[boy rob]

So after owning our Niro 4 self charge for 1 month now 400 miles (ex demo 3k miles when we got it) I would like to ask what people think about the guilty of the car. In the last five years I have owned a Mercedes E class 2017 convertible cost 48k when new, 3 year old to me cost 22.5k only had for 6 months. A BMW 335D 2016 great car huge spec £51k ,2 years old cost me 22.5k and a Jaguar XE 2015 I paid 22k with 2.000 miles when it was 2 years old. For nearly 5 years my wife owned a Sportage GTLine 2.0d. (P/X for our Niro sold the Merc gone down to one car;
The BMW and Merc fantastic guilty as for the Jaguar remember British Leyland say no more.
As for the reliability and running costs Kia will win hands down.
I am a little disappointed with the Niro guilty the door cards look cheep and scratch very easy in the door handle the part you pull to shut the door. Leather seats creased very badly under 4.000 miles looks worse than a BMW at a100k, me and my wife are both under 12 stone so not down to weight. Carpets look like the material used in the £1 mats from Poundland and the JBL sound system is rubbish branded as Harman Hardon in the USA but nothing like I had in my Merc or BMW worlds apart, I think seats in the Sportage made of plastic looked like new at 50k door card plastic inlays nice.
Ok that might seem harsh but the rest of the is great LED lights good but after driving a Mercedes with intelligent light system a little poor but compared to the lights in the Sportage halogen bulbs LEDs a must. So only things I am no happy with I don't think that's bad,
If I was to list the thing I wasn't happy with the Merc BMW Jag the list would go on and on. Sportage lights rubbish and sound system. thats about all.
This post has taken me almost 2 hours to wright as I have dyslexia so my grammar and spelling may not be 100% thank you

 

[Llanigraham]

So you are comparing a car that costs around £25k with a £40k car? Sorry, but I think you are being a bit unrealistic.

 

[gdh300]

Appreciate your efforts against dyslexia; it's a cruel thing. You're doing fine!

Re the Niro, you gets what you paid for. It's true of a lot of things. But, by way of contrast, did the BMW, the Mercedes or the Jaguar come with a 7 year warranty? It depends what you value in your car: lovely materials to admire while you're on the hard-shoulder waiting for the AA, or cheaper faux quality with the oil bits covered for longer than you'll keep the vehicle?

 

[Indalo]

While I empathise with the OP's difficulty and find myself in agreement with the replies, I'm stuck on the meaning of the word 'guilty' in the context of the post. It's probably something really simple that I'm just not getting.

Help, anyone?

 

[vengablue]

While I empathise with the OP's difficulty and find myself in agreement with the replies, I'm stuck on the meaning of the word 'guilty' in the context of the post. It's probably something really simple that I'm just not getting.

Help, anyone?

Quality

 

[Lancelot1937]

Quality

"the guilty of the car " Not English.

 

[Indalo]

Thanks 'vengable' & 'Lancelot'; that clears it up. My mind had gone off at a tangent, thinking it might have been a mis-spelling of a particular model within the Niro range. It all makes perfect sense now.....duh!

I think I've been banged up too long!

 

[Back again]

When we bought our Ceed SW back in 2010 the quality was every bit as good in many respects as the outgoing C-Max but it lagged behind in some areas. After 5 years only problem was a holed AC Condenser (warrant surprising covered it), everything still worked and there were no rattles so it was without doubt fit for purpose.

But since then we have been disappointed with all the Kia's we have looked at not because they have gone backwards (with one exception) but simply because other brands have moved their games on. The 5 cars we have bought since the Ceed have been a Seat Leon (better than a Ceed in every respect bar the warranty and perhaps rear seat leg room), a Nissan Note (better than the Venga for us mainly because my mother could not get into the Vengas high seating position), 2 Skoda Superbs (looked at the Proceed and Sportage last time and there is simply no comparison IMHO) and a Skoda Fabia ( we thought the Stonic truly dreadful and whilst better than the Stonic the Rio would have cost us about £5000 more than the Fabia for the same kit/performance - the Fabia is also bigger despite being smaller).

We will continue to look since the Kia dealer was close and easy to speak to but the cars have to be better in enough respects before I spend my hard earned.

 

[pw2112]

I have 20 plate Niro 3 HEV as a mobility car and am generally very happy with it, it's very comfortable and gives reasonable fuel economy despite weighing almost 2 tonnes.
I find the sound system really good and the connectivity to be excellent overall, I miss having a CD player but realise that most people nowadays use spotify or similar.
I am surprised that as you only have the set spec levels, 2, 3, 4, eNiro rather than an options list which you can add to any base model that they don't produce a handbook that is model specific rather than just the one that includes everything that you may not have on your vehicle. How difficult would it be to have one for the Niro 2, one for the Niro 3 etc.
The one biggest issue I have found is the halogen headlights, they are so bad they are dangerous! I love my Niro 3 but I would not have another one unless I could test drive it in the dark to check the headlights on it. I have changed the bulbs to some Philips extra bright ones and whilst it made a small difference the headlights are still dangerously bad!
I know the Niro 4 comes with LED headlights which I believe are very good but I couldn't afford the extra deposit for that model. I know I am not the only one who feels the headlights are terrible and I think that unless Kia do something to address this they will lose future sales on all models with poor headlights. I cannot imagine the overall cost to fit LED instead of halogen would be that great if it was done as the car was built rather than retro-fitting them.
Overall I am extremely happy with my Kia but as it stands I wouldn't have another one solely due to the headlights!

 

[iuygoig]

Agree with the sentiment on headlights. The headlights on my Sportage as standard are wimpy to say the least, and very yellow looking by contrast to the LED DRLs, I have replaced the Sylvania bulbs with some Slightly brighter, much whiter haolgens and the result is just about acceptable. Part of the problem is teh shutter dipping mechanism,. A single bulb serves both main and dipped beams. On previous cars the headlights had separate dip and main bulbs and both remain in when on main so you get more light overall. I dunno if the lights are like this from some EU directive but the KIA implementation is less than adequate. Looked long and hard at fitting LED bulbs but this is a nightmare, It is illegal to do this and the market is anyway a minefield of outrageous claims about light output. It is difficult to see how the proper beam pattern can be achieved without changing the lamp assembly as well, so I gave that a miss <sigh>.

 

[Lancelot1937]

"it was without fit for purpose. " Another odd term.

 

[pw2112]

I find the main beam to be ok, it's just the dipped beam that is poor. I have changed to Philips extra bright bulbs and the light is a nice white colour but the beam doesn't shine far enough infront of the car.
As you rightly say fitting aftermarket LED or HID kits is illegal so the only option is to fit brighter halogen bulbs, however due to the poor design of the headlamp unit this only gives marginal improvements. For us to retro-fit the LED headlamp unit it would be horrendously expensive, I assume, but for Kia to do it as the car was being built surely wouldn't cost that much, and even if it did, the cost could be added to the price of the car resulting in satisfied customers and future sales. How the halogen headlights passed safety testing is a mystery to me!

 

[Back again]

"it was without fit for purpose. " Another odd term.

Edited since. Look again.

 

[iuygoig]

I find the main beam to be ok, it's just the dipped beam that is poor. I have changed to Philips extra bright bulbs and the light is a nice white colour but the beam doesn't shine far enough infront of the car.
As you rightly say fitting aftermarket LED or HID kits is illegal so the only option is to fit brighter halogen bulbs, however due to the poor design of the headlamp unit this only gives marginal improvements. For us to retro-fit the LED headlamp unit it would be horrendously expensive, I assume, but for Kia to do it as the car was being built surely wouldn't cost that much, and even if it did, the cost could be added to the price of the car resulting in satisfied customers and future sales. How the halogen headlights passed safety testing is a mystery to me!

It has become apparent that headlamp beam aiming is not very good out of the factory, and it seems many dealers do not check and correct this during PDI. I was able to effect some improvement by adjusting the headlamp aim myself. It is not hard to do but care is needed to get the car level with a suitable surface to see the aiming point. Some vehicles have separate main and dipped beam adjusters - mine did not so there was an element of compromise.

 

[pw2112]

It has become apparent that headlamp beam aiming is not very good out of the factory, and it seems many dealers do not check and correct this during PDI. I was able to effect some improvement by adjusting the headlamp aim myself. It is not hard to do but care is needed to get the car level with a suitable surface to see the aiming point. Some vehicles have separate main and dipped beam adjusters - mine did not so there was an element of compromise.

Interesting, do you have any info on how to do this? I would like to try and adjust mine.
I assume that you would adjust it sort out the dipped beam as that is the weak point, and you only use the main beam when there is no other traffic anyway.

 

[solarpower03]

@Back again, regarding your Seat Leon point, I have switched to Ceed from Golf for few reasons - VAG vehicles require cambelt changes, unless you go for high trim, VAG vehicles don't have multilink independent suspension, and of course with VAG you get 3 years warranty. Ceed interior is of much better quality than that of Leon-it is not too far from Golf. Leons do not come with adjustable boot floor as well and are quite plasticky. New Golf and Leon have most controls via touch screen - i prefer knobs. However Kia's vehicle is also not up to Golf-small things like felt lined door bins and glovebox, air conditioned golvebox, ventilation for rear passenger, 12 v socket and usb ports in rear/boot etc are standard in Golf and some other VAG vehicles. Ceed sits somewhere between Golf and Focus. I have owned Kia vehicle for a short time, so I don't know how reliable it will turn out to be.

 

[iuygoig]

Interesting, do you have any info on how to do this? I would like to try and adjust mine.
I assume that you would adjust it sort out the dipped beam as that is the weak point, and you only use the main beam when there is no other traffic anyway.

Not familiar with your vehicle (mine is a Sportage) but there will certainly be adjusters at the very least for up/down and right/left on each headlamp. Some KIAs have three adjusters which allow (with some fiddling about) adjustment of up/down for head and dip separately (there are threads on how to do this IIRC the Optima and Stinger)

Suggest you start a new thread in teh appropriate modey/year section as I would expect someone on here knows.

You coud also try having a very careful look at the back of your headlights and see if you can find them for yourself. Usually marked with little arrows and UD or LR to show the sense of teh adjustment. They are usually not all that obvious.

 

[pw2112]

Thanks @Turnup I'll have a look at the back of the headlights and see what I can find

 

[Back again]

@Back again, regarding your Seat Leon point, I have switched to Ceed from Golf for few reasons - VAG vehicles require cambelt changes, unless you go for high trim, VAG vehicles don't have multilink independent suspension, and of course with VAG you get 3 years warranty. Ceed interior is of much better quality than that of Leon-it is not too far from Golf. Leons do not come with adjustable boot floor as well and are quite plasticky. New Golf and Leon have most controls via touch screen - i prefer knobs. However Kia's vehicle is also not up to Golf-small things like felt lined door bins and glovebox, air conditioned golvebox, ventilation for rear passenger, 12 v socket and usb ports in rear/boot etc are standard in Golf and some other VAG vehicles. Ceed sits somewhere between Golf and Focus. I have owned Kia vehicle for a short time, so I don't know how reliable it will turn out to be.

Cambelt changes on VAG vehicles are not an issue for us because of the specified intervals. Before we bought the Leon I enquired at Customer Services since the dealers specified interval of 3 years 30,000 miles seemed crazy, a high mileage user would be doing it every year or so. It was confirmed as inspect at 60,000 miles and after that every 20,000 miles. If its not damaged no need to change. But at 120,000 miles or 5 years the belt must be changed. Since we were planning to keep the car only 5 years and do a max of 50,000 miles that was not an issue.

We bought an extended warranty before the car was registered meaning we got the same T & C's as the 3 years warranty, buy after its registered and its a waste of money. Cost just over £300.

Ours did not have the multilink suspension (1.4 TSi 140 PS) but at that time Golfs and A3's with that engine did have the multilink suspension (for a lot higher price). The suspension despite its simplicity was not an issue, a better ride than the Ceed. The 2 Golf GTI's I had owned previously had the simple suspension so I knew it wasn't an issue.

The interior plastics of the 2013 Leon were far nicer than the 2010 Ceed. When we bought the Ceed in 2010 we looked at a Seat Altea MPV and that was shocking inside, things had improved.

Only had one car with an adjustable boot floor, that was the Note, never used it.

Our Leon had A/C glovebox, cannot remember about the rest.

Only warranty issue Ceed had was a holed A/C condenser (actually surprised it was warranty), no warranty issues with Leon, extended warranty was waste of money.

When we bought the Superb PHEV we also briefly looked at the Ceed PHEV estate. Price wise it was difficult to compare due to the different offers but it was pretty close with a small advantage to the Ceed despite a lack of brokers selling that model. Kit wise both had more than enough. But both cars suffered a loss of boot space compared to the petrol models due to batteries etc but the Ceed lost most leaving a poor 395 litre, the Superb still had 490 litres plus an 80 litre box under the floor, almost 50% more space. Then we found a dealer with a quantity of cancelled company order Superb PHEV models, £3000 less than the best broker price, deal done the same day.

 

[boy rob]

Thank you for your understanding my Dyslexia it not just reading and writing its has many other problems in day to day life, short term memory loss, understanding instructions, directions, and may other problems.
I did mean for the extra 20k my other cars would cost new to find 3 bad points is good yes?.I must apologise after saying the stereo was rubbish, after playing with the sound setting today (needed a little help from my son ) the bass mid range and treble was all set at number 1, he played around with the equalizer for about 30 seconds ,and its sounds is better than the meridian audio in the Jag not as good as my BMW but did some research and that had 13+ speakers so to be expected. I should have looked at the Niro sound setting before makings a stupid statement. I know the quality is not as good as a Merc or BMW but is hard for me to put pen to paper but I think what I meant is not as good as my Sportage but only a few things. The question is after only a mouth would I buy another one hell yes as someone pointed out Kia has a 7 year warranty. I only looked at the Niro we now own it is 4 months old with 3.400 miles 6k cheaper than list new. I did try Carwoo for a new one only got 2 reply's discount only if we took out finance but we wanted to P/X the Sportage plus the cash I got for my Merc.
If all goes well and we don't have too many problems with this car and have the money I think In 3 to 4 years we would go for a electric Kia that will be our last car because by the time that is 4 or 5 years old we will may in ours 80s and probably to old to drive or dead. Please except my apologise for my poor crammer and spellings.I like to be a member of a forum as this helps me to try and improve.