KIA Sportage ehh !

I have been on a trip with a bloke that had a kia sportage and it went suprisingly well up and down hills, as well as through the mud. I thought it would have had no chance.

The only thing we had trouble with was finding somewhere to tow it from at the front if needed.

Cheers

Kenny,
What tyre pressures was he running in it? In my experience, it is necessary to lower pressures to mid 20's to allow the tyres to gain enough purchase on steep/rough terrain. If he was still running with 30+ psi, he'd have buggar-all chance.
Dunno anything else about the drive-train on these cars though.

This guy had a failed vacuum hub assy. As an owner of a Sportage, I can tell you that is a common problem (and common to all vacuum operated hub mechanisms). There is a design flaw in some of the very early ones and it was not successfully addressed in the two following redesigns. The only effective solution is to replace the vacuum operated hubs with Warn manual hubs. (Who wants to draw water into the hubs anyway?)

Suspension travel 9" at the front, 13" at the rear standard.

Your friends problems may have also been to do with driver experience.

As to being soft......There are a few people on this list who have been out with me who may wish to contribute to the discussion.

Firstly I have a 2" spring lift and 31 x 10.5 tyres. LDS standard in the rear.

I went out to Bunyip State Forrest for a "slip and slide" day with the Suzuki 4WD Club of Victoria last weekend. There were two Hiluxes, a Suzuki Sierra, a Vitara 4Door, and me with all but one of their total number of axles having lockers. The vehicles that had the probs (worst to best) was the IFS Lux (clearance, front wheel travel), the Solid axle Lux (turning circle, torque), the Vitara (clearance, power), with the Kia and the Sierra matching each other, but only with the Sierra fully locked (mud and rocks).........Raised a few eyebrows.......

Kenny
I have to agree with Garyinoz about hte capabilities of the Kia.

We tend to hang a bit of Sh-t on Gary's Kia, which he take in his stride I have to say that I have been on a couple of trips with Gary in his Kia and I was in my Troopy and Gary has shown to me that the Kia is quite a capable vehicle.

I guess as he quite rightly points out driver experience and indivdual modifications to vehicles make each make, model more or less capable.

But the Kia went everywhere I did and did it quite well with little problem, In fact due to lower centre of gravity than the Troopy it probably did some things easier.

I would not call them a soft 4wd.

Surprised a lot I would think.
Does the bigger wheels make the not overpowered 2litre donk struggle a bit with
significantly larger wheels.
Understand a newer one is on the way with bigger donk too!