[civicowner]

Hello, I've been posting at other forums about the website Hybrid-Battery-Repair.com. I've read the site and rebuilting the IMA battery is more within my budget right now. I just want honest responses because I can't afford this fix not to work. Has anyone had this service and if so is your battery still running after the year warrenty? I have a HCH Gen I.

Thanks

 

[ac7ss]

I am shocked I saw your note before the owner of the shop did! He is a regular poster here. Many many users have used his service (Not myself, I am still in warranty.) And they all sound happy. The only trouble is the shipping. If you are an East coaster, it works great. But those of us on the left coast it gets pricey fast.

 

[civicowner]

I'm on the East coast so shipping is not an issue. Just wanted to know if anyone used him. I'm interest but the 2-3 week turnaround time may be an issue for me. I could just buy a battery off of him or just bum a ride for a few weeks. If I could get a good two years out of my battery after the repair - I'm good. Called the Honda dealer and got a price. Just trying to weight my options. Thanks for the reply

 

[Hybrid-Battery-Repair]

I am shocked I saw your note before the owner of the shop did! He is a regular poster here. Many many users have used his service (Not myself, I am still in warranty.) And they all sound happy. The only trouble is the shipping. If you are an East coaster, it works great. But those of us on the left coast it gets pricey fast.

I am not about to interfere when someone is asking for others' opinions of my services. I'd prefer there be no chance of anyone thinking I had rigged the responses.

Shipping-wise, an Insight crate runs about $80 across the country full while a Civic crate runs about $75. The Civic battery housings are smaller and have less of the fragile lumps sticking out, so I'm able to use an extremely compact crate for them. The size makes the difference.

Insight: 27x26x15 100lbs full 35lbs empty (billed at a dimensional weight of 55lbs)
Civic: 24x17x8 86lbs full, 21lbs empty

 

[TangoRunner]

Civicowner,

I just received my refurbished battery from Hybrid Battery Repair.com 8 days ago. Since I am very local to the business (I'm in central NJ), I drove to and from the site for both the battery removal and re-installation.

While I can't offer you any solid evidence - yet - of the durability of the refurbishing, I can say that everything seems work as it did before I brought the battery pack in for repair: The IMA, autostop, the charging and discharging, etc. And I definitely plan to post when the 1-year warranty period ends on how the battery performed overall.

That said, you mention the "2-3 week turnaround" time as a concern.

On October 1, 2010 I drove to Hybrid Battery Repair.com and had the battery removed for refurbishing. At that time, I was told the repairs were running "4 to 5 weeks". While this seemed like a long time, it was a cheaper option than a new battery, and environmentally more responsible. Within a day I authorized a $500 payPal transfer as a deposit for the work. Fast forward 4+ weeks...

I called the company on November 3rd (or 4th) to confirm pick up on November 5th, 5 weeks after the battery was dropped off. My call was NOT returned so I called again on the 5th and spoke with the owner and was told that I needed to call his tech to get an exact delivery date. When I called her and got it, and I was shocked: November 24, 2010, almost 3 weeks later.

At this point, I became somewhat irate: Hybrid Battery Repair had my battery for 5 weeks, they had my deposit, and they had my message that I was expecting to pick up the battery that day, and they had NOT respond to my call, and now the delivery date was pushed back 2 1/2 weeks.

FYI, driving your Insight without the battery is harder on the engine (and I would say the clutch too, if you have a manual like me) and you lose the punch of the electric motor, which you need for climbing hills, passing, etc. And the starting from a 12 volt is a lot rougher too.

On November 8, 2010 I sent the company an email stating that I needed a firm answer to the question of whether the battery would actually be refurbished by the 24th or not. I wanted something in writing as I was concerned they would miss this delivery date too. In my words: "at this point, I just need straight talk from you - no spin, no optimism, no bullshit."

3 Days later, in a email, I was told the battery would be ready the 22nd of November. Indeed, I did have the battery re-installed on November 22, 2010 - 7 weeks and 3 days after I dropped the battery off - and things so far are working fine.

Why is it necessary to become irate to get people to do their jobs? i.e. respond to their paying customers, make reasonable estimates, and keep them informed as to what is going on? This seems to me to be somewhat of a pervasive problem.

Bottom line, think hard before parting with your battery and get delivery dates in writing.

 

[ericbecky]

In most cases there is no reason to get irate.

Hybrid Battery Repair is a reputable company and does their best to fulfill the increasing number of orders out there.

There are plenty of uncontrollable variables in refurbishing batteries, including supply of parts.

I'm sure they do their best to communicate with customers.

As far as "harder on the engine"... I'm not so sure I'd agree with you on that one. It's a car. It's meant to be driven. Is it slower. Yes. But not necessarily any harder. Remember, you are driving around with less weight in it, too. Starting from the 12v is not harder on the car either. It's a starter. That's it's job. To start the car.

Parting with a dead battery should not be too hard of a decision. The lower cost factor more than outweighs the slight inconvenience. Example: I just had a local person quoted $5,800 to replace the battery. To get the battery through hybrid battery repair would be nearly $4,000 in savings! Is having a slower car for 2 months worth $4,000 in savings? Yes it is.

 

[Hybrid-Battery-Repair]

FYI, driving your Insight without the battery is harder on the engine (and I would say the clutch too, if you have a manual like me) and you lose the punch of the electric motor, which you need for climbing hills, passing, etc. And the starting from a 12 volt is a lot rougher too.

The car is quite capable of running without any assist indefinitely. It is no harder on the engine than driving a CRX or a non-hybrid Civic. I do agree that it is far less satisfying to drive, but at least it didn't have to be parked for the duration.

Why is it necessary to become irate to get people to do their jobs? i.e. respond to their paying customers, make reasonable estimates, and keep them informed as to what is going on?

Getting irate did not change the date of completion of your battery, all it did was upset the staff.

We are currently running at a 4-6 week repair time. It fluctuates based on the number of customers coming in, the number of replacement cells needed for each battery and the current status of available cells. It even varies based on battery testing factors: some results require additional tests or even retests. For every battery we repair, there is at least one that we have to process to get the replacement sticks.

As far as returning your phone call, I receive 40 or more calls per day. As most anyone here who has talked to me on the phone can attest, I can rarely get through a conversation without someone trying to beep through. I guess I missed yours in the shuffle. Sorry.

I also get better than 100 emails per day. This means that I'm spending more than half of my day responding to people. Also, almost every customer calls about a week before their battery is scheduled to be completed, only to be told that it won't be done early.

We are in the process of moving to a new location while expanding. There are now seven people working here, and there is an email address just for updates. It is [email protected] There will shortly be a new phone number as well and several people will answer it. Hopefully that will alleviate others' similar concerns.

Other than that, how is the battery doing?

 

[Maryland Civic Owner]

hybrid-battery-repair.com

Hi,

Currently I am having my IMA battery rebuilt by hybrid-battery-repair.com. I paid the $500.00 deposit via PayPal, and sent off a batt that I bought from a junk yard. The estimate time was 4 to 6 weeks. Right now we are at 6 weeks. I have emailed the owner a couple of times asking about status, but have not recieved a reply. I am not concern yet, but I would feel better if someone would email me and give me an update.


Mean time I am driving my 2003 Civic with the orginal IMA batt, which requires disconnecting the 12 volt batt everytime I park. If I don't I will have a dead battery and will require a jump. Also driving without the IMA assit is putting extra strain on the gas motor, hence I would not want to drive in this mode for an extented time.

Bert Murray
Ellicott City, MD

 

[Kevin Dougherty]

We are in the process of moving to a new location while expanding. There are now seven people working here, and there is an email address just for updates. It is [email protected] There will shortly be a new phone number as well and several people will answer it. Hopefully that will alleviate others' similar concerns.

Other than that, how is the battery doing?

Congratulations on expanding the economy
Good service tends to do that to a company!

 

[boogetyboogety]

Hi,

Currently I am having my IMA battery rebuilt by hybrid-battery-repair.com. I paid the $500.00 deposit via PayPal, and sent off a batt that I bought from a junk yard. The estimate time was 4 to 6 weeks. Right now we are at 6 weeks. I have emailed the owner a couple of times asking about status, but have not recieved a reply. I am not concern yet, but I would feel better if someone would email me and give me an update.

Mean time I am driving my 2003 Civic with the orginal IMA batt, which requires disconnecting the 12 volt batt everytime I park. If I don't I will have a dead battery and will require a jump. Also driving without the IMA assit is putting extra strain on the gas motor, hence I would not want to drive in this mode for an extented time.

Bert Murray
Ellicott City, MD

:-?

As he said above:

I also get better than 100 emails per day. This means that I'm spending more than half of my day responding to people. Also, almost every customer calls about a week before their battery is scheduled to be completed, only to be told that it won't be done early.

So... what part of "4 to 6 weeks" didn't you get... or "The car is quite capable of running without any assist indefinitely. It is no harder on the engine than driving a CRX or a non-hybrid Civic..." I thought he was quite clear on the process.

I'm reminded of my good friend, whose Dad worked at NASA during the heady Gemini and Apollo days, who liked to quote, "working for NASA feels like they sometimes expect you should get nine women pregnant at the same time, so we can provide a baby in one month." You know, when it comes time to do a job as exacting and labor-intensive as above, you can't hurry the process sometimes. Chill, man, I'm sure our sponsor is doing his very best on your behalf, and your posting your complaints here smacks of insensitivity at best and a sense of entitlement at worst. Disassembly, assessment, reassembly, testing, delivery... with a zillion other things to do involved with running a business with half-a-dozen employees, and keeping other customers happy, and planning for future growth... I bet you've never run a business. Otherwise, you'd be a bit more laid-back about your delivery date.

Long after you forget the extra few days, you'll remember you saved a boatload of money over a dealer repair. Again... chill...

 

[Hybrid-Battery-Repair]

Bert,

You do realize that NYC is suffering the worst winter in decades, don't you? We were closed from 12/23 to 1/2 because of NYC not plowing streets. There was three feet of snow blocking in all our cars.

We've had three more snowstorms since then, this morning was a declared state of emergency, and we're getting ready to close up shop early this afternoon because of a coming ice storm.

As a result, the 4-6 week in house is translating to 6-8 calendar weeks. Your battery is actually coming in at 5 weeks of work as it will be finished this Friday and ready to ship Monday (barring unforeseen weather problems). It would have been 4 (aka 6) weeks, but we also moved to new offices last month and that caused some work interruptions.

Now, about your email. I spent last week at home with the flu and I've spent all of this week so far trying to get through the 600+ emails that I have stacked up, so I apologize for not responding earlier.

Ron Hansen
Hybrid-Battery-Repair.com

Hi,

Currently I am having my IMA battery rebuilt by hybrid-battery-repair.com. I paid the $500.00 deposit via PayPal, and sent off a batt that I bought from a junk yard. The estimate time was 4 to 6 weeks. Right now we are at 6 weeks. I have emailed the owner a couple of times asking about status, but have not recieved a reply. I am not concern yet, but I would feel better if someone would email me and give me an update.


Mean time I am driving my 2003 Civic with the orginal IMA batt, which requires disconnecting the 12 volt batt everytime I park. If I don't I will have a dead battery and will require a jump. Also driving without the IMA assit is putting extra strain on the gas motor, hence I would not want to drive in this mode for an extented time.

Bert Murray
Ellicott City, MD

 

[Hybrid-Battery-Repair]

"The car is quite capable of running without any assist indefinitely. It is no harder on the engine than driving a CRX or a non-hybrid Civic..." I thought he was quite clear on the process.

He is reporting needing to disconnect the 12V everytime he parks, which I think is resetting his IMA system so that it will start on the IMA motor and not the starter (which will further strain his 12V).

This is an inconvenience, so he's got a right to be upset, but if he'd called me last week I would have answered the phone despite being sick (or at least answered the voicemail message) and explained the delay.

 

[Hybrid-Battery-Repair]

Mean time I am driving my 2003 Civic with the orginal IMA batt, which requires disconnecting the 12 volt batt everytime I park. If I don't I will have a dead battery and will require a jump. Also driving without the IMA assit is putting extra strain on the gas motor, hence I would not want to drive in this mode for an extented time.

Bert Murray
Ellicott City, MD

Bert,

Your 12V battery should not be going dead. When the car is turned off, there is no drain on the 12V battery. If there is, then you (probably) have a stuck AC relay that is unrelated to the IMA system.

If your 12V battery is not charging (ie the alternator light is on) then you need to charge the 12V battery - not disconnect it.

Driving without IMA does not put a strain on the engine any greater than driving up a hill. The IMA motor is there primarily to make your car more responsive and fun to drive. The ICE is more than capable of running the car - forever.

The only detrimental thing that running the car this way is doing is putting excess wear on the IMA battery. Since you are selling that battery to us when your new battery is ready, you should not worry about damaging it - we're not.

 

[kennysmith]

I'll second the stuck AC relay. I also have a 2003 HCH and for over a year had occasional dead 12V (and occasional IMA light). 2 different Honda dealers could not find problem. Finally figured out the relay on my own and when I went to Honda parts to buy new one the counter guy said, "Oh you must have a dead battery." I needed him diagnosing my car!!! Otherwise 150K trouble free miles on that car on original ima battery.

 

[dennisducher]

my experience with hybrid-battery-repair

this is my first posting with INSIGHT CENTRAL, so please bear with me.

back in sept. 2010, i inquired about getting my IMA battery repaired with insight-battery-repair. i removed my own battery and made arrangements to drive it out to long island,n.y. the first week of oct. i live in the detroit area, so this was going to be a drop-off and sight seeing trip for the missus and me.
we dropped the battery off on oct.12 and ron hansen couldn't have been more cordial. he told us that it would be about 4 weeks until it was finished. with that, later that day, i pay-palled him the $5oo deposit to get things going.
in the middle of nov. i e-mailed him to see if he was going to ship the battery soon. got a reply that refurb. time was 5-7 weeks. so at the end of nov., i e-mailed him again, but with no reply. this is how it went all through dec--no replies to calls or e-mails.
on dec. 22 i finally get an e-mail with the bill for the rest of the payment; $845 which i immediately sent to him.
got the battery on jan. 8th, but since the weather was bad(doing the install in my driveway), i didn't put it in until jan. 10. following the service manual, i reset the system and went to drive it. didn't get half-way down the block when it faulted out the IMA. put the code reader on it and it was the P1449 fault; the one that it was showing when i took it to I-B-R; ONLY WORSE.i could go a week between faults before. so i ended up resetting it 5 more times with the same result. got discouraged and left it until the next day, when i tried it a few more times and gave up.
so, for the next 6 days i tried to get in touch with ron hansen. finally he responded by phone. he appologized and told me to pack it back up and send it back. i did that on jan. 18. he received it about 4 days later. since that time i have tried to contact him by phone and e-mail with no reply.
last week, a friend of mine that has 2 insights, graciously agreed to let me swap one of his IMA's into my car. it worked like a charm. good charge and discharge. so now i know that my circuitry is not at fault.
so here i am 5 MONTHS later with no battery and no clue as to when it will be done. i'm sure that ron hansen will do his best to fix it right, but the communication with paying customers has to improve. i only found out about a new e-mail address for updates by reading a reply to a post by TangoRunner on nov.30.
please ron, let me know what's going on. thanks

 

[KMD]

Boogety boogety
I am assuming by your absolutely rude reply to someone concerned with the lack of communication they are getting from Hybrid Battery Repair That you are a friend or work there.
Your response to someone who has concerns is out of place and rude. Maybe you should research how many unhappy customers this company has right now before attaching this persons post.
They have reason for concern this company is not even coming close to keeping the promises they made to us and are impossible to get hold of.
They may have done good work in the past but our experience with them has been absolutely horrible. They have some of the worst business practices I have ever dealt with.

 

[boogetyboogety]

Boogety boogety
I am assuming by your absolutely rude reply to someone concerned with the lack of communication they are getting from Hybrid Battery Repair That you are a friend or work there.
Your response to someone who has concerns is out of place and rude. Maybe you should research how many unhappy customers this company has right now before attaching this persons post.
They have reason for concern this company is not even coming close to keeping the promises they made to us and are impossible to get hold of.
They may have done good work in the past but our experience with them has been absolutely horrible. They have some of the worst business practices I have ever dealt with.

Oh, bite me. As of six weeks ago, when I responded, there were no complaints. If Ron has run into some business problems, we need to know that. Otherwise, my statements stand. The free marketplace will ultimately determine the success or failure of any enterprise, and any ongoing business concern will suffer hiccups from time to time.

I don't work for Ron, don't know Ron, don't shill for Ron... but I still stand by my reply to the impatient customer. If that's considered rude, then so be it. I don't have to explain myself to trolls or morons. But I do judge the vendors I use not by their mistakes, but how they ultimately handle those mistakes. I'm a big customer-service advocate, judging their performance in times of deficient service against what my old friend Stanley Marcus would have done in their shoes.

If you have a problem with Ron's service, and that problem is repeated with other customers, that will color our forum members' perception of the capabilities of a trusted vendor and sponsor on this site. But someone with a couple of posts with an alleged axe to grind just doesn't have a lot of pull in my world. If you don't like my answer, you can go pound sand... and that, my friend, is being absolutely rude.

 

[thedhgroup]

I met Ron last summer at the green car expo in Madison Wi last summer. He went over, above and beyond explaining the technical stuff with these batteries.

On the news recently they mentioned the WTC museum would be open in about a year in New York. I said at the supper table that we should go see it when it is open. My 12 year old asked if we could go visit Ron when we go. Chew on that for a minute.


Years ago I repaired loudspeakers for sound companies. One thing I learned is that you can't satisfy all the customers all of the time. Stuff happens, usually an unforeseen back ordered part.

In my never-ending search for an Insight, I have broadened my search for ones with a bad battery. Why, because I would do biz with Ron in a second, no hesitation.

 

[KMD]

@thedhgroup
maybe you would consider buying ours! It has no battery but you would be able to do business with Ron again and get the battery from him! We will sell cheap + the cost of the battery repair we have paid Ron.

 

[Kevin Dougherty]

Please send PM w price & details.