2011 HYUNDAI ELANTRA — Complaint #1766668
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about EXTERIOR LIGHTING:BRAKE LIGHTS:SWITCH filed September 4, 2021
NHTSA complaint #1766668 (ODI reference 11431727) concerns a 2011 HYUNDAI ELANTRA and was filed on September 4, 2021. The owner reports the failure occurred on August 27, 2021. The report was geocoded to Texas based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as exterior lighting:brake lights:switch, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.
The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.
Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same HYUNDAI ELANTRA cohort independently describe similar exterior lighting:brake lights:switch failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2011 HYUNDAI ELANTRA shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
Brake pedal stopper deterioration. The brake pedal stopper pad deteriorates, allowing the brake light switch plunger to remain extended when the brake pedal is released. If the brake light switch plunger does not retract as it should when the brake pedal is not being pressed, the brake lights stay illuminated, preventing accurate communication to following vehicles that the vehicle is slowing or stopping. Additionally, if the brake switch plunger is not retracted, then the transmission can be shifted out of "park" without depressing the brake pedal. Consequently, the risk of a crash increases with either condition. This is an issue Hyundai has had to recall other models/years for! This issue drained my battery completely and I had to pay $60 out of pocket to figure out what was going on. The brake pedal stopper pad is just $1.80 USD at the dealership. Hub Hyundai wanted to charge me $80 initially to install it, when they DID NOT report this problem to me when they "inspected" my car
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 1766668 |
| ODI Number | 11431727 |
| Date Filed | September 4, 2021 |
| Failure Date | August 27, 2021 |
| VIN | KMHDH4AE6BU |
Similar EXTERIOR LIGHTING:BRAKE LIGHTS:SWITCH Complaints for 2011 HYUNDAI ELANTRA
Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.
Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.