Pickup Trucks Recalled for Airbag That May Deploy Without a Crash
Heartland Motors is recalling 218,000 pickups because the driver-side airbag may deploy without warning, causing injury.
What this means for you
Illness, injury, or structural failure has been reported. Stop using the product immediately and contact the manufacturer for a refund or repair.
Our severity reasoning: Structural vehicle defect causing injury (4 reports), per rubric — score 4. Bumped from 3 by NHTSA-documented physical injuries.
Plain-English summary
Heartland Motors is recalling approximately 218,000 model year 2023–2025 R1500 pickup trucks because a faulty clockspring assembly in the steering column can short and cause the driver-side airbag to deploy without warning.
NHTSA has documented 4 minor injuries from inadvertent deployment, primarily lacerations and one wrist sprain. No deaths or major injuries have been reported. Heartland will replace the clockspring assembly at no cost; owner notifications begin September 12, 2026, and dealer service is expected to take approximately 90 minutes.
Until repair, owners can continue to drive the vehicle. Heartland advises maintaining proper hand placement on the steering wheel and not modifying the airbag system.
The recalled product
- Product
- R1500 Light-Duty Pickup
- Brand
- Heartland
- Manufacturer
- Heartland Motors Corp.
- Category
- Vehicle — Pickup Truck
- Hazard
- airbag
- inadvertent-deployment
- laceration
- Affected units
- 218,000
Is your product affected?
Check your packaging against the codes below. If any of them match, the product is part of this recall.
Model numbers (3)
- R1500-2023
- R1500-2024
- R1500-2025
Distribution
Distributed nationwide across the United States.