Ask the Car People.SM


Hyundai Santa Fe 2007+

2993 messages,  Last post on Feb 28, 2013 at 8:00 PM

You are in the Hyundai Santa Fe Forum.

What is this discussion about? Hyundai Santa Fe, SUV

    

Messages Page 133 of 300

#1316 of 2993 More Hyundai experience-Sparcap54 by wjaner

Aug 27, 2006 (4:44 pm)

This being a 2007 Santa Fe forum I hope you all don't chastize me for sticking in the 1999 Elantra.
My wife was very impressed and disappointed with the elantra because she could not drive it because of the manual transmission.
We stopped in a Hyundai Dealer and looked at the 2002 Santa fe. After climbing into and driving the Santa Fe my wife asked if I would agree to her buying one. It was love for the Santa Fe hands down. It is the 4cyl Automatic and we took it home in May 2002. We paid $18,400. out the door (includes tax &license). Now it was my turn to be impressed.
I just had to have one also.
On December 31st 2002 I bought a 2003 Santa Fe. It also has the 4 cylinder engine but I have the 5 speed transmission,it cost me $17,000. out the door including all taxes and license.
The 2003 Santa Fe is the nicest most trouble free car I have ever owned besides the 99 Elantra Wagon. Considering I have bought three new Cadillacs in the past.
I have never looked for neck snapping performance and could not expect it in a family utility vehicle.
The Hyundai 4 cylinder is a long stroke engine which means it puts out high torque at low rpm. Because it puts out approx 140 HP it does not compete on the race circuit but it will comply with all maximum speed limits and still have oomph left over. When you need to extract maximum HP because of hills or passing the 5 speed transmission enables you to put the 4 cylinders to work.
Because of the excellent milage I got from the 99 Elantra I was anxious to see what the same basic 4 cylinders would do for me in the 2003 Santa Fe. (The Hyundai 4 cylinder is the basic power plant borrowed from Mitsubishi). Excellent engine!
Because I drove the Santa Fe over the same route consistently it was very easy for me to make a controlled fuel consumption test. On each test I topped the tank off when the car was on level ground and used the cruise control to maintain the same exact speed on each run between fill ups. The book says the tank holds 17.2 gals but you can add another 2.2 gals in topping it off which brings it to 19.4 gals.
There is lots of talk about milage improvements after engine break in but my experience has shown very little change occuring after break in.
Keeping in mind the 2003 Santa fe curb weight is 3494 lbs vs about 2750 for the 99 Elantra Wagon this difference in weight should be apparent in our test results.
(Could someone out there please correct me on the weight of the 99 Elantra Wagon as I am guessing and I could be wrong).
I don't want to make this post too long for fear of evaporation so I am cutting it off to be continued.

#1317 of 2993 2007 Santa Fe Limited - minor misses by hsudog

Aug 27, 2006 (5:50 pm)

Just bought a 2007 Santa Fe Limited, Artic White, no options except floormats and cargo cover. Most articles on internet are Santa Fe fanfests. I really like the '07 Santa Fe (which is why I bought it), but prospective owners should know the minor misses on this vehicle, as what may be minor annoyances for me could be deal-breakers for you.
 
Minor misses:
- Interior dashboard plastic looks a little on the cheap side - it's hard with little give.
- Light in front row does not turn on when door is open.
- Instrument gauges should be electroluminiscent for an aspirational vehicle like the Santa Fe; instead it is a cheap-looking white/blue lettering.
- Interior door handles are plastic - should be chrome.
- Glove compartment too small.
- Cup holders in back seat are integrated in arm rest - not useable if you have 3 in back.
- Cruise control is a series of non-tactile buttons on wheel; it would have been better as a control stalk.
- No body-side moulding.
- Back hatch extremely easy to open due to handle - but a bit stiff and hard to close with one hand.
 
Overall, it's a fantastic car. It looks great, is silky-smooth and quiet on the road, handles almost as well as a car, and of course has an unbeatable price for value.

#1318 of 2993 Re Santa Fe experiences Continued-Sparcap54 by wjaner

Aug 27, 2006 (5:50 pm)

This is follow-up to my prior about 2003 Sta Fe fuel consumption. From the get go I experienced 30.5 miles per gallon with 90% freeway and 10% city driving. The window price equipment sticker shows 20 mpg city and 27 Highway.
The worst milage I got was 27 mpg pulling a small utility trailer with total weight of 1100 lbs mostly city driving.
I use Mobile 1 which is synthetic oil and the milage had stabilized at 32.5 mpg with a cruise speed of 58 mph. Recently I made two trips to Reno Nevada over Route 395. While in Carson City I made two trips over the Sierra Nevada which for about 50 miles is 7000 feet above sea level and with an outside air temperature of 90 degrees the density altitude is over 10000 feet. I expected the milage to drop drastically but the Hyundai injection system has an altitude compensator. As a result the milage was still 31mpg and with all of the downshifting the speed varied from 25mph to as high as 55 mph. Of course the engine had no power and maximum available was about 40 hp. Even the 300 hp autos lost their oomph and found it hard to pass other vehicles.
I am the worlds biggest skeptic when it comes to claims made by engine oil additive companies. To prove most do not work I have experimented down through the years and made records of the results. Probably the biggest seller of engine oil additives was and still is Slick 50 which is a Teflon based resin additive.
On one of my trips to Carson City which is 400 miles one way I added one container of Teflon resin to my 2003 Santa Fe engine and the milage changed from 32.5 to 34.2. This is the same small improvement I have found on several other vehicles I experimented with in the past.
In my attempt to find the maximum milage attainable on the 2003 Santa fe I added a product called Gas-Kicker which supposedly produces better combustion. It has a lot of testing data behind it and when I added 2 ounces to my full tank the milage increased from 34.2 to 36.1 mpg.
I firmly believe that The maximum milage has been attained and in order to make further improvements the last option would be to reduce the weight of the vehicle by at liest 500 pounds. I especially like being able to travel 500 miles on a tank of fuel.

#1321 of 2993 Re; Santa fe Experiences continued-Sparcap 54 by wjaner

Aug 27, 2006 (7:39 pm)

I have religiously kept detailed logs on all of my Hyundai Santa Fe experiences.
On 5 May 2006 I was driving my 2003 Santa Fe on the Freeway in So Ca in the far right lane in very light traffic. I was traveling at exactly 55 mph (on cruise control). It was 12:00 midnight. I saw the headlights of a vehicle to my left coming towards me. Since it was perpendicular to me I thought it was coming from the other side of the freeway.
There was no place for me to go as the freewy wall was to my right.
He hit me exactly in the middle of my left two doors. The noise of the crash was tremendous and my Santa Fe shook and shimmied as I corrected the steering to continue straight ahead.
The engine shut down so I coasted to the apron of the next fwy exit and stopped. The first thing I did was to look at my body to see if my legs and arms were still in tact.
 
Shortly another vehicle (2005 Lincoln) came coasting up behind me and the driver informed me he had also been hit by the same vehicle that hit me.
The result was; a 1994 honda traveling at over 75 miles per hour struck the 2005 lincoln in the rear that was traveling behind me. The honda continued out of control crossing the lanes of the Fwy before coming back and hitting me.
All three cars were towed off the fwy and no one was seriously hurt.
The damages to my Santa Fe first estimate was $12,500. so the insurance company immediately totaled it out. I had my 2003 Santa Fe towed to a garage that I had experience with when I was in the insurance business.
They ordered a lot of used parts and the repairs involved removing most of the left side of the Santa fe. They spent many hours repairing the lower chassis and the total came to $8000.
My Santa Fe saved me from serious injury because the Honda was lower than the Santa Fe and the frame took the brunt force of the collision and prevented the honda from penetrating the doors and reaching my body. As it was I had several cuts and bruises on my body from the pieces of plastic that flew around.
I am so thankful to have been driving the Santa Fe rather than a regular compact vehicle.
My car spent a total of 65 days in the repair shop.
The driver of the car that caused the accident only had $10,000 limits of property damage.

#1322 of 2993 Re. Santa Fe experiences(continued) Sparcap54 by wjaner

Aug 28, 2006 (10:44 pm)

I am trying to keep the BS to a minimum. Noticed some postings re a trailer hitch for the 07 Santa Fe. (Etrailer.com) shows a 3500 lb hidden hitch for $127.95. Half hour installation time with 6 bolts, no drilling or welding. The light wiring harness is available from Wall mart for less than $20.00. Very nice hitch, I put one on my 2003 Santa Fe.
Also there has been some discussion about the Bridgstone tires on the 2007 Santa Fe. I also had some missgivings about the tires and did some checking. The 225/70/16 tires have a tread wear rating of 300. The original tread depth is 10/32 and the tire is not light truck rated. Because of the tread wear rating of 300, a very agressive driver will not get over 35,000 miles out of the tire. On the other hand prior to the 2007 model year all Santa Fe's came with five full size tires and wheels. This means that if you rotate the tires you will get 20% greater milage out of a set.
The Bridgestone is not only a quiet running tire but the plient sidewalls give a nice ride. So when the chips are down the tires as supplied are a good compromise for most Santa Fe drivers.
Regarding that tread wear rating of 300, I really bitched and moaned about such a low rating as most discriminating drivers look for ratings of 460 or above. I was chatting with a large tire service center about the bridgestone low rating of 300 when the owner showed me some low cost tires that they took off from Calif Highway Patrol vehicles. I almost crapped my pants when I saw the tires had a tread wear rating of 270. I hope one of you many rubber experts out there will give me your opinion on that one.
Lots of tire people deprecate the Michelin brand of tire. I have had nothing but good results. My 1999 Hyundai Elantra came with Michelins and they now have 60,000 miles and the tread wear is now 4/32 (they are ready to be converted into asphalt) but they are kiddy car sized tires and never were intended to last so long. I was able to get 100,000 miles on my cadillac equiped with Michelins. The tires began to break before the tread completely wore out.
Please somebody, educate me on the advantage of the low profile 18 inch tire on the expensive 2007 Santa Fe. Sure, they must look good, and they must grip the pavement coming down the mountain on the suicide curves but is it not time to reduce our speeds and conserve resources? Why should we allow ourselves to be permanently blackmailed by the middle east OPEC oil producers?
During the year 2005 we killed 43,445 innocent men women and children on our nation highways. Where are the right to life demonstrators marching to stop the carnage? We lose 2500 soldiers (I am a korean war vet helicopter search and rescue)in Iraq and the radical left is ready to capitulate.

#1323 of 2993 comparison Santa Fe 2007 vs Rav4 2006 by virgil2

Aug 29, 2006 (6:01 pm)

I just can't beleive these results. They certainly didn't road test same vehicules I did. I road test the rav4 (base and sport) and the Santa SE back to back.
 
The Rav4 more quiet? better visibility? better audio system layout? better comfort? Are you kidding?
 
http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/Drives/Comparos/articleId=116618
 
I didn't road test the CX-7 but, IMO, the Santa Fe is a better choice overall...

#1324 of 2993 Re: comparison Santa Fe 2007 vs Rav4 2006 [virgil2] by jcspohr

Aug 29, 2006 (6:29 pm)

Replying to: virgil2 (Aug 29, 2006 6:01 pm)
Ditto - we test drove a loaded RAV4 Limited and it seemed low-end in comparison to the Santa Fe Limited.
 
The Toyota salesman killed any chance of us buying the RAV4 by stating right after the test drive that "Toyota doesn't offer incentives and they don't discount the price." I hadn't even brought up price at that point. With attitudes like that Toyota, or any dealer for that matter, won't be selling many vehicles.
 
We did NOT drive the CX-7. The overall look and specs just didn't appeal to us.
 
So we bought the Santa Fe Limited and are loving it. Often, people think it is a high-end vehicle like a Lexus. I'm glad we paid much less.

#1325 of 2993 Re: comparison Santa Fe 2007 vs Rav4 2006 [jcspohr] by backy

Aug 29, 2006 (7:15 pm)

Replying to: jcspohr (Aug 29, 2006 6:29 pm)
I think the review mirrors your opinion. It admits that the Santa Fe is the most "luxurious" of the tested SUVs--the one that was compared to Lexus by passers-by. The reason the Santa Fe came in 3rd was due to being slower than the others (as one editor noted, who cares about that with an SUV?) and some issues with driving position, a shaky steering wheel off-road (how often will Santa Fes go off-road?), and a few other quibbles.

Messages Page 133 of 300

To POST a message, please Sign In.

Advertisement

Browse by Category

Browse by Vehicle
   View All Vehicles

Browse by Board
Browse by Topic
View All Topics

Edmunds Community

Advertisement