Road Trip Composure, or Lack Thereof - 2015 Kia K900 Long-Term Road Test

Edmunds.com

Road Trip Composure, or Lack Thereof - 2015 Kia K900 Long-Term Road Test

Edmunds.com conducts a long-term test of the 2015 Kia K900 and comments on its behavior on a road trip from Los Angeles to Phoenix

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subytrojan

Great analysis of the ride, suspension and steering, Jay!

kirkhilles1

Agreed, thanks. These comments are very valuable to potential buyers. Its a lot more useful than the endless posts about the stupid seat, steering wheel or glove compartment heaters. I mean, spend 5 minutes in the car and you can figure out if the heaters are good or not. Suspension and ride quality is more difficult to tell from a quick test drive.

fordson1

I don't think there is one Hyundai or Kia vehicle in the Edmunds LT fleet that has not had this exact criticism. That's something of a record, and not a good one.

Yes, they offer a lot of features for the buck, and seem fairly reliable...but the number one priority of a modern private passenger vehicle is to drive and ride in a pleasant, competent fashion appropriate to its mission in life, whether an economy hatchback, a luxury sedan, a performance car or CUV...and these cars don't do that.

Kia hired Peter Schreyer from VW/Audi Group to design and style its cars, and now he is head of Kia and Hyundai both. My advice for Hyundai/Kia...go BACK to VW/Audi and hire away a couple of their suspension and ride/drive engineers.

misterfusion

Hyundai/Kia are nothing if not consistent in their bad suspensions. But this leaves me wondering about the new Sonata: It seems to be universally liked by the staff, but would a trip like this reveal the usual shortcomings?

s197gt

i wonder if this is something that could be fixed in the aftermarket; say, Bilstein or Koni dampers? Say you get one of these for a song in the used market... would a set of Bilstein HD shocks cure what ails it?

(the answer is no. just checked and neither have products for the k900.)

ebeaudoin

Makes me wonder why someone would purchase this vehicle instead of a low-mileage late-model Benz/BMW/Audi. For example- a 2015 K900 wLuxury with the VIP Package can be had for $57,535 according to TrueCar ($9,266 off MSRP). For that money, I could have a Certified 2013 MB S550 4Matic with 23,000 miles.

Which would you buy?

barich1

This has a longer warranty and is likely to be more reliable with lower maintenance and repair costs.

I wouldn't buy it, but neither would I consider buying a used German car, certified or no.

vvk

Of course Kia is not ready to compete at this level. Just because they hired an Audi guy to put a pretty face on a pig (and made it super popular among a certain demographic) does not mean that the pig has turned into a thoroughbred.

mercedesfan

@ebeaudoin,

Exactly. That has always been my issue with the Equus/K900. Why settle for a value proposition when you can get a lightly used version of the real thing? Now, obviously maintenance costs of the Germans are going to be much higher, but I doubt there will be much reliability difference. I drove an early-model S550 to 130,000 miles without a single major repair. More importantly, that isn't rare. The W221's have very strong reliability reputations. In that light you would have to be crazy to buy a K900.