ProblemsByVin/recall-gap-index

Recall-Gap Index

High-complaint failure patterns that have NO corresponding NHTSA recall — defects owners report in volume that regulators never forced a fix for. Every row is cross-checked against the live NHTSA recalls API, so vehicles that WERE recalled for the component (even when our local DB missed it) are excluded.

Columns

column	meaning
year	Model year
make	Manufacturer
model	Model
component	Failure category with no NHTSA recall
complaints	Total NHTSA complaints in this cluster
mileage_median	Median failure mileage (if available)
alleged_deaths	Complaints alleging death (unverified)
alleged_fires	Complaints alleging fire (unverified)
severity	critical | severe | moderate
url	Source page on ProblemsByVin

Source & methodology

Candidates are (vehicle, component) clusters with no recall for that component in our DB and ≥ the complaint threshold. Each candidate vehicle is then queried against the live NHTSA recalls-by-vehicle API; any cluster whose component is in fact covered by a real NHTSA recall is REMOVED. Survivors are genuine recall gaps as of the verification date. Complaints are unverified consumer reports; absence of a recall is per NHTSA records on the verification date.

Canonical version, full methodology, and the other datasets: https://problemsbyvin.com/data/ .

License

CC BY 4.0 — free to use with attribution to ProblemsByVin (https://problemsbyvin.com).