Hyundai Problems

The Hyundai brand has developed an enviable reputation in this country for reliability and quality. The brand’s warranty is also excellent, taking away even more buyer anxiety. With that in mind, the decision to go diesel or petrol comes down to the way you use the vehicle.

This applies to all brands, not just Hyundai, but if all (or most of) your driving will be urban or suburban based, then the petrol engine is for you. Yes, you’ll use a little more fuel than the diesel variant, but servicing costs could be a little lower and you’ll avoid the modern turbo-diesel’s biggest downfall; a blocked Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF).

The DPF is an emissions device that traps the soot from the diesel engine and burns it off at a later date. The problem with that is that the DPF can only burn off the soot and regenerate itself if the engine (and exhaust system) gets to a temperature high enough for this to happen. In urban running, that doesn’t just doesn’t happen, at which point the on-board computer will either try to force a regeneration (not always successful) or the DPF will have to be manually cleaned or even replaced (and that’s costly).

The bottom line, then, is that a turbo-diesel (even a modern one) is only for you if you will be driving the car at highway speeds for at least half an hour at least once a month (once a fortnight is better). If that’s how you use a car, then the diesel should be okay; if not, it’s petrol every time.

Hyundai i30 Bluetooth pairing is achieved by switching your mobile phone’s Bluetooth function to On and the phone to Visible or Discoverable. The vehicle itself must also be stationary; phone pairing can not occur if the vehicle is moving.

Then, press the Phone button on the car’s stereo system or the Call button on the steering wheel. The infotainment screen should then display the devices it can find (including your phone). At the same time, the vehicle’s name should appear on your phone’s screen. Ensure it matches the vehicle and then select it.

On phones that require a passkey, a screen should show up on your phone. Enter 0000 and the connection should be completed. On phones that require confirmation, the info screen should show a six-digit code which will be mirrored on your phone. If the code is mirrored exactly, press Enter or OK and pairing should occur. From there you can transfer phonebook information and call lists per the on-screen prompts.

For more instructions on how to play music through the system, more setup options, and troubleshooting problems, refer to the vehicle’s owner’s manual.

It’s not unknown for a car-maker to receive a batch of parts from a supplier where the parts in question have a materials or manufacturing flaw in them. Certainly, enough Hyundai owners have reported this same problem for that to be a reasonable hypothesis. The theory about the gear in the steering system is one possible cause for the noise you’re hearing, but I’ve also heard other mechanics suggest that it’s the clock-spring (that electrically powers the air-bags, steering wheel controls, yet still allows the wheel to turn) that’s at fault.

Either way, it’s a warranty job for the dealer to sort out, but experience has shown that Hyundai’s dealers are very good at keeping their customers happy. Meantime, the replacement part should be from a later, improved batch, without the inbuilt flaws, so it shouldn’t happen again.

It’s nice to see that the worldwide web has put Carsguide in touch with people in the USA and that they’re prepared to ask for advice from half a planet away. Meanwhile, if safety is your number one priority, then you really need to find a vehicle with all the latest driver aids such as autonomous emergency braking, lane-keeping assistance and rear-cross-traffic alert. These are the new safety must-haves now that air-bags, stability control and other systems are considered par for the course.

The catch with your situation (from our point of view) is that the vehicles we assess and test in Australia don’t necessarily correlate with the North American buying experience. The specifications of Australian-delivered cars don’t always line up with those of a USA-market vehicle, and that can mean that the safety kit fitted here isn’t mirrored by the same make and model sold on your side of the pond. Don’t forget, too, that some makes and models (Hyundai and Kia are good examples) often feature Australian input into the suspension and steering settings to make them more palatable to an Australian audience. As a result, the same car without that input (such as the version sold in the US) might drive very differently.

Petrol versions of the Hyundai i30 from this era have a rubber, toothed timing-belt. This is a clean, quiet running arrangement, but it does require replacement at 90,000km intervals. The advice is to change the tensioners, associated pulleys and the engine’s water pump at the same time as all these components wear out and are located in the same general area, making it a smart move to do all this work in one hit, rather than pull the engine apart a second time.

This one is a little beyond my pay-scale, to be honest. Medical advice from a car website is not something we’re prepared to indulge in. Damaging levels of radiation from a car are not something we've heard of, but to comment either way and potentially put somebody’s health in danger is not our place. The absolute best advice is to make certain the driver in question seeks proper medical treatment.

If you think the car is at fault, you could have it scientifically tested to detect the presence of radiation, but it’s certainly sounds unlikely given the well-documented history of the motor-car. From where did your theory that the car is at fault come?

This is a relatively common complaint among Hyundai Kona owners. Sometimes the noise manifests as a buzz or a groan and sometimes it’s loud enough to hear over the stereo. Since your car has electrically-assisted power-steering, there’s no chance that it’s a lack of hydraulic fluid causing the noise, but some Hyundai specialists believe the noise comes from a worm gear within the electric assistance unit. It seems that even in almost new cars, there can be enough wear in this component to cause a noise. The other possible cause is the clock-spring which is a spring that resides inside the steering column and maintains the electrical connections with the steering-wheel mounted controls, the air-bag and the rest of the car, yet still allows you to turn the wheel to steer the car. The good news is that your car is well and truly within the factory warranty period, so a Hyundai dealer is obliged to sort it out for you. Just don’t make the mistake of taking 'they all do that' for an answer.

The Ioniq PHEV is not exactly a fast car in terms of its acceleration, but it will comfortably cruise at the legal limit. Certainly there are cars that are better at overtaking than the Hyundai PHEV, but it will still accelerate around slower traffic on the highway.

Overtaking is a bit of a lost art these days with dual-lane freeways and it really doesn’t matter how powerful your car is if you don’t know how to overtake safely. The other thing to consider is that hybrids like the Ioniq are at their best in city and suburban traffic where the harvesting of energy otherwise lost during braking makes them most relevant. If all your driving is over long distances at cruising velocities, a conventional car with a conventional driveline might make more sense.

The Hyundai i40 has a great reputation in the trade for being a solid, dependable car with few inherent problems. In fact, it’s one of the models that has recently helped forge Hyundai’s overall reputation as a safe bet. The brand’s five-year warranty hasn’t hurt it in that regard, either.

In terms of Hyundai i40 diesel engine problems, the news is good. And that’s largely because Hyundai has been building small capacity passenger-car diesel engines for decades and has the technology all worked out.

But there are a few things to watch out for and those include the propensity of modern, common-rail injected diesels to require plenty of preventative maintenance. If injectors, pumps and filters are not looked after, they can all give trouble down the road and fixing common-rail injection is generally not a cheap pursuit. So make sure any second-hand i40 (petrol or diesel) has a fully stamped service book and that no preventative maintenance has been skipped.

The other thing worth mentioning is that unless you plan to do at least some highway driving, then the turbo-diesel – as nice as it is to drive – may not be your best bet. The Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) fitted to modern diesels needs a good run at a decent speed every few weeks to ensure that it can regenerate properly. If it doesn’t see this sort of running, it can become blocked and, in a worst-case scenario, require replacement. This is by no means a Hyundai-specific problem and many modern diesels with DPF technology carry the same caveat.

The bottom line is that even though the diesel version of the i40 may squeeze more out of each litre of fuel, it’s not necessarily the cheapest-to-own variant in the long run.