Kia is warning Telluride owners to keep their cars parked outside and away from structures, as part of a new recall campaign.
Certain 2020 – 2024 Kia Telluride SUVs are under a new recall this week, according to documents the automaker filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). According to a filing submitted June 5, Kia determined the car’s front seat motors could have a misaligned seat motor control switch with a stuck seat slide knob, causing the seat motors to overheat and potentially catch fire. The problem affects a total of 462,869 vehicles built between January 9, 2019 and May 29, 2024.
Kia told safety regulators that, “If there is an external impact with excessive force to the front power seat side cover and/or seat slide knob, the power seat switch back cover can dislodge resulting in internal misalignment of the seat motor control switch.” Such a condition causes the seat motor to continuously operate, then overheat while driving or while the vehicle’s parked.
In the short term, the company is instructing owners to park their vehicles outdoors and away from other vehicles or structures until dealer technicians can perform a repair. The solution involved equipping affected cars with a reinforced power seat switch mechanism that will not be dislodged by an “external impact force”.
2024 Kia Telluride models built after May 30, 2024 already have the reinforced mechanism, and are not included in this recall.
The company submitted a chronology report as part of its notice to the NHTSA. In that document, Kia says it first learned of the problem from a dealer case involving a 2021 Telluride, in which the owner reported smoke from underneath the driver’s seat. By May 29, 2024, the automaker recorded seven unique incidents, including one under-seat future. The other six had “localized melting of [the] seat tilt motor”. None of the cases involved crashes, injuries or fatalities.
Kia will begin notifiying dealers of the problem on July 25. It will send out customer notices through the mail on July 30 – 31, after which owners are strongly encouraged to take their Telluride to their local dealer for repair. Kia’s number for this recall is SC316, while the NHTSA’s number for this campaign is 24V-407.
