Hyundai's R&D, Product President, Engineering and Electronics Chiefs Resign Over Quality Issues

While I remain a H/K fan, my son bought a CPO '11 Sonata in August that needed 4 recall campaigns performed on it. Three of them were safety-related. The dealer (not the one we bought it from) turned the car around in a day with no hassle whatsoever. And my 09 Sedona recently needed an out-of-warranty replacement of its throttle body and accompanying ECU reflash (the technical service bulletin only covered the repair under warranty); this cost me $800 at a local auto electric shop. While these vehicles provide great service and are generally very reliable, my feelings about the mfrs stem directly from how the issues are handled by the dealer.

As far as bearings failing, maybe they weren't 'packed' right. If they were sealed bearings, maybe they weren't packed right at the factory. I had Romanian-made Delco front-axle bearings that I packed under pressure before installation, just to be on the safe side, but they still failed. The NAPA store blamed the failure on me not tightening the front hubs properly. The second set also failed. But when I bought no-name bearings from Motor Supply that were made in the Chech Republic, I had no problems and I still see that antique on the road today, driven by the people I sold it to years ago.

@highdesertcat I'm bullish on the Czech Republic. The level of work ethos, skilled craftsmanship & pride in what is produced their easily rivals anything I've seen from anyplace else, including besting a lot of what comes out of the much-lauded Deutschland.

@DeadWeight Years ago, I bought a new AK-47 that was made in the Czech Republic, and it was much, much better than the Chinese-made one I brought back from Viet Nam in 1967, and better than the USSR-made ones I saw at gun shows. The stampings were solid, the block cleanly machined, highly polished and the wood stock was H&H grade stained hardwood. It was a keeper. The others were not. Goes to show that there still are places where quality matters.

You're not the only one who has had issues with poor-quality replacement bearings and axles! I'm very concerned about this issue. No repair shops today will even do axle repairs (replace or repair a CV Boot or joint) because the can buy Chinese-made axle assemblies for $47 each. I have Japanese and German cars from the 1990s in my daily-driver fleet, and I'm going to keep the superior-quality OEM axles alive for as long as I can, even it it means pulling an axle to replace the boot. I don't trust the quality of the replacement parts in most cases, and I don't have the ability to determine if a part is 'good' or not.

@redmondjp Even during the Soviet block years, Czech made stuff was better than from any other iron curtain country, incl East Germany and I guess it continues to this day, I don't see Russian cars being desirable anywhere. As far as parts are concerned, I was also told I'd be better off with new China parts than rebuilt ones, but the tech was wrong and now I have to pay the consequences.

Redmondjp, find another shop. I did not want my CV joints on my Probe replaced with imported Chinese crap. I had the outer boots replaced. Did not save any money, but I have factory parts still in there.