A friend of ours had a similar complaint. I'm not sure if she ever got it resolved. I was shocked to see how low it sits when fully open. It's a recipe for a split forehead if you ask me.


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Design a car in a country with a short average height and you get this kind of design flaw unless you invite a few tall folks to test early mock-ups. Same for skinny folks designing cars for chubby folks and right handers for left handers.

Honda used to do that a whole lot better!

 

The Odyssey is designed in the States. So it has nothing to do with Japan's avg height that you seem to be alluding to.

 

My EX-L with the power tailgate opens up to about 5' 10" on the power mode, but then can be lifted higher to just about 6'. Unfortunately there must be some kind of safety mechanism built in to protect the motors, so this high height can't be programmed in as the default opening height.

 

I have not noticed any issues with the height of the tailgate on my 2019 Touring. I am 5'9" and my husband is 5'10". Isn't the tailgate adjustable as well?

 

That is because the Touring and Elite have power liftgates which are adjustable. The EX and EX-L have manual liftgates that open to a much lesser and frankly, dangerous height.

 

How did the EX that you test drove before your purchase? Did its rear hatch open enough?

 

I feel the same problem too. The fully opening height for the tailgate is way too low for a normal person. I only noticed this when I got my new car. And I confirmed with the sales at the Dealership. He admitted that the EX model have lower height than the Touring in the showroom. I was quite disappointed with this design flaw. Just need to get used to docking my head all the time when I'm coming close to the opened tailgate....

 

I wonder if EX users can file an petition, and eventually asking Honda to recall, and adjust the height for the tailgate.....

 

I also have the similar issue. opening height for 2019 honda odyssey ex is too low...Did anyone received the response from Honda to fix the issue?

 

Maybe it has an auto setting preventing it from opening further to prevent damage while in home garages. I wished for that feature as soon as I got my first SUV with powered lift gate and twice I almost lost the whole door.

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This issue is particular to the EX and EX-L trim package Odyssey. If you have a Elite or Touring package (adjustable lift gate, no worries apparently). As I mentioned I am 6'-0" (6'-1" with boots). The lift gate hinges apparently cannot be retrofitted to make them adjustable. If I were to walk toward the rear of the car with the lift gate open to say, load groceries, the leading edge of the outside metal panel would take my eye out. After getting a gash in my scalp and then visiting our dealership which did nothing except get me an offer of a discount on a much more expensive trim package(Elite/Touring). This is 1) a design flaw, and 2) a serious and potentially hazardous condition. For me this does not end here. More to come hopefully.

 

I wonder if EX users can file an petition, and eventually asking Honda to recall, and adjust the height for the tailgate.....

Ya, good luck with that! It will never happen. That would cost money and it's not on the safety checklist nor is it compatible with Honda's appetite for profit.

I think what went wrong with the design, and this is only a guess, they used the same design parameters for the EX tailgate as in previous generations. Problem is, I believe the 5th generation sits about 4 inches lower. They did that for increased stability on fast corners but they also neglected to compensate for the reduced height in the manual tailgates. The math certainly makes sense. I'm 5' 10" and have never had a problem, except when loading from backing up to a sidewalk. I cracked my coconut once and employed the usual colorful metaphors at the Honda idiots who screwed this up ! Perhaps we can get a group discount on hard hats.

 

@Hodna, love your Canadian sense of humour

 

Thanks King Kong! Laughter is the best medicine .

 

At 6'6" I find the current tailgate height near perfect, you don't have to duck under to activate the kick sensor to close it if your hands are full, just tap the close button with your nose.

 

My wife bought a '19 EX and twice in the past month I've met the lift gate head on and most recently fitted myself with a scar on my scalp to show for it. I'm just shy of 6' tall and when the gate is up and I approach the outer edge of the gate it lines up perfectly with my eye. Honda must be waiting for litigation.

 

Maybe it has an auto setting preventing it from opening further to prevent damage while in home garages. I wished for that feature as soon as I got my first SUV with powered lift gate and twice I almost lost the whole door.

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I have the EXACT same problem and it makes me want to consider selling the van. We looked at the EXL which has a much higher clearance, but because my wife didn't want the moonroof and wanted the velour seats, we decided on the EX and not the EXL. These vans are not as plentiful so they had to find one from a remote dealer. It wasn't until we both discovered the ridiculously low clearance that I returned to the dealer. The supervisor at the service department was quite surprised that there was such a difference in the clearance between the EX and the EXL, and he said there was no ability to make an adjustment on the tailgate.
So the theory that Honda wanted to lower the rear end for stability, but forgot the head clearance would be affected doesn't make sense since the EXL is still ok. I wish we could file a "class action suit" and make Honda come up with a fix. Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a hot button item, and none of us deserve to continuously have to duck under the "non-power tailgate" to avoid repeat "Traumatic Brain Injuries". I'm thinking it may be best to "trade in" this van and get the EXL because this is a serious design flaw, and it's unlikely that Honda is going to voluntarily come up with a fix.

BTW if you own this van and think your speaker must be cracked because you hear a popping noise, I discovered the fix. Apparently if even one leaf or twig gets under your hood and lodges near the windshild wiper, there is an intake opening for the climate control system in the same location. So even a minor noise in that area gets transmitted into the cabin through the air intake opening and sounds really loud. After opening the hood,we cleaned the leaves out of there, and things went back to normal. In my opinion this also is a design flaw. It's easier to buy a "keyboard" cleaner than blows air out a can from Office depot and use that because the places where these leaves get lodged is not easily accessible even with a small tool.


So after the advice from Pjones, I called Honda Corporate and this is what I was told. Go to owners.honda.com/ and scroll down to "Contact Us". The easiest was "send an e-mail" The "topic" is "Product" and the "subtopic" was "Concern". Have your VIN on hand and your millage and answer a few questions then you can describe the issue with the "unacceptably low head clearance" on the 2019 Odyssey EX model compared to the EXL and others.I suggested that come up with a new hinge that would allow the hatch to open wider to prevent a potential class action lawsuit. I was told if enough owners are unhappy, and express their concerns through the owners.honda.com/ site then they are more likely to respond and resolve with a FIX. I think if we all submit the concern and get others to do it as well, we could get some help from Honda. A Facebook page might also get enough owners with the same problem to also submit the concern. More to follow

 

I have the EXACT same problem and it makes me want to consider selling the van. We looked at the EXL which has a much higher clearance, but because my wife didn't want the moonroof and wanted the velour seats, we decided on the EX and not the EXL. These vans are not as plentiful so they had to find one from a remote dealer. It wasn't until we both discovered the ridiculously low clearance that I returned to the dealer. The supervisor at the service department was quite surprised that there was such a difference in the clearance between the EX and the EXL, and he said there was no ability to make an adjustment on the tailgate.
So the theory that Honda wanted to lower the rear end for stability, but forgot the head clearance would be affected doesn't make sense since the EXL is still ok. I wish we could file a "class action suit" and make Honda come up with a fix. Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a hot button item, and none of us deserve to continuously have to duck under the "non-power tailgate" to avoid repeat "Traumatic Brain Injuries". I'm thinking it may be best to "trade in" this van and get the EXL because this is a serious design flaw, and it's unlikely that Honda is going to voluntarily come up with a fix.

BTW if you own this van and think your speaker must be cracked because you hear a popping noise, I discovered the fix. Apparently if even one leaf or twig gets under your hood and lodges near the windshild wiper, there is an intake opening for the climate control system in the same location. So even a minor noise in that area gets transmitted into the cabin through the air intake opening and sounds really loud. After opening the hood,we cleaned the leaves out of there, and things went back to normal. In my opinion this also is a design flaw. It's easier to buy a "keyboard" cleaner than blows air out a can from Office depot and use that because the places where these leaves get lodged is not easily accessible even with a small tool.

rgrisoli, did you ever get anywhere on the hatch? I just bought a 19 ex and am frustrated with the same issue.

Additionally, I noticed your post on the popping noise. We are hearing a noise that seems to be coming from the front dash tweeter speakers, but oddly still happens even when the audio is turned off. Is that what you experienced?

Thanks!

 

Good idea about sending messages to owners.honda.com. One problem: I'm a Canadian and any Honda forms I fill in that have a .com domain generates a message telling me to contact my Canadian counterpart. In other words, "You're a Canadian, so don't bug us!"

I certainly agree that they need to raise the hatch height. I've dinged myself a few times !

 

 

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This is a real engineering design flaw and I am hoping that Honda will design a new hinge that will allow the EX to open fully.

 

 

 

I just bought an EX-L and one of the reasons was for the adjustable tailgate. When I got home I discovered that I couldn't set the rear tailgate to open all the way because it would hit my standard size garage door (Door opening is 6' 11"). I had to lower the adjustable position to near that of the typical EX position (but was able to go another inch or 2 higher... which allowed me to walk under it.). But my 2006 Odyssey could open enough, so I still agree it is a design issue.

 

Agreed, Schif72. I think Honda dropped the ball on this one. Even if they would offer a replacement set of hinges for a nominal fee, that open to the right height, I'm sure a lot of people would take them up on it. Then again, some would want them for free because it is a design error. It's a real no-win scenario.

 

There are instructions for adding the power rear lift gate. So perhaps it can be added to an EX. Cost?

I may have read PDF wrong, looks like for adding sensor.

 

Looked up hinge part numbers for EX vs elite. They are different, wonder if hinges are swappable?

AZ12ZZ for EX
A022ZZ for elite

 

Probably not. I'm only speculating but the marketing guys at Honda likely anticipated anyone's desire to turn an EX into an Elite, tailgate-wise .

 

Thanks for the info

 

I was wondering about this after i sold my '10 and bought a '15. I keep hitting my head because I am used to a higher liftgate.