Don’t buy a KIA!

KIA Carnival is the worst piece of junk imaginable. We paid 32,5000 NT (some 10,000 US) for a six year old model. We did a reasonable amount of googling before making up our minds. Too bad we didn’t put in “KIA total engine failure” or “KIA ruined my life.” If we had, we would have gotten a lot of hits.

There was clearly something wrong with the engine from the very beginning. The car suddenly just lost power and on the highway going to work that could be really scary. The car mechanic fixed it a couple of times but then he said he wouldn’t guarantee any more repairs. We asked him how much he would pay for it and he said he didn’t want to buy it.The car had just died. And now we’ll have to pay again to give it an environmentally friendly burial.

As it turns out, the KIA engines have a well known problem which affects some 40 percent of our model. The honorable thing would have been for KIA to recall them all but instead the owners quickly sell up when the warranty expires after six years. Yes, it was a car like that we happily put our savings into.

We haven’t had a car for some five weeks now and it’s been great. My Chinese has improved a lot from speaking to cab drivers and we’ve made all kinds of interesting sociological observations on the buses we’ve been on. From now on we will not lose an opportunity to say something nasty about KIA (and about the “friend of a friend” who sold it to us). Yes, 10,000 dollars is a lot of money to us. For example, it corresponds very closely to the price of a ticket to Europe to visit friends and family next summer …

KIA Carnival is the worst piece of junk imaginable. We paid 32,5000 NT (some 10,000 US) for a six year old model. We did a reasonable amount of googling before making up our minds. Too bad we didn’t put in “KIA total engine failure” or “KIA ruined my life.” If we had, we would have gotten a lot of hits.

There was clearly something wrong with the engine from the very beginning. The car suddenly just lost power and on the highway going to work that could be really scary. The car mechanic fixed it a couple of times but then he said he wouldn’t guarantee any more repairs. We asked him how much he would pay for it and he said he didn’t want to buy it.The car had just died. And now we’ll have to pay again to give it an environmentally friendly burial.

As it turns out, the KIA engines have a well known problem which affects some 40 percent of our model. The honorable thing would have been for KIA to recall them all but instead the owners quickly sell up when the warranty expires after six years. Yes, it was a car like that we happily put our savings into.

We haven’t had a car for some five weeks now and it’s been great. My Chinese has improved a lot from speaking to cab drivers and we’ve made all kinds of interesting sociological observations on the buses we’ve been on. From now on we will not lose an opportunity to say something nasty about KIA (and about the “friend of a friend” who sold it to us). Yes, 10,000 dollars is a lot of money to us. For example, it corresponds very closely to the price of a ticket to Europe to visit friends and family next summer …