10.0
really awful- Crashes / Fires:
- 1 / 2
- Injuries / Deaths:
- 1 / 0
- Average Mileage:
- 87,357 miles
About These NHTSA Complaints:
The NHTSA is the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints can be spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem. See the Back button — blue bar at the very top of the page — to explore more.
« Read the previous 20 complaints
The drive axel broke while the car was doing approximately 5 mph. When it broke, the ball joint pulled out of the right side wheel, a piece of metal flew up and tore the serpentine belt. There is a recall #112 for the 2013 Hyundai Santa Fe that the drive axel can break but I was told it does not affect my car. How does the drive axel just break. The recall affects the front right axel. Prior to it breaking, I was going down I70 at 70mph, thankfully, it didn't break at that time.
- Grain Valley, MO, USA
While traveling on expressway at 65 mph our 2007 Santa Fe suddenly lost all power and we had to pull over to the emergency lane. A defective valve cover gasket leaked oil on the alternator causing it to short out and be damaged beyond repair. Hyundai have a recall (#121) on the 2007-2012 veracruz for the exact same problem. Clearly the Santa Fe needs to be included in the 121 recall. My family and I were placed in danger as we were in the left lane on a busy expressway and had to quickly merge over to the emergency lane on the right side while quickly losing speed. Additionally, the cost of repair was $750 for the alternator and gasket cover replacement.
- Grafton, WI, USA
As I was driving is a rain storm, my battery light came on. I lost my window defrosting capability, my lights dimmed and I had no power steering. I am not sure what else was affected at this time as I was just concentrating on getting home alive. When home, I opened the engine compartment and found that the crank shaft pulley had come apart. Lucky, it was laying on a small ledge in the car. This could have fallen off, damaged the engine compartment, fallen to the street and become a rolling piece of metal. If a woman had been driving(this is actually my girlfriends car), this would have been a dangerous situation.
- Mundelein, IL, USA
My crankshaft vibration damper failed. It literally broke into two pieces. It left me unable to steer the vehicle. Fortunately I was stopped at a light on a two lane (each side = 4) road. I was in the left lane, however, and had to maneuver the vehicle to the right and off the road. If I had been on the highway doing 70 who knows what would have happened. I consider myself lucky. This is dangerous and should have been a recall item in my opinion.
- Bentleyville, OH, USA
The contact owns a 2007 Hyundai Santa Fe. The contact stated he had to make several attempts to start the vehicle before the engine would operate. The failure recurred intermittently. The vehicle was currently being diagnosed by an independent mechanic. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The approximate failure mileage was 30,000.
- Placentia, CA, USA
At a slow speed while turning (either direction, as incident has occurred now 3 times in 10 weeks) vehicle loses all power to steer and brake. Feels like the car has died, however the battery and check engine light are on. When it resolved, the engine was still running, brakes and steering restored. First two times the power failure was momentarily. Third time the vehicle lost power for 3-4 minutes and stranded me while turning onto major road from my neighborhood with oncoming traffic. Had car towed to local Hyundai dealer who kept insisting they would need to see the vehicle fail in order to know how to repair it. I said not good enough, they need to find another method to trouble shoot and refused to pick up vehicle. Now the dealer is blaming the power loss on worn front tires and the ESC system cutting power to the engine, steering and brakes due to it sensing slippage. I'm not buying this explanation from the dealer, especially because of (1) the slow speed (no slipping tires in these three instances), and (2) tires have slipped on quick acceleration before without ESC system cutting power to brakes & steering, and (3) if this were the case, I would think ESC would be potentially dangerous and not designed to save lives! will file complaint with Hyundai America but I don't have much faith that they will be of help.
- Apex, NC, USA
While driving the car suddenly loses power. Pressing the accelerator has no effect even though the engine is still running and in drive. This has occurred multiple times at different speeds. So far I have managed to pull to the side of the road without incident. Turning the engine off and on multiple times restores power again.
- Milliken, CO, USA
- Orchard Park, NY, USA