AtWhatMileage
Glass · 5 owner reports

Other visibility problem on the 1998 Hyundai Sonata

Only 1 report for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.

Reports of this failure 5
With an odometer reading 1
Reports per 1,000 built 0.3 per 1,000
Filed below 36,000 miles 0%
Mention a crash, fire or injury 0
Typical repair $150–$1,400
What it means when it happens Moderate
Rank among this year's problems 4th

When other visibility problem gets reported

There are 5 reports of other visibility problem on the 1998 Hyundai Sonata, 1 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.

A part like this is normally expected to survive 75,000 miles. It is the 4th most-reported problem on this model year.

The whole distribution

Percentiles of the 1 odometer readings owners gave.
10th25thMedian 75th90th
— — 43,000 miles — —

Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.

What a percentile can and cannot tell you here

These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.

What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.

Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.

What happens, and what it costs

Putting it right typically runs $150–$1,400 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.

The same failure on other years

The same failure is reported on 15 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2012, at a median of 300 miles, and latest on the 2018 at 125,000 miles.

By volume the 2006 carries the most reports, with 176; the 1998 has 5. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.

If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.

Median
  1. 1997 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 64k
  2. 1998 (this one) 43k
  3. 1999 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 77k
  4. 2000 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  5. 2001 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 58k
  6. 2002 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 79k
  7. 2003 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 56
  8. 2004 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 115k
  9. 2005 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 4k
  10. 2006 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 64k
  11. 2007 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 60k
  12. 2008 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 57k
  13. 2009 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 54k
  14. 2010 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 71
  15. 2011 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 28k
  16. 2012 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 290
  17. 2013 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 6k
  18. 2014 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 26k
  19. 2015 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 44k
  20. 2016 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 44k
  21. 2017 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 25k
  22. 2018 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 125k
  23. 2020 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem 1k
  24. 2021 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  25. 2022 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  26. 2023 Hyundai Sonata other visibility problem
    no odometer readings given
    —

Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens

What owners wrote

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.

Turn signals and hazards failed. All fuses, control box, and wiring were checked and problem could not be found. In addition, electric window assembly plastic pulleys have broken in 3 of 4 doors. Causing windows to remain in either up or down position. *tt

43,000 miles NHTSA complaint 410182 filed 2003-06-01

Also reported on the 1998 Hyundai Sonata

Other powertrain problem

8 reports median 41k

Fuel tank, filler or EVAP failure

7 reports median 90k

Door latch or handle failure

6 reports median 70k

Other body or interior problem

5 reports median 71k

Other electrical problem

3 reports median 43k

How far this goes

This page is kept out of search results because 5 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.

Complaints are voluntary, so 5 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.

Questions this page answers

At what mileage does other visibility problem happen on the 1998 Hyundai Sonata?

Across 1 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 45,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.

How common is other visibility problem on the 1998 Hyundai Sonata?

5 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.3 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.

What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars

Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed