Sudden unintended acceleration.

- Clarksville, MD, USA

2004 Kia Amanti - on cold startup the engine sometimes revs aggressively when pulled into gear, causing the car to lurch forward or back if the brake is not firmly applied. It is a dangerous scenario. I've asked Kia to look at the problem and they've said they cannot identify the cause and have no knowledge of it.

- Calgary, 00, USA

I bought a brand new 2004 Kia Amanti. As I approached 30,000 miles the engine would periodically lose power while in operation, then restore seconds later. I reported the incident to my dealer. I ws told they would reset the fuel injection system, and that would resolve the issue. Since then the issue has surfaced (3) times. Two of the three times almost lead to a serious crash. During these precious few seconds (3-5) there was absolutley no engine power available. I notice it it seemed to occur when removing the foot from the gas pedal, then reapplying it to gain power. At this point the engine just dropped off. It will restore and race to high RPM seconds later. It has gotten to the point where I was afraid of driving the vehicle. It was a crap shoot everytime you needed to make a left turn across on coming traffic whether or not my car will lose power. It was not a stall, needed to restart the vehicle afterwards. The vehicle recovered on its own.

- Debary, FL, USA

Dear sir: I am the owner of a 2004 Kia Amanti. There are 43,542 miles on the odometer. The vehicle engine runs fine and then will suddenly go into lugging and misfiring at various speeds causing down shifting. When I turn the engine off and leave it to set overnight or for more than eight hours at work, the engine light remains on but the engine runs fine once started again. After a few more starts the engine light goes off. I took it to the dealership and told them of the symptoms. They ran tests and said they could find nothing wrong. They said bring it back when it does it again. Fine, so it goes into the misfiring on a weekend at night traveling the interstate. No chance to just leave the engine running for a dealership the next day. Now it runs fine again until another inconvenient situation. Problematically, the engine behavior creates a driving hazard at high and low speeds and could easily cause an accident. This is a serious safety issue that needs to be resolved by Kia, not by its ignorant or ill trained dealer mechanics. Are you familiar with this problem" is it the computer module that may have a short or crack in the housing? misfiring is a timing issue and most surely goes to the firing order and timing controlled by the advance mechanism and the module. Or is it the throttle system? or egr valve or solenoids? do americans need to die before Kia comes up with an answer" I need to get this fixed before my wife who panics may have a serious accident.

- Lecanto, FL, USA