2013 Kia Rio Lx on 2040-cars

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Electrify Expo is an all-electrified auto show like the old days

In late July, Autoblog swung by Washington, D.C. to check out the Electrify Expo. Now in its third year of nationwide shows, the Electrify Expo calls itself “North America's largest electric vehicle festival filled with over 1 million square feet of the world's top electric brands.” At every stop, visitors can find out about, crawl around in, drive and ride just about any personal conveyance that uses a battery for propulsion. Truth be told, when the show's PR team reached out to us with an invite, we only considered going after finding out about an area showcasing battery-electric tuner cars. EV tuning is undoubtedly going to be huge—eventually—which got us curious about these early days. We figured weÂ’d brave whatever the rest of the expo was to find out whatÂ’s the equivalent of nitrous for a Tesla. See, the EV event scene is still such that one never knows if theyÂ’ll show up to a mix of science and county fairs with a few cars on display just for truth in advertising, or if theyÂ’ll show up to a parking lot with 26 cars, 10 of them locked, 10 of them homemade, and 6 guarded by promotional hires desperate to tap all your identifying info a tablet before dispensing dubious and superficial information. Which is to say, we didnÂ’t expect much. And that makes us chuffed to report: Electrify Expo is great. We hadnÂ’t been strolling the lot outside the old RFK Stadium for five minutes before thinking, “This feels like an old-school auto show!” The exclamation to that point came from a group of four who cut me off to reach the C40 Recharge in the Volvo booth, one of them exclaiming as if he were the group expert and as if his friends were deaf, “THATÂ’S THE LEAST EXPENSIVE ONE! AND ITÂ’S BEEEE-YOUUUUU-TI-FULLLLLL!” I wasnÂ’t there to judge, I was there for the enthusiasm. Automakers had built small, simple, open booths, parked cars in them, then provided visitors the kind of interactions that will do the most good for anyone wondering about or interested in an EV. We only saw two cars that were off limits, the new Volkswagen ID.Buzz and the Ford F-100 Eluminator. Volvo wouldnÂ’t let me get an espresso from their chic little trailer, either, unless I visited the EX90 Experience trailer first. Otherwise, it was a free-for-all. Tesla had a large booth full of cars. BMW had two i7s open for everyone to sit in, next to the Ford booth with that Eluminator and an unlocked Mustang Mach-E GT and F-150 Lightning showing their cooler-chest-frunk trick.

NHTSA looking into non-Takata airbag shrapnel case

The global airbag inflator recall from Takata has been one of the biggest topics in auto safety for months. Now, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is opening a preliminary evaluation into the components from Arc Automotive to investigate whether two reported ruptures and two injuries signal a wider problem. So far, only the 2002 Chrysler Town & Country and 2004 Kia Optima are believed to be affected. If a safety campaign is deemed necessary, it could cover an estimated 420,000 of the minivans and 70,000 of the Korean sedans. NHTSA first noticed these ruptures in December 2014. The agency received a complaint of a 2009 case in Ohio about the bursting of the driver's side inflator in a 2002 Town & Country. According to the report, the incident broke the woman's jaw and sent shrapnel into her chest. The government investigated the case, and this was found to be the only known occurrence in these vehicles. The analysis indicated the part's gases were possibly blocked somehow and caused the component to explode. FCA US spokesperson Eric Mayne told Autoblog that the company is "cooperating fully" with NHTSA. "Also, we no longer use that inflator," he said. A second incident came to NHTSA's attention in June 2015 with the driver's side rupture in a 2004 Optima in New Mexico. The agency lists fewer details about the case, and a root cause isn't known. This is also the only currently known example in a Kia vehicle. According to a statement from Kia to Autoblog, "We are taking this matter very seriously and support NHTSA's action and will continue working cooperatively with the agency and suppliers throughout the process." Arc's components are sealed within a steel housing that's meant to protect them from "external atmospheric conditions," according to NHTSA. Multiple suppliers also use them. In the Chrysler, the airbag module came from Key Safety Systems and from Delphi in the Kia. In a statement to Autoblog the company said, "We have received NHTSA's notification and are cooperating fully with its Preliminary Evaluation." At this time, NHTSA admits that it doesn't know for certain whether these two cases are linked. The agency is conducting this preliminary evaluation to learn more.

2014 Kia Optima is better by a nose

Kia is showing off a slew of vehicles here in New York, including the ever-so-slightly refreshed 2014 Optima sedan you see here. The brunt of the changes surround the new front fascia, with repositioned LED lighting above the headlamp units and some new quad-LED fogs rounding of a touched-up front bumper. At the rear, Kia has reworked the taillamps, and of course, LEDs are found there, as well.
Other changes to the Optima for 2014 include the additions of two new displays inside the cabin - a 4.3-inch TFT display in the gauge cluster and a larger, eight-inch high-resolution screen that houses the navigation and infotainment data. There are also new seats inside the Optima, which are hopefully more comfortable and offer better bolstering than the decidedly flat chairs found in the current car, plus Kia has added available new safety features like blind spot monitoring and cross-traffic alert.
The powertrain offerings have not changed for 2014 - base cars still get a naturally aspirated 2.4-liter engine while the SX models get the 2.0-liter turbo. There is, however, a new Drive Mode Select system specifically for the SX, which adjusts transmission shift points and steering weight for a more engaging dynamic, or so we're told. (The Optima Hybrid model did receive upgrades to its battery and electric motor just recently, but those changes technically hit during the 2013 model year - it is not immediately clear if the gas-electric model will receive the updates shown here).