My wife went to her monthly bridge club last night. She called me about 11:30 and said the RL would not start - she couldn't turn the ignition on. I had been asleep about an hour and wasn't very happy. As soon as she told me that she said "Oh, it works now".

I tried it this morning and had no problem. I then left the remote in the house and tried to start the car. It did the same as she was describing, so apparently the car was not recognizing her remote as being present. Thought maybe the remote batteries could be low, but owner's manual says the average life is 2 years. We've only had the RL for 3 months.

Also, she did not know how to use the manual key and I didn't either. I thought you just inserted in the slot and turned the knob. Read the owner's manual and found you have to insert the key in the slot and pull to the right to remove the knob. You can then insert the key in the ignition slot. Should have read the owner's manual better.

 

I had the same problem, but then I just grabbed the wheel and turned in to the left a little bit to take the tension off the wheel lock mechanism. It did the trick and yes, it has happened again with me using the same solution to resolve the problem.

 

The problem is the same as you would encounter in another car with a regular key except the RL is a little more propense to this temporary steering wheel lock. Just jiggle the steering wheel as suggested and you will have no trouble starting. It did it to me too and I was cursing the "keyless" system.

 

That's the first thing I told my wife. I asked her if the steering wheel was in a bind, or course she didn't know. I told her to try moving the steering wheel if it happened again.

 

I've had the same thing happen to me but fortunately I had experienced the same thing in my Legend and in my wife's CRV so a quick "jiggle" of the steering wheel and all was fine. My wife's Accord from 20 years ago and my mother's old 1991 Accord all have done the same thing. It must have something to do with the way Honda designs their steering wheel locks. I presume that the design must have value from a security standpoint to explain why Honda hasn't changed it.

 

Hi, it did happen to me quite often in my Legend due to this wheel lock mechanism. I mean if we talk about "wheel lock". It seems normal to have this happening, it looks like the safety feature to me.


However, as for the issue of RL, hope catsailr has found the causes and got the good solutions.