2014 KIA SOUL — Complaint #1558268
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NHTSA Complaint about ENGINE filed April 15, 2019
NHTSA complaint #1558268 (ODI reference 11196599) concerns a 2014 KIA SOUL and was filed on April 15, 2019. The owner reports the failure occurred on April 13, 2018. The vehicle had 69,441 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to Connecticut based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as engine, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.
The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.
Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same KIA SOUL cohort independently describe similar engine failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2014 KIA SOUL shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
THE VEHICLE IS WELL MAINTAINED AND AT 69441 MILES ON THE 2.0 LITER ENGINE, THE ENGINE SEIZED WHILE DRIVING IN HEAVY TRAFFIC ON AN INTERSTATE HIGHWAY. I HAD TO GET OUT AND PUSH IT TO A SAFE AREA OFF THE HIGHWAY. I HAD IT TOWED TO A CERTIFIED MECHANIC AND THE DIAGNOSIS WAS A SEIZED ENGINE. I CONTACTED A LOCAL KIA DEALER AND THEY WOULD NOT COVER IT UNDER ANY WARRANTY. THEY ONLY OFFERED A VERY HIGH ESTIMATE TO REPLACE THE ENGINE. I OPTED FOR MY MECHANIC TO INSTALL A USED REPLACEMENT ENGINE FROM AN AUTO RECYCLING COMPANY. INVOICE FOR THE REPLACEMENT ENGINE IS ATTACHED TO THIS REPORT. SINCE THE REPLACEMENT ENGINE CAME OUT OF THE SAME YEAR AND MODEL KIA SOUL WITH SLIGHTLY LOWER MILES ON IT, I AM CONCERNED THAT THE SAME THING WILL HAPPEN WITH THE METAL CHIP IN THE ENGINE DEFECT ISSUE RECENTLY REPORTED, SINCE I DRIVE MOSTLY HIGHWAY SPEEDS. IT IS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS TO GET OUT AND HAVE TO PUSH THE CAR OFF A BUSY HIGHWAY!
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 1558268 |
| ODI Number | 11196599 |
| Date Filed | April 15, 2019 |
| Failure Date | April 13, 2018 |
| VIN | KNDJX3A56E7 |
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Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.
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