that stopped propulsion issues (mainly battery capacity concerns) until vehicle was out of warranty. Now vehicle will not turn on/move even though HV battery completely charged. Vehicle is essentially bricked at this point. Will be taking back to dealer 12/30/2024

I bought my car and I had no idea about a known issue that this car has. Unsuspecting and trusting, I noticed my car had a reduced propulsion and it would like lose power and just slowly jerk and then really drastically reduce speed without anyway to fix it and on the freeway I got scared as I have never in my life has this happen in any car. So it happen a couple more times and I took a picture of it and took it to the dealership where I purchased it. They told me they couldn’t do l as they can’t repeat the issue. Well that only usually happens when I’m driving but now it’s more. The propulsion thing loses power and I as a driver going up a hill or anywhere now will lose speed and it’s dangerous, I feel like I may not make it home and I took it to the dealership many times and they told me there’s no issue. I took it again recently now that I’m out of warranty because it also had some high voltage issue and a sensor coolant issue that misreads. I like the car but very unhappy about dealership and manu not fixing this issue that every volt owner I talk to has, read about. I lose power, my car randomly heads up when it’s been cold all night and not driven now I have the same issues. I have the same issues and I use 91 gas, I have inspected my car and I had to learn about cars or more than I ever did which was like zero all because of this car. I even took it to the dealership 3-4 times (documented) to get it fixed and they just said there isn’t anything wrong nor did they say there’s a known issue and watch out for this or that. I had to look up the issue and learn about it on my own. Very dangerous date happening this is happening now almost everyday but was frequent 1.5 years ago but last 8 months it’s like the standard. I’m afraid my car will lose power on freeway, which it does and I have to take toll to stay away from others for everyone’s safety

My 2014 Chevy Volt suffered a complete failure of the EV power system when the battery reached 0 remaining miles. Unlike normal failover to hybrid mode, the vehicle switched into reduced power mode. I was able to drive home (1/4 mile) in this mode but was unable to charge or drive the car after parking it. At this point the car become completely immobile and had to be towed to the dealer (Jerry's Chevolet in Joppa MD). It was there as of December 18. 2023. This is the same behavior as noted in the complaint about Gen 2 Volts except this is a Gen 1 Volt. In the reduced power mode, the car does not accelerate normally and is subject to power surges. The dealer inspected the car and said that a failed cell in the traction battery caused a fault in the entire traction pack. The resulting repair requires a replacement of the battery for $22,000 not including labor! The car is otherwise in excellent condition. I had the SAME issue repaired under warranty in 2021 with the exact same symptoms. If a reasonable battery replacement was offered, I would happily repair the car. Prior to the fault, the vehicle performed normally and even had 39 miles of range (this is nearly original range). I had not indication that the battery may be failing or degraded.

The car stopped working at a stoplight while I was driving my son to school. There was no warning other than a "Propulsion power is reduced" message seconds before it stopped working. After turning it off and back on, I got the car to limp out of traffic. By the time the tow truck arrived an hour later, we could barely get it to go into neutral to tow it. After towing it to the dealer, they replaced the engine control module. Since then, it has been working fine.

Vehicle stopped when changing from battery power to gasoline. Unable to drive. Not charging the Lithium battery therefore, I experienced 3 similar incidents with this vehicle. The first one on 02/15/22. The vehicle was towed to Bommin Chevrolet in Florida City, FL. This time it was under warranty. The second time 01/02/23 while on the road similar thing happened, again was towed to Tropical Chevrolet in North Miami, FL; a diagnostic was performed the error code was cleared and started charging again. This time same issue when the main battery was depleted the vehicle stalled. I had to towed to my home where is still sitting. Not operational.

A SIMILAR ISSUE IS CURRENTLY LISTED UNDER THE 2013 VOLT HERE BUT I EXPERIENCED IT ON A 2014 VOLT & IT LED TO COMPLETE ENGINE FAILURE WHILE DRIVING, VERY DIFFERENT THAN JUST "REDUCED PROPULSION POWER". I WAS DRIVING MY VOLT ON ITS EXTENDED RANGE MODE WITH THE GAS ENGINE (DAYS EARLIER, I HAD TAKEN THE CAR TO A REPAIR SHOP & GOTTEN A GREEN LIGHT ON IT) & I GOT AN ERROR MESSAGE "SERVICE POWER STEERING--DRIVE WITH CAUTION". THAT ERROR MESSAGE THEN TURNED TO "SERVICE PARKING ASSIST" & THEN "SERVICE STABILITRAK", BUT IT WAS DRIVING FINE & I INTENDED TO TAKE IT TO THE DEALERSHIP THE NEXT DAY. THEN BEFORE I COULD GET HOME, THE MESSAGE CHANGED TO "PROPULSION POWER IS REDUCED", SO THE CAR COULDN'T DRIVE AS FAST AS BEFORE. I STILL NEEDED TO DRIVE HOME SO I TURNED ON MY HAZARDS & THEN THAT ERROR MESSAGE MORPHED INTO "ENGINE NOT AVAILABLE, SERVICE SOON". NOW IT'S STILL DRIVING OKAY BUT THEN ALL OF A SUDDEN IT DECELERATES COMPLETELY AND STOPS MOVING IN THE MEDIAN ON THE HIGHWAY. I WAS LUCKY TO BE ALIVE. I WAS NEVER INFORMED OF ANY RECALL ON ANY VOLT & I PREVIOUSLY OWNED TWO OTHER 2013 VOLTS.