@FLHamster: You decided to trade in your 2013 1.6 litre Soul.
But suppose you had decided to keep the 2013 Soul and had booked an appointment with the dealership to switch out the engine. You would have saved tens of thousands of dollars. Even if the replacement engine was doomed to failure after ~7 years of use.
There is nothing wrong with your decision. If you value a newer vehicle sufficiently, you pay for it. Simple. We all know or should know that vehicles start depreciating in value and do not stop once they are driven off the lot.
The upshot -- from my perspective -- is that Kia was willing to look after you.
The second takeaway is that by pro-actively installing a magnetic oil drain plug, you were able to better monitor the health of your vehicle. That to me is the significant lesson that most of us in this chat forum should take away.
Conclusion: Thank you kind sir.
My dealer was happy to install the new Magnetic Drain Plug (that I bought and provided to them) in my new 2020 Soul.
They even mentioned that they wished more people would do that, since the manufacturer does not provide one.
As intelligent as these new cars are, they don't have a "DANGER! Your engine's coming apart" message to show up on the dashboard someplace. Since with my 2013 Soul, I changed my oil myself, I always examined the Magnetic Drain Plug on every oil change. There was always a little gob of goo on the magnet, but it was more like black grease, till that fateful day when the goo turned to CHUNKS. Goo is OK, normal wear and tear, but CHUNKS, not so much!
That's as bad as biting into an apple and finding only half a worm. Eh?
But KIA already knew that they had a problem in that 1.6L engine, and that's why they put out a recall on it. It had nothing to do with the manner in which I operated my car. I didn't exactly drive it like I stole it, but neither did I baby it, which can be just as bad.
I've read the horror stories from people who took their car in for a new engine. Those things are not on the parts room shelf, but have to come from half way around the world. And, we have to trust that the mechanic doing the swap out, gets all those little wires back where they belong, etc. I've read where an engine swap can take a month or more to complete and there
will be expense to the car owner, even if the dealer is providing the 'new' engine under warranty.
Free loaner? Maybe that '49 Studebaker they keep on the back lot, just for such occasions. lol
At 77, on limited Social Security, and not the best of health, I'm just not up to dealing with an engine change, even on a little car that I dearly loved. A new car was really my only option. I'm sorry if that offends anyone.
Cheers Mates!
FLH
