I assumed that the radio would be covered under the basic 5-year warranty on my Tucson. But when I turned in a problem report to Hyundai, they told me that the radio was only covered for 3 years. This information was NOT in the owners manual - it was in the maintenance manual - not someplace I thought to look. And it was not mentioned by the salesman during the purchase.
Anyway, the radio volume gradually decreased over the initial 3 years I had the car, to the point that it was only audible when parked. On the road - I could not hear anything due to road noise. Hyundai did try to determine the cause, but never came up with a solution. They just made a mess of my wiring, cutting wires to test and then splicing them back together. This particular Tucson does not list an external amplifier, but as time went on it seemed the only logical source. Too bad Hyundai could not find one in my car, anyplace!
In the end, they just gave it back to me and allowed the parts department to order another radio to test in my car. In all, I think I tried 3 or 4 different radios and they all had the same volume problem. Eventually, I found one that I could hear better than the rest, so the parts department sold it to me for $85, It did not fix the problem, but it did have a 6-CD changer in it, so it was a nice upgrade for only $85! This particular radio also has a cassette tape player in it - and those are very hard to find anymore.
But I still could not hear the radio on the road at high speed. So I finally got fed up, took it to a sound
shop and asked them to amplify the front 3 speakers. This cost me $350! Needless to say, I did not bother with the rear 3 speakers. Just too expensive to do all of them, After they put a high-output amplifier on those speakers, they are plenty loud enough now! But I have never been able to really enjoy the sound system in this car with all 6 speakers going, after about the first year. I complained about this problem to several people at the dealership and was told that I would have to live with it, since the initial warranty period of 3 years had passed. I didn't take it in sooner because giving up a radio for repair would take a long time, and I just can't drive without music. Plus I was NOT told by the salesman that the radio was only covered for 3 years - I just assumed the 5-year basic warranty would cover it. HA- never assume anything with Hyundai. So the amplified speakers are the solution - I only need to have the radio at half-volume with those in there!
Hiding the information about the radio warranty period in a place that I would not normally look seems very deceptive. I've since seen a number of complaints about the radios in the Hyundai Tucson being engineered to last only 3 years and then once outside of the warranty - then they would die or develop some problem that's not covered. So I am not alone in having a radio problem. Someplace there is a radio speaker amplifier in my Tucson and Hyundai could not find it! So in the end it cost me a lot of money to fix PART of the problem. For me, it was the only acceptable fix, even though it was expensive.
When I win the lottery I'll buy a new car and thus get a new radio. Meanwhile, having the front speakers amplified makes the radio usable. Hyundai refused to cover this solution, of course. They seem to make no effort to contact other dealers and ask about a similar problem elsewhere.
Fortunately everything else that failed in the first 5 years got fixed under the initial warranty, and it's been a very reliable vehicle - it's got 80,000 miles on it now and I never have any problems. I plan to drive it at least 300,000 miles and get my money's worth out of it. So those speaker amplifiers had better hold up!
I assumed that the radio would be covered under the basic 5-year warranty on my Tucson. But when I turned in a problem report to Hyundai, they told me that the radio was only covered for 3 years. This information was NOT in the owners manual - it was in the maintenance manual - not someplace I thought to look. And it was not mentioned by the salesman during the purchase.
Anyway, the radio volume gradually decreased over the initial 3 years I had the car, to the point that it was only audible when parked. On the road - I could not hear anything due to road noise. Hyundai did try to determine the cause, but never came up with a solution. They just made a mess of my wiring, cutting wires to test and then splicing them back together. This particular Tucson does not list an external amplifier, but as time went on it seemed the only logical source. Too bad Hyundai could not find one in my car, anyplace! In the end, they just gave it back to me and allowed the parts department to order another radio to test in my car. In all, I think I tried 3 or 4 different radios and they all had the same volume problem. Eventually, I found one that I could hear better than the rest, so the parts department sold it to me for $85, It did not fix the problem, but it did have a 6-CD changer in it, so it was a nice upgrade for only $85! This particular radio also has a cassette tape player in it - and those are very hard to find anymore.
But I still could not hear the radio on the road at high speed. So I finally got fed up, took it to a sound shop and asked them to amplify the front 3 speakers. This cost me $350! Needless to say, I did not bother with the rear 3 speakers. Just too expensive to do all of them, After they put a high-output amplifier on those speakers, they are plenty loud enough now! But I have never been able to really enjoy the sound system in this car with all 6 speakers going, after about the first year. I complained about this problem to several people at the dealership and was told that I would have to live with it, since the initial warranty period of 3 years had passed. I didn't take it in sooner because giving up a radio for repair would take a long time, and I just can't drive without music. Plus I was NOT told by the salesman that the radio was only covered for 3 years - I just assumed the 5-year basic warranty would cover it. HA- never assume anything with Hyundai. So the amplified speakers are the solution - I only need to have the radio at half-volume with those in there!
Hiding the information about the radio warranty period in a place that I would not normally look seems very deceptive. I've since seen a number of complaints about the radios in the Hyundai Tucson being engineered to last only 3 years and then once outside of the warranty - then they would die or develop some problem that's not covered. So I am not alone in having a radio problem. Someplace there is a radio speaker amplifier in my Tucson and Hyundai could not find it! So in the end it cost me a lot of money to fix PART of the problem. For me, it was the only acceptable fix, even though it was expensive.
When I win the lottery I'll buy a new car and thus get a new radio. Meanwhile, having the front speakers amplified makes the radio usable. Hyundai refused to cover this solution, of course. They seem to make no effort to contact other dealers and ask about a similar problem elsewhere.
Fortunately everything else that failed in the first 5 years got fixed under the initial warranty, and it's been a very reliable vehicle - it's got 80,000 miles on it now and I never have any problems. I plan to drive it at least 300,000 miles and get my money's worth out of it. So those speaker amplifiers had better hold up!
- Nancy H., Reno, NV, US