Winnebago recall 26V498 covers 96 model-year 2024 and 2025 EKKO motorhomes whose touchscreen can register unintended inputs and start the generator without the operator's knowledge. NHTSA says an unintended start in an enclosed area, including a garage, can expose occupants to carbon monoxide and increase the risk of injury or death.
Owners are instructed to park outside until the repair is completed. Winnebago plans to provide a free software update and expects to mail owner letters on August 24. The federal record does not include a stop-drive instruction.
Why the park-outside instruction matters now
A 96-unit population is small, but the interim instruction changes how affected coaches should be stored and received for service. RV dealers, indoor-storage operators and used-RV sellers should identify campaign status before moving an EKKO into an enclosed building and preserve NHTSA's park-outside language in customer communication.
The campaign's July 30 event date, August 5 dataset publication and August 24 owner-notification target are different milestones. Stores may encounter an affected motorhome before its owner receives a letter.
The new campaign overlaps an earlier EKKO action
Winnebago's public recall page currently lists campaign 26V257, an earlier action involving the same unintended-generator-start hazard, but it does not yet list 26V498. The earlier campaign covered 1,537 model-year 2022–2027 EKKO motorhomes under Winnebago recall 205; the newer filing covers 96 model-year 2024–2025 units under recall 208.
The available federal record does not say whether 26V498 supplements, replaces or corrects part of campaign 26V257. Dealers should resolve each coach by VIN and current manufacturer instructions instead of assuming that completion of one campaign establishes the status of the other.
What RV operations should do
Service and storage teams should add a campaign-status check to intake, identify where an affected coach can wait safely, and confirm the current remedy path before promising repair timing. Used-RV teams should run the same check before acquisition, indoor merchandising or delivery.
NHTSA's campaign metadata marks over-the-air update as false, while the remedy narrative says Winnebago will release a free over-the-air software update. Until that conflict is reconciled, dealers should not infer whether a specific coach can receive the remedy remotely.
Campaign applicability is VIN-specific. The instruction is to park outside until repaired; NHTSA's filing does not state that owners must stop driving. The relationship between campaigns 26V257 and 26V498 remains unresolved in the cited records.
Cited references
- NHTSA campaign 26V498 record — Federal recall record; report received Jul. 30, 2026; dataset published Aug. 5, 2026
- NHTSA recall datasets — Federal dataset index; recall files updated Aug. 5, 2026
- Winnebago campaign 26V257 — Manufacturer recall page; posted Jun. 11, 2026; cited for comparison