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Hyundai and Kia motors tried to conceal recall

  • 기사입력 2013.09.27 21:07
  • 최종수정 2014.05.15 10:36
  • 기자명 신승영


[AutoDaily] Hyundai and Kia motors were trying to sneakily conceal their recall but weren't successful, so now they have to do a massive recall.
 
On the 25th, the MLTM(Ministry of Land, Trasport and Maritime Affairs) told Hyundai and Kia motors that they have to recall all the cars models listed with flaws. There are a total of 15 models, which numbers 662,519 vehicles, in the recall including the Sonata.
 
All 15 models that were listed in the recalls have problems with faulty brake light switches that could cause the ignition to fail and the cruise control system to malfunction. The vehicles also have problems with the vehicle attitude indicator working. Vehicles detected so far with these defects include 50,270 Hyundai Genesis's, 185,176 Sonata's, 69,253 Tucson's, 63,096 Kia K5's and 61,870 Forte's.
 
Hyundai and Kia motors have been having problems on their vehicles since early April in the U.S. on the same defective brake light switches. The U.S. recall was the companies biggest which included 1,900,000 vehicles. At the same time in the Korean market, they implemented a recall for the same issue on 6 different vehicles which included the Avante, Santa-Fe, Veracruz, Carens, Sorento and Soul which totaled 162,509 vehicles.
 
Shortly after the recalls in the U.S. and Korea, Hyundai and Kia motors had the same problem and implemented the same procedure in China. They recalled 175,000 IX35 and Sportage in May.
 
After the April recalls KATRI(Korea Automobile Testing & Research Institute) which got a referral about a recall investigation and started checking into the vehicle faults from the MLTM. Through the investigation, KATRI found out that there were more vehicles affected than what Hyundai and Kia reported. So KATRI told the MLTM the exact information and then the auto makers decided to implement a wider range of the recall.
 
The auto makers first emphasized that this issue could be fixed through a free repair but decided to do a full recall. Plus, they said this fault is not about the brake problem, just an electronic operating device defect that doesn't directly cause a safety problem.
 
However, experts said that it is a safety hazard because if by using the brake and the brakes lights don't work, this is a safety issue that needs to be recalled. If the government didn't step in and investigate the problem which accounts for almost 660,000 vehicles, this could cause real road danger and this also brings Hyundai and Kia's ethics into question. If the government didn't look into it, Hyundai and Kia would probably not have taken action.
 
 
By Lee Sangwon.
(translate by Lee Jeonghwa)
 
 

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