Transcription
Hey everyone, today we're going to talk about the top five problems with the Hyundai Elantra. That's right! [Applause] Guess what number one's gonna be? Yeah! [Music] Poor Hyundais. And don't forget to check out 1auto.com for all your car part needs.
So that was number one, and it's pretty obvious. And if you own a Hyundai, you've kind of probably heard it. Unfortunately, quite a bit of them have problems. Even the Elantra, Sonata, they all have the issue. But the first thing you want to do if you start hearing that noise is check your oil level. That's what the manufacturer is going to tell you to do, the dealer. And you want to check it, and you want to have records of your oil changes because that is going to determine whether they're going to give you that free engine and recall.
So this is overfull. This car is overfull. It's been sitting for over a couple of hours. And unfortunately, that's not a good thing either. It's not going to cause any massive engine damage, but when it's full, it's overfull, and the oil has no place to go. You'll end up blowing seals, and that you don't want that because then you have a leaky oil, and now you're always going to be low on oil. But Hyundai is notorious for that engine tick, and it's not upper end. It sounds like it. Everyone's like, "Oh, it sounds like lifters." Unfortunately, it's not. It's actually what Hyundai has come down to, actually piston slap, and it's in the actual block. So call your dealer if you have that noise. Get in as soon as you can. Hopefully, you're within warranty, and they'll take care of you.
And number two, yep, has to do with the engine again. Of course, it does. You say it is a timing chain. It is a no-start condition where you turn the car over, crank, crank, crank, crank. You might be able to check you have spark, you even have fuel pressure, but it won't start. Well, leading up to that, you probably had some timing chain noise, a little bit of chattering. Sounds like a deck of cards against a wooden spoke or a metal spoke, especially when it's idling, chattering. And then acceleration, it chatters. What happens is the timing chain guides, which are these little plastic with aluminum backing to them, they hold the chain in tight. Well, they crack and brittle, fall apart. Now the chain has slap, and it skips a tooth on the cam 90% of the time. So you get in, crank it, it just keeps cranking over, will not start. You actually possibly could have two codes with that too. That would be P0340 or a P0016. If you've got those two codes with it, yeah, your timing chain probably stopped, jumped, and now you gotta evaluate whether it's worth doing.
Number three is steering wheel. Do you feel your steering wheel loose? Like, Hyundai is notorious for this. You can watch this go back and forth. Like, I'm not talking an eighth of an inch, I'm talking like quite a bit of free play, almost like you're riding on ice, but the steering wheel is moving, but the wheels are not moving. Um, I actually did a video on this probably about two years ago. You can look in the archives and find it on 1Auto, and I tear it apart and I show you this rubber spacer they put in there, and they call it a steering coupler, and it's made of rubber. Looks like a star, and it just shreds, shreds to pieces. Now all that space is in there. It's pretty unsafe, but as you can watch the video, you can see how easy it is to fix.
Okay, number four. Yeah, we're back inside the car. Well, this one is pretty weird. A lot of people online really, really told a lot of stories about this. So basically, when you put your key in the ignition, you start your car up, and it's running, you always have this light right here that says "Passenger Airbag Off." Where there's no weight in the seat, the seat has actual little sensor in it that tells you if it has 65 pounds or more. When there's nobody in the seat, or you don't have your duffel bag full of equipment, it says that it's off. Well, no one in the seat, the people are saying, "No one in the seat, and the light's flashing like there's a problem." And they look at their dash, there's no other airbag lights on, no other problems. They shut their car off and they get out. But before they get out, they look on their dash, it's lit up. All the accessory lights are on, radio's still playing, and the airbag light's flashing up there. They're like, "What kind of thing is taking over this car?" How to solve that real quick? Just put the key back in, start it right up, let it run. [Music] Shut it off, take your key out, and everything goes away. But what you need to do is go to the dealer. There is a reflash for that program. Just has to update the little computer telling it what to do, what not to do.
Number five, which if you do own a Hyundai, you're looking at me right now, you might actually have this problem. Alternator light. Alternator light, and alternator light comes on, and you replace the alternator. I know six months, eight months, even a year, perfect year, when the warranty ends, and the alternator light comes back on. I can personally say I fell victim to this. I know of a Hyundai that's in my family realm, and I've put like four alternators in this thing.
So that about wraps it up for the top five problems with the fifth-generation Hyundai Elantra. Don't forget, if you're not a subscriber, please subscribe and ring that bell because that turns on all the notifications so you won't miss a future video. I gotta get this thing parked before this engine seizes. I want to see if I can do. Do you ever see that guy do this? They do. How they do this on, I don't know how they do. They go like, "Number five." Then they, I don't know. It's number five is an alternator. Now, well, I was like this. I went, I went like this. I went [Laughter].