Updated: 3:14 p.m. ET March 20, 2006 DETROIT - Chrysler said on Monday it was recalling almost 269,000 vehicles to replace a faulty windshield wiper motor part.
The DaimlerChrysler AG division said it had notified the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the voluntary recall covering the
2005 and 2006 model years for one of its sport utility vehicles and three minivan models.The vehicles covered by the recall are the Dodge Durango, the Dodge Caravan and Grand Caravan, and the Chrysler Town & Country, Chrysler said.
No accidents have been reported because of the failure of a faulty metal armature on the wiper motor, it said.
Chrysler will notify owners when parts are available and replace faulty wiper motors without charge, it said.
Chrysler, which found the defect and traced it back to a faulty batch of parts, expects only a third or so of the wiper motors will need to be replaced but is recommending that all of them be inspected for safety, said company spokesman Max Gates.
Separately, U.S. safety regulators said last week they were investigating about 1.16 million Chrysler minivans, SUVs and pickup trucks for possible defects ranging from faulty air bag sensors to loose steering wheel coupling bolts.
The Dodge Durango SUV as well as the Dodge Caravan and Chrysler Town & Country from 2005 and 2006 were part of that engineering analysis by the NHTSA.
NHTSA said it had received complaints about the failure of front air bag crash sensors in the minivans, possibly because of corrosion.