Honda expects to resume full production in North America of all its models except the 2012 Civic compact in August, the company said. Production of the new Civic will remain at a 50% rate because of shortages of components resulting from disruptions caused by the earthquake/tsunami in Japan in March. “This situation continues to be evaluated and full production is expected to resume sometime in the fall,” Honda Motor America said in a statement. “As the supply of parts from Japan improves, production will ramp up in August on a step-by-step, plant-by-plant, and model-by-model basis.”
This, after Honda is set to report its worst May sales since 1997, Edmunds.com says. The final figures won’t be in until after Memorial Day, but for Japanese automakers, they are going to be especially ugly because of production disruptions. Like Honda, Toyota lost market share this month by a hefty 2.4 percentage points, Edmunds.com predicted.
Output is expected to return to normal levels for the Accord, CR-V and Acura RDX, with four-cylinder engines, as well as the Accord, Accord Crosstour, Odyssey, Pilot, Ridgeline, and the Acura TL, MDX and ZDX with six-cylinder engines.
