2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz

2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz began shaking on the interstate and showing a check engine light on the dash. After pulling off the road to a nearby auto parts store, the ODB reader showed a DTC of P0301, which is a misfiring cylinder. A independent mechanic across the street from the auto parts store diagnosed the issue as a leaking fuel injector, but in order to get the repair cost covered, the vehicle had to be towed to a Hyundai dealership. The dealership did not have any loaner vehicles to offer and estimated 1-2 weeks to even officially diagnose the vehicle themselves. 2 weeks later, the dealership is estimating another 2-3 weeks or more, and Hyundai corporate will not approve any reimbursement for the out-of-pocket costs of hotel, towing, Uber, and rental until diagnosis AND repair is complete, which could be an unknown period of time.

I was trying to accelerate with pushing the gas pedal and the truck would not go any faster than 22 mph. This went on for 15 minutes until the truck was turned off and restarted. It seemed to be corrected with turning the vehicle off. No engine warning lights came on and the vehicle was in drive the whole time. The concern was not being able to accelerate on the on-ramp to the main highway. The vehicle has not been inspected by anyone at this time. The problem could not be reproduced after it occurred today.

August 16th, 2023 - Roughly 10:30 am Started car using Push-To-Start, car coughed a few times upon startup. Was about 74 degrees, not too hot or too cold. (This has happened before, not totally abnormal for it to cough on startup.) Loaded up the kid, our luggage, and left. Car was running about 4-5 minutes before putting it in drive. Drove out of the neighborhood street pretty normally, went to our stop sign, turned left. Car struggled up hill, appeared to be revving, but the RPMs and the speed did not reflect the amount of noise the car was making. Stopped at another stop sign, turned right, car WOULD NOT accelerate faster than 25ish mph. I put the pedal to the floor to try to bring up the speed, the SMART mode indicator was turning red (indicating bad gas mileage) but it was not accelerating or moving any further. Pulled into someone's driveway to get off the road. Stopped the car, put it in park, then put it in reverse, drove out of the driveway, put it back in drive. Car continued to not accelerate. Unable to get RPMs past 3k and speed past 25ish mph. Got it home without incident. Had dealership tow car as I was unwilling to drive it on an 70 mph road to get it to the dealer. Dealership and Hyundai corporate reject that anything occurred due to there being no computer indicator indicating there was an issue. They believe I had the car in manual mode. I discussed with them that 1) This was very unlikely, as I shifted back into drive more than once and 2) my RPMs would have been increasing if I was accelerating but simply not shifting. I went online and found out this is a widespread issue - I am not the only one reporting this problem.

Hyundai Santa Cruz's have been having transmission problems that cause you to lose power while driving. This is a dangerous situation, the car will not accelerate and you are left in the middle of the road with no power to maneuver out of danger. I had to coast to the side of the road to get out of traffic. Hyundai announced a recall but Hyundai states that there is no fix at this time. Dealers are not able to perform any work as Hyundai doesn't have a plan to correct this dangerous situation.

Problem 1 - The vehicle has stalled twice at low speed (less than 5 mph). Both times I had just pulled away from a parking space, coasting (or slowing) before a STOP sign and the vehicle dies. It beeps loudly, says shift to Neutral and restart. It did restart both times. This happened both times while being in SMART mode. I drove it about a month in NORMAL mode between stalls and the issue did not happen. Maybe a coincidence, maybe not. I have had the Santa Cruz less than 2 months. Problem 2 - While accelerating away from a stop, it seems the vehicle revs and does not accelerate, almost like it is not in gear.