5.7

fairly significant
Crashes / Fires:
0 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
0 / 0
Average Mileage:
15,000 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.

Get notified about new defects, investigations, recalls & lawsuits for the 2018 Kia Optima:

Unsubscribe any time. We don't sell/share your email.

Get free help with your lemon!
close ad
problem #1

Nov 292019

Optima

  • 15,000 miles
I was driving on a highway and started to hear an noise from the front right while I was on a road trip. Had been driving for about 45 miles and moved over one lane to the right and front right tire blew - had less than 16,000 miles on car. I got the tire replaced at a Kia dealership and wheels aligned. Then, driving on a main road, 45 mph a few weeks later, got to a passing zone, and passed the car in front of me after accelerating to 65 during the short passing zone. After passing the car I tapped the breaks to slow back down to 45 and the traction, brake, and tmz lights all came on. When brake engaged, car did not brake as normal and a odd noise like a grinding sound could be heard coming from the front right wheel area. Took the car into dealership, they ran diagnostics, said it was a 'miss-tripped' sensor and clearing it corrected the issue. I drove my car less than 5 miles down the road and engaged the brake on a 40 mph road at a stop light, all three lights came right back on. Had to call and take car back in and they ended up keeping my car several days before saying I had a bad tire sensor, but car was safe to drive. Drove again, to a neighboring city and had been driving about 40 miles and front left tire blew. Got it towed back to the dealership, who said tires blowing had nothing to do with censor. Got tire changed and rotation. Picked up car and tire pressure light came on -low pressure. Nitro was added by dealership and light went off. Turned my pressure reader on and 2 miles down the road the car went from 37 to 45 psi. I think bad sensor is causing over inflating of tires at the dealership leading to blown tires.tested pressure with separate pressure reader and too high so let some air out, drove down a highway at 50 mph and car 'bottomed out' on a rolling dip in the road scrapping the plastic protection piece behind the front right tire under the car

- Greensboro, NC, USA