[markeh]

The answer to this problem, as in many in life, is duct tape. What could be simpler.....

 

[GregBrew]

The answer to this problem, as in many in life, is duct tape. What could be simpler.....

Bubble gum and bailing wire has proven itself for over a century.

 

[Hitstirrer]

The answer to this problem, as in many in life, is duct tape. What could be simpler.....

Yes.

 

[atari800]

Ahh..but MacGyver could repair it with
A pack of Alka Seltzer
5 Rubber bands
2 nickles
and the moons gravitational pull

 

[alexw]

One more "don't bother doing anything about it" opinion over here. That is a purely defensive shield to prevent road debris from cutting open the cooling channels behind it. It looks like it did its job, and it looks like it's in plenty fine shape to keep doing its job, and if you haven't gotten any temperature errors or lost any coolant, I think it's safe to say whatever damage it's covering up is too minor to worry about.

If you held a gun to my head and said "fix it for less than 50 grand" I'd probably just put a little patch of new fiberglass over that area so it wouldn't fray anymore or get snow/salt ingress. In fact, if this were my car, I'd strongly consider adding a little duct tape, just to keep the damp out (or maybe a tape a little more durable than duct tape but you get the idea).

 

[Hitstirrer]

I would probably remove the shield from the car so that it can be worked on properly indoors, and use fibreglass mat and paste to repair it. Then paint the entire shield so that any casual observer under there would not focus on that small area.

At the end of the day it's just like a motorcycle helmet that has been scratched in a minor spill. In that case you would replace the lid not the brain inside it.

 

[Ionhorse]

The battery shield, made of glass fibre and resin, has a certain amount of flexibility as all materials do. Yours has clearly exceeded its flexibility limit by the force of the impact it received., The question in my mind is, at the moment of its breaking how much of that force was transferred to the HV battery. How much damage was caused? .A little? A lot? None at all? I would want to remove the shield to determine just how the battery was affected before jumping to the conclusion that all is fine with the battery.

 

[rambokid]

OP has to decide on the risk. The best action is the worse case, replace it. Otherwise, use some common sense...

• Look at the construction of the battery chassis in the tear down in post #20. Coolant circulates at the bottom. There is no leak and no sign of battery/charge issue.
• The damage is at the edge. If the impact is beyond the shield, it would be on the battery chassis edge which seems to be the strongest from the tear down video.
• Remove and patch the shield is not trivial due to size, adhesive remove+cleanup+reapply. Might end up breaking the shield at another area 😆 due to the adhesive.

Posts are from people with different level of education, experience, profession. Drive it for a few more weeks to monitor for abnormalities. If none, then duct tape or go under to improve the condition with fibreglass replace kit or do nothing.

 

[jimchoff]

I assume you were driving when the damage happened. Why arent you filing an auto insurance claim?

 

[alexw]

I assume you were driving when the damage happened. Why arent you filing an auto insurance claim?

That'd be a fair question if it was definitely-for-sure necessary to replace the battery, but at this point this whole thread amounts to "I got a rock chip in the hood. One shop says my car is going to catch fire and it'll cost me $50k to fix, the other shop says buy a $10 paint pen."

If you had a paint chip, would you pay a $1000 deductible and bump your insurance rates to fix it?

 

[jimchoff]

I would certainly turn over the decision to my insurance company and ask for a written statement about whether it needs to be repaired, replaced, or does not need repair. That should be free, right? I dont know if you own or lease your vehicle. If leased, it would be a bummer if they charged you 30,000 to return a car with a residual of 20,000. If owned, you couldn't sell it because potential owners have it inspected and pass because of the "risk". Again, getting your insurance company to take a look, doesn't mean you have to do anything.

 

[GregBrew]

That'd be a fair question if it was definitely-for-sure necessary to replace the battery, but at this point this whole thread amounts to "I got a rock chip in the hood. One shop says my car is going to catch fire and it'll cost me $50k to fix, the other shop says buy a $10 paint pen."

If you had a paint chip, would you pay a $1000 deductible and bump your insurance rates to fix it?

No, but if I had undercarriage damage that might have compromised the integrity of a battery pack that could catch fire and kill everyone aboard, I'd certainly carefully look into it.

 

[nlc201]

Just an update that there's no update yet. I've contacted Hyundai via their web portal and have not heard back from them yet. I'm out of town for a few weeks, so I've left the car parked outside instead of in my garage. Not that I expect it to spontaneously combust. As I put earlier, I've driven several thousand miles in the car with the damage and have had no issues. I've also DC fast charged multiple times at the fastest charge rate in 100 degree+ weather. The car's battery cooling system seems totally normal, so I have no reason to suspect the cooling plate was penetrated.

My question after looking at those Munro videos is weather the air gap between the shield and the cooling plate is a sealed air gap, or is technically open to the elements?

 

[macklin77]

Okay, I'll chime in. Also, just another random I5 owner with zero professional experience. No else has mentioned this, if the hole was in the middle of the battery pan cover, I would be more worried about something penetrating the battery case itself. Because the hole is on the edge where it bolts to a frame member (or something solid) it looks to me be be near impossible that the battery could be damaged. I do agree with the others that replacing the bolt and cover would be a good idea, if reasonable. Otherwise replace the bolt and fix the hole.
Your story reminds me of my own tail of woe. I had a beloved 1984 Accord, I had the clutch replaced in California and shortly afterwards we moved to Southern Oregon. After 6 months or so the clutch stopped working. I limped it to a well respected (I thought!) independent auto repair shop. They called me and said it need a whole new clutch assembly...
I got the car and took it to the local Honda dealership, they called and said the clutch cable was broken and quoted me a very reasonable price to fix it. I was their customer for many years after that experience.

 

[nlc201]

Okay, I'll chime in. Also, just another random I5 owner with zero professional experience. No else has mentioned this, if the hole was in the middle of the battery pan cover, I would be more worried about something penetrating the battery case itself. Because the hole is on the edge where it bolts to a frame member (or something solid) it looks to me be be near impossible that the battery could be damaged. I do agree with the others that replacing the bolt and cover would be a good idea, if reasonable. Otherwise replace the bolt and fix the hole.
Your story reminds me of my own tail of woe. I had a beloved 1984 Accord, I had the clutch replaced in California and shortly afterwards we moved to Southern Oregon. After 6 months or so the clutch stopped working. I limped it to a well respected (I thought!) independent auto repair shop. They called me and said it need a whole new clutch assembly...
I got the car and took it to the local Honda dealership, they called and said the clutch cable was broken and quoted me a very reasonable price to fix it. I was their customer for many years after that experience.

You know, the thought did occur to me that the initial service place was trying to "take me for a ride", so to speak in telling me to replace the battery. But, I can't imagine anyone agreeing to $52,000 for a battery replacement when you can buy a brand new and more modern version of my Ioniq 5 for less than that. And, there's no insurance company in the world that would pay that when they could just write off the car and hand me a check for well under half of that amount for the current value of the car. Maybe they were just testing if I was monumentally stupid? It's like offering to mow somebody's lawn for $5,000. Probably not going to find many takers on that offer....

 

[rambokid]

Another view of the battery chassis

 

[nlc201]

Final update to this saga. I took the Ioniq 5 into a third service center to get it inspected. They agreed with the 2nd service center that the damage was superficial and nothing to worry about. They told me any battery issues would almost certainly be met with dashboard warnings and OBD codes (there have been none). So, I think I'm going with the majority here and considering the car fine. I've still been driving it throughout with no issues.