Consumer Complaint Detail

KIA / SPECTRA / 2004

Recalls
0 Injured
Investigations
0 Death
Complaints
No Fire
Components - Details
NHTSA Complaint Number: 005011383 Incident Date: Mar, 14 2005
Consumer's City: CANTON Consumer's State: MI
Vehicle Transmission Type: Manufacturers Name: Kia Motors America
Model Name: SPECTRA Model Year: 2004
Vehicle Involved in a Crash: No Component's Description: Air bags:frontal:sensor/control module
Vehicle Involved in a Fire: No Persons Injured: 0
Vehicle's VIN#: Date added to File: May, 23 2021
Date Complaint Received: Mar, 14 2005 Complaint Type: IVOQ
Incident Reported To Police: No Purchase Date: Aug, 01 2004
Was Original Owner: Yes Anti-lock Brakes: No
Number of Cylinders: 4 Date of Manufacturer: -
Was Vehicle Towed: - Description of the Complaints: My complaint is not a traditional "failure" as you are accustomed to receiving on your website. my complaint is that kia has redesigned the airbag module in their newly designed spectra model, and do not appear to have any plans for retro-fitting the new design to same model spectras manufactured before jan 2005. the new design was an improvement to allow the spectra to raise its "poor" offset iihs frontal crash rating to something better. the new tests of the redesigned module upgraded offset frontal crash results to "acceptable". smaller venting holes in the airbag are described as the primary change. it is stated that the test car was indeed a 2004.5 model retrofitted with the new airbag module. my complaint is that if kia could retrofit an 2004.5 model at to obtain a new test from iihs, they should be willing to offer that module upgrade free-of-charge to purchasers of the 2004.5 and 2005 models built before jan 2005. see the links below for more of the specific iihs details. === iihs test with old airbag design resulting in a "poor" rating http://www.hwysafety.org/vehicle%5fratings/ce/html/0417.htm === iihs test with new airbag design resulting in a "acceptable" rating: http://www.hwysafety.org/vehicle%5fratings/ce/html/0502.htm . *ak ===