This week, Chrysler announced a recall affecting approximately 22,100 small cargo vans because of inadvertent side air bag deployments.
Chrysler reportedly told the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) it has reports of 25 unexpected air bag deployments in Ram C/V Tradesman commercial vans. Fortunately, no one has yet been injured and there have been no reported crashes in the affected vehicles.
According to Chrysler, 18,245 model year 2013, 2014 and 2015 Ram C/V Tradesman vehicles are in the United States and 3,870 are in Canada.
This recall follows several others, notably three separate recalls affecting as many as 1.2 million Ram pickup trucks for steering-system tie rods that may have been misaligned during assembly or steering-system service. Approximately 968,000 vehicles of the total number affected are in the US and 157,000 are in Canada.
One recall will inspect an estimated 842,400 model-year 2003-2008 Ram 2500 and 3500 trucks to find approximately 116,000 repaired with tie-rod assemblies that could become misaligned.
Two additional campaigns are being conducted to capture those vehicles known to have tie-rod assemblies linked to previous recalls. They comprise 294,000 model-year 2008-2012 Ram 2500 and 3500 pickups, chassis cabs and 2008 Ram 1500 4×4 Mega Cabs; plus 43,500 model-year 2008-2012 Ram 4500 and 5500 4×4 chassis cabs.
