Although it's difficult to tell, certain replacement ignition switches can also be defective
General Motors could be facing another risk in the recall of 1.6 million vehicles across North America for defective ignition switches.
According to a Reuters report via Automotive News, certain replacement switches manufactured by Delphi Automotive have an identical part number as the ones being recalled. There’s a chance the replacement parts aren’t defective, but unless their manufacturing history is checked or the switches are physically taken apart and examined, it’s difficult to tell.
The report says documents from GM filed to the U.S. NHTSA, Delphi made the internal spring tighter following the consent from a GM engineer in 2007. The stiffer spring meant any weight on the key wouldn’t cause the ignition switch to shift positions, but neither company changed the part numbers.
“When you make a change, you change the part number so everybody understands what happened,” a former, unnamed GM exec said. In effect, this is a “cardinal sin” in standard practices among engineers.
The recall surfaced in February and has grown to cover 1.6 million examples of the Chevrolet Cobalt, Pontiac G5 and Saturn Sky, among other vehicles. At least 12 fatalities have been linked to the recall.