[Ticmxman]

I found it on drivers side. Build date 10/31/18. You would think dealer had time to install software before it left the lot in 8/19. Will have it done with service when due.

I doubt the 19s had this service campaign added until very recently. Some of the 2019s built after a certain time likely already have the revised software.

 

[Dbird29]

Got our 2019 Santa Fe Limited 2.4 in for oil change and 953 update. Reading the TSB it looks like the software engineers figured out how to use the knock sensor to detect connecting rod bearing failure. That's cool and makes you wonder how many bearing failures they had to justify software development costs.

 

[DarrenBach]

...makes you wonder how many bearing failures they had to justify software development costs.

They feel it makes them look better (safety-wise) when the judge lays down the fines!

 

[RetroGiant]

For those that had this done, about how long did it take for them to do the update.

 

[squire10]

For those that had this done, about how long did it take for them to do the update.

It takes about 1 hour.

 

[Tiwtin]

For those that had this done, about how long did it take for them to do the update.

It depends on the dealership and their workload. I showed up at 9:05 AM this morning and was out by 9:25 AM.

 

[bkjjohn]

I have a 2018 build and it's needed.

 

[RochHam]

For those that had this done, about how long did it take for them to do the update.

I don't know how long it took as I had mine in for an oil change & tire rotate when they said this was due to get done. I got a call in less than 2 hours that it was ready so assuming the oil change and tire rotate took an hour (which it's been in the past on another vehicle there) the software was probably less than an hour. FWIW my build date was in early Sep 2018, bought Oct 18.

After reading some of the posts I have differing feelings on this update, service campaign, whatever it is. I did a LOT of research in late Sep and while the 2019 SF Limited beat the 2018 RAV4, CX5, Outback in all major areas the only thing I had reservations on was this Theta engine although it was more on HP/weight and it actually powers the vehicle well. I would have loved the Jeep 3.6 V6 in the Santa Fe but of course that's not possible, but the Jeep's 2.4 Tigershark derivative off Hyundai's 2.4 Theta has been OK. I got assurances from the dealer that Hyundai 2.4 problems were a manufacturing defect isolated to 2011-12 builds, they hadn't seen any problem on recent years and sell 90% non turbo 2.4s (in fact a recent look at the lot showed no 2020 turbos). Then last winter this 953 got expanded to 2013-2018 Santa Fes, a concern since what's different on the engine from 2019 and how could a manufacturing problem go on that long? Now 2019s have it too. Why not 2020s, it's the same engine!? Perhaps 2020 builds after such a date have the fix built into the engine software. Should I feel better I have this limp mode catcher software? I am very focused on top tier gas and severe service oil changes less than 3750 miles. But I also expect reliability driving 1100-1700 miles each way for snow bird trips, a long term breakdown could be a massive mess: on the way to Padre for a month a week long breakdown in Oklahoma gives me a rental I need to get 800 mi back a week later ... not cool. Do GDI engines have these problems? Honda CRV trubos clearly have/had big cold weather problems, but Mazda CX5s seem ok.

 

[Davidrbeekman]

Well I ran my vin on the Hyundai website on our 2019 2.4 Santa Fe tonight and to my surprise the results show an open campaign for the 953 engine software knock sensor update. I’m sure I had checked a while back and nothing was found. I just had it to the dealer a month ago for service and they mentioned nothing at that time about this. Kinda makes me wonder if they are not expanding this campaign after the recent class action settlement, which did say certain 2019s were included in the settlement. You may want to run your 19 vin on the Hyundai site.

BE WARE of letting them do the update... My 2015 Sonata ran fine for 59,000 miles then the Knock Sensor software 'update' and now it has gone into 'Limp Mode' three times in the past two months at highway speeds at 3,000 ft elevation; the most recent at 3,000 RPM passing a truck on Interstate 8, 90 miles East of San Diego. Limp mode limits RPM to 'under 2,000' and only the dealer can turn it off... Dealer says: ''we do not have an altitude problem''... (maybe we have an 'Interstate 8' problem ?...)
To the dealers' and Hyundai credit, they have provided a comp rental car while they make 'repairs' and extended my Warrantee from 60,000 miles to 120,000 miles.
I do not see any other posts on Hyundai forums regarding this Limp Mode issue...
Any insight would be helpful....
Dave B.
San Diego Ca
[email protected]

 

[Ticmxman]

To the best of my knowledge Hyundai came up with the 953 campaign to attempt to prevent catastrophic engine failure that could result in fires in the engine bay. The idea is the knock sensor will monitor certain parts of the engine, probably the crankshaft and connecting rods, bearings and if a problem is detected RPMs will be reduced to try and allow the vehicle to safely get to the shop. Unfortunately there have been reports of false positives due to wiring harness or sensor faults. I have no idea how common these false positives are or if it effects more of the older models vs the 2019s.

FWIW I did ask if my service department had seen any come in and they said only one and it was a 2015.

 

[SnailFe]

I tend to be optimistic and hope that the theta problems have been resolved, but maybe after spending a huge amount of money replacing engines, Hyundai decided to roll out the knock sensor ECU upgrade to detect premature engine failure as a risk mitigation for all cars with those engines just in case there are some latent issues. If they catch a few engines early and can fix it with bearings instead of replacing the entire engine, it’s probably a huge net savings.

My experience with risk management is that the low likelihood/high consequence area of the risk matrix is a terrible place to be. Take an extreme example that there’s a 1 in 1 million chance that an asteroid is on a collision to destroy all life on earth but it will take a trillion dollars to mitigate by redirecting it. What do you do? Spend a trillion bucks and have it miss anyway and your decision will look terrible. Spend nothing and the asteroid misses and you’ve “saved“ $1 trillion. You‘ve got 1 in 1 million odds of being a hero with a successful diversion. (On the plus side, spend nothing and get hit then there’s nobody around to criticize your decision, except maybe your spouse will have a few choice words for you .)

Making up some numbers, Hyundai might have thought along the lines that it will cost $40 to add to every car, but it might cost $6000 to replace an engine, so that’s allowing 1 failure for every 150 cars to break even, which would still be too many engine failures. But they have a bigger incentive: customer loyalty. We want reliable cars and if there’s a problem, quick fixes are preferable to timely engine replacements.

 

[Tantor67]

I took mine in for a 9000 mile service. I change my oil every 3000 miles. I have a 2019 ultimate 2.0 all-wheel drive and they did the update to the knock sensor yesterday. I did not even know about the TSB on that

 

[Ticmxman]

I tend to be optimistic and hope that the theta problems have been resolved, but maybe after spending a huge amount of money replacing engines, Hyundai decided to roll out the knock sensor ECU upgrade to detect premature engine failure as a risk mitigation for all cars with those engines just in case there are some latent issues. If they catch a few engines early and can fix it with bearings instead of replacing the entire engine, it’s probably a huge net savings.

My experience with risk management is that the low likelihood/high consequence area of the risk matrix is a terrible place to be. Take an extreme example that there’s a 1 in 1 million chance that an asteroid is on a collision to destroy all life on earth but it will take a trillion dollars to mitigate by redirecting it. What do you do? Spend a trillion bucks and have it miss anyway and your decision will look terrible. Spend nothing and the asteroid misses and you’ve “saved“ $1 trillion. You‘ve got 1 in 1 million odds of being a hero with a successful diversion. (On the plus side, spend nothing and get hit then there’s nobody around to criticize your decision, except maybe your spouse will have a few choice words for you .)

Making up some numbers, Hyundai might have thought along the lines that it will cost $40 to add to every car, but it might cost $6000 to replace an engine, so that’s allowing 1 failure for every 150 cars to break even, which would still be too many engine failures. But they have a bigger incentive: customer loyalty. We want reliable cars and if there’s a problem, quick fixes are preferable to timely engine replacements.

Yeah I was optimistic that the issue was resolved or greatly reduced when I bought my 2019 in December but I also new it was an unknown. I agree there was probably some risk management by Hyundai both financial and public relations wise when they implemented the 953 campaign. Having news reports and lawsuits of vehicles catching on fire likely motivated them as well. With all that hopefully the bulk of the failures were in earlier models.
At the very least 953 should improve the safety of the Santa Fe, just too bad it’s needed at all.

 

[wsubball]

Is it me but after the 953 update, my gas mileage has dropped noticeably (2019 SantaFe Ultimate Turbo). I had the oil changed, tires rotated, also was due for the engine additives as well, not sure if that matters. Anyone else notice the same?

 

[SnailFe]

Colder temps and winter gas blends usually result in a hit to mpg. Perhaps it’s coincidental timing?

 

[wsubball]

I have documented every fill since I've owned the car, just over a year (fill up at the same location unless traveling) and I have stayed between 21-26 and now I'm tracking 19!. I'm hoping it's the additives, not sure what they are, and it comes back to normal in a couple fills.

Another note. After I had the update done the very next day I received an email from corporate prompting me to get it done with the offering of extending the warranty. I checked the VIN now and that campaign has been satisfied. So then that made me wonder if that update was doing more than an improvement update.

 

[AllenChicago]

Received the software update availability notice this past Spring for my 2015 Sonata. Got the update done over the Summer at the dealer. Took about 45 minutes. The service manager told me that the engine would now be more aware of internal problems that could be treated before they became serious.

Fast forward to November 2019. My Sonata engine light starts blinking and the car goes into "limp mode" (max rpm computer limited to 1800).

After 2 days of the dealer trying this and that, I just said screw it. Traded it in for a 2020 Santa Fe.

Even though the Sonata had 148,000 miles, the Dealer was working on fixing it under warranty. (Service bulletin limited the max miles to 120,000. Dealer made an exception.)

If they had not done that software update over the Summer, I would still be driving just fine. Sometimes problems are so minor, they don't become a real issue for many many thousands of miles later. Sensing them when they are actually just normal wear/tear is not beneficial, IMO.

We see that in the medical industry. I can put any one of us under a deep full-body CAT Scan and find at least 3 tiny problems within the body. But putting you into "Limp Mode" until you choose to have the little smudge on your gallbladder removed, would be a dumb thing to do. YET...that is what Hyundai is doing.

Also, the dealer can look for additional profit producing services while you're there. That's a biggie these days.

 

[Scott2015]

Is it me but after the 953 update, my gas mileage has dropped noticeably (2019 SantaFe Ultimate Turbo). I had the oil changed, tires rotated, also was due for the engine additives as well, not sure if that matters. Anyone else notice the same?

Absolutely! I used to get close to 26mpg back and forth to work. After the update getting 22-23. It certainly seems anecdotally that the update is making adjustments to engine operation that result in reducing mpg. I wonder if they have reduced horse power in doing so.

In my opinion, all indications are that Hyundai is clearly aware of a serious engine design flaw and is doing anything they can to avoid failures including silently reducing performance and gas mileage.

That is not okay if it's the case! I started a thread dedicated to that question so we can get an idea of how many owners notice this change.

Campaign 953 Reducing Gas Mileage ???

Many Santa Fe owners have recently received the Hyundai engine software update Campaign 953 in the mail or from their dealer. I found out while at the dealer for an oil change. I was reading the following thread on Campaign 953 and several users complained of reduced gas mileage...

www.hyundai-forums.com

 

[Scott2015]

To the best of my knowledge Hyundai came up with the 953 campaign to attempt to prevent catastrophic engine failure that could result in fires in the engine bay. The idea is the knock sensor will monitor certain parts of the engine, probably the crankshaft and connecting rods, bearings and if a problem is detected RPMs will be reduced to try and allow the vehicle to safely get to the shop. Unfortunately there have been reports of false positives due to wiring harness or sensor faults. I have no idea how common these false positives are or if it effects more of the older models vs the 2019s.

FWIW I did ask if my service department had seen any come in and they said only one and it was a 2015.

ANY detection system will suffer from false positives. Increasing detection sensitivity will almost always result in increased false positives. In this case Hyundai appears to be modifying the function of the existing pre-ignition (knock) sensors to try and detect sloppy, worn main bearings or possibly wrist pins before the engine completely seizes. They are doing this to avoid catastrophic failures as noted in the Campaign mailing. Repurposing a sensor like this and likely increasing the sensitivity to do so, could certainly increase false positives.

I visited my dealer just a few weeks back. They did the Campaign 953 update. I've observed no adverse behavior and my engine service lights remain off.

I also got the Campaign 953 announcement in the mail today. Reading further about this worries me. It certainly appears Hyundai screwed something up in this engine design regarding the crank main bearings or wrist pins. I don't see any other way to perceive this Campaign. NOBODY would do this for an engine design that was exhibiting expected reliability.

They aren't extending the long block warranty to 120k EVEN FOR SUBSEQUENT OWNERS out of their benevolence. They want to head off a PR disaster before it starts. Kudos to their proactive approach. Nevertheless, it would appear that us 2019 Santa Fe owners may have a rough road ahead. ☹

I've already been dealing with the Slip-n-Jerk shifting problem. Frankly this engine does not sound as tight as it should for an engine with 8k on it.

I've never experienced these kinds of problems with a new vehicle before not even my crappy Ford Windstar!

I'm really losing faith in this vehicle and Hyundai.

 

[Latitude42]

I have received the 953 campaign letter from Hyundai on my 2019 SF. I am very leery, especially with some of you saying that you experienced a MPG hit.

Back before Dieslegate exploded into a worldwide debacle, I received a seemingly benign campaign letter for my VW Diesel (yes one of the dirty ones, I would learn some weeks later) saying they wanted to update my ECM software to prevent false MILs. I blithely took the software update for my VW, and my fuel economy went down.

Eventually I took the Dieslgate buyback and used the proceeds to pay for most of my SF. I had read about the problems with the 2.4L Theta-2 engines in earlier years, but that gave me confidence that the engines were pre-disasterized (i.e., the faulty process that resulted in metal chips and blocked lubrication must be long gone). And now, here they are alluding they are still worried.