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1996 Kia Sephia 1.8L automatic.
My first issue is the power loss. I will be as detailed as I can be about it.
In park the car will rev past 3000 RPMs just fine, it feels light and peppy.
In any drive gear including reverse it instantly feels bogged down. No matter how hard you push the gas it will not go above 3000 RPM. The car drives fine, you just cant get over 3000 RPM. The only issue is slow acceleration (not being able to get higher RPMs) and if I come to a hill I will lose a good deal of power, I can push the gas pedal down and pick that back up but I shouldnt have the issue. I believe it to be a clogged cat, tomorrow morning I am taking upstream o2 sensor out and driving it up a hill see if it has anymore power. (I should be able to tell right off because the RPMs wont be stuck under 3000)2nd issue is a grinding noise, I believe it to be wheel bearings but cant confirm with easy tests so may have to take hub off and apart.
This noise does not happen all the time sometimes not at all.
Its a rhymthic intermittant grinding noise. It does get worse when turning to the right it gets less pronounced turning to the left. You can feel it in the steering wheel and foot pedals. Somewhat of a harsh grind, it seems about 1 full grind noise is about 2.5 rotations of the tire. Sound seems like its coming from mid engine at the bottom on the left. (feels like where CV goes into tranny but who knows, I cant tell where a grinding/vibration is coming from just the general area) I put the car up, pulled/tilted the tires and got no play. Spun the tires and heard no noise. I am going to put my hand on the spring tomorrow on the strut and spin the tire, I read if you feel any grittyness in the spring with wheel turning you probably have bad wheel bearings.This has been going on for over a month and I have checked just about everything I thought it could be. (except volt tests) The CV axles look new, the boots are in very good shape and no leaking. The ball joints are newish and good. My Brake pads look brand new, ,the rotors look to of been turned once before but look good, I cleaned the calipers up and regreased the slide pins. My brakes do squeek but I read that is almost normal for my type of car. (and no indication the sqeek is something work out)
For the power issue Ive just checked connections. Found a loose bracket for the exhaust and fixed that but other than that, no luck. (tomorrow is first day off in awhile so my best ideas are going to be tried then, feeling spring for coarseness while spinning tire and o2 sensor removal and drive)
Thank you for your help!
*edit*
I forgot to add the tranny seems to shift the same as every other car Ive ever owned. So do not think the power loss is from the tranny. (especially since in park it revs great)
I have changed spark plugs, wires, oil, flushed the pan of the tranny but no filter change, new battery connectors. I got the car a month ago and only changed out those few items, the car had a receipt for a full tune up 4 months before I got the car, everything Ive checked on receipt is new so I believe it to be true and thats why I dont continue the tune up. (the plugs looks great, better than any other ive pulled out of a car, possibly due to only having about 800 miles on em)
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Thanks all for input 🙂
Going to order the hubs with bearings if I can find it online. An extra 10 dollars or so is all I see it being charged which isnt much at all. Saves some time and effort even though id still like to do them myself.
May be moot either way my dad does have a puller not sure if it was a tamer or shark he may have both.
Thanks again 🙂 Looking forward to getting that grinding gone!
There is no such thing for front bearings. You may be able to find new hubs. But, you would still have to press the bearing onto the hub and press the hub with the bearing into the steering knuckle.
Replaced both the front wheel bearings.
Car has less road noise, less hum. We drove it about 3 miles and have not heard the grinding back. Going on a longer drive now to see if its gone.
Still cant figure out why I cant go over 3k RPM but auto shop says its normal.
Bearings were alot easier to replace than I thought, did use a hydraulic press. Took about 2 and a half hours to complete the job. Really kind of makes me wonder why the auto shop says 4+ hours for this repair when I can do it in nearly half the time and im looking for the tools I need most of the time.
Left wheel bearing did not seem to have any problem at all, no grinding and looked good. The one issue we found that may of been causing the horrible grinding we heard was the nut on the end of the axle. I bent the depressed tab up, put the socket on the nut put my foot on it to begin to stand on it to break it free and the socket fell to the ground before I put any weight on it. We unthreaded the rest of it by hand. The other side was on slightly better but I was able to use just my hand and not have to push very hard at all to break it free. The right side had rust in it, made a dry grind noise while spinning, the retainer ring was also only halfway on. This car has service records for the CV replacements only a few years ago and they didnt torge them at all. No service records for the bearings so I dont know who screwed up putting a retaining ring on.
Thanks all for the help will update in a few days if the grind is fully gone.
40 minute drive didnt happen once.
Looks to be fixed.
I still think it was the nut not a bearing. You cant imagine my surprise when we opened that first bearing and there was absolutly nothing wrong with it. 😛For sure it ended up being the nut.
I still have power issues though. =/
Hoping someone read through this and has some new ideas?
My car started studdering when accelerating, oil in one of the spark plug wells. (misfiring but no codes and making it impossible to accelerate unless you feathered the pedal just right and got it to catch) Finally replaced the valve gaket and that solved the problem. (whoever put it on before didnt tighten one of the center nuts enough, letting it bend/push the gasket and leak oil via a screw hole.) I had no more studdering for 2 weeks. Now I have only on acceleration a single chug once in awhile. Annoying but car is driveable. (before the gasket the car was not, you couldnt accelerate)
and for the RPM issue, I re-replaced most of the common tune up parts;
I replaced the spark plug wires, spark plugs (tried 2 gap ranges, no difference with either), air filter, changed oil, oil filter, 1 bottle of heet + injector cleaner (2 full tanks), cleaned maf. I know ive replaced more but cant think of it offhand. Just the basics.Any ideas? Thanks!
*edit*
I dont think I made it very clear. Car still has a seemingly 3000 RPM cap on it and runs wrong imho. The chug when accelerating is what the car is doing extra now, about a month after the valve gasket replacement. Trying to get rid of that single chug now.I do know that I think its the evap hose? that goes to that charcoal canister on the firewall is bent or plugged, we vaccum tested the lines going to and from the charcoal canister and the one leading from the tank was blocked. (we were checking for leaks) but from all of what I read that should not be causing my issue. Its been blocked since last January when I high centered on some snow, atleast thats when I figured I crushed the line. (or its been crushed since I bought the car)
We vacuum tested every line that we could that was air and all held vacuum (no leaks) except that one evap hose that is blocked.
Car is a pain in the butt 😛 Never really seems to fully die but never runs well. It even ran with that bad oil leak under the valve cover, just sometimes it would take 10 minutes to start the car and then wouldnt move unless you got the pedal just right.
Thanks for reading! Hoping to get it fixed before end of next month so I dont convince myself I need a new car. Dont want to spend the money on a new car but always worrying about the one your driving is very taxing on your nerves.
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