Other engine problem on the 2013 Kia Forte
2 crashes 4 fires 1 injury 7 of the 71 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When other engine problem gets reported
Owners of the 2013 Kia Forte report other engine problem at a median of 90,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 67,500 miles and a quarter after 117,500 miles, from 48 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 1st most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 50,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 135,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 83,574 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.
2% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50,326 miles | 68,250 miles | 90,000 miles | 118,613 miles | 133,900 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
Of these reports, 2 a crash, 4 a fire and 1 an injury are mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $300–$4,000 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 14 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2022, at a median of 20,000 miles, and latest on the 2011 at 115,000 miles.
By volume the 2014 carries the most reports, with 129; the 2013 has 71. 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.
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.
Kia forte 2013 purchased new and had problems with car when driving 55-70 miles at highway speed. The car shakes,tires make noises like they're flat,trouble with steering,really rough ride,smoke came from engine and the car has been a pain considering it's supposed to be new. It also leaks when it rains and sometimes you can't see out rear window. All these things and more were reported to kia motors who sent me to dealership. The dealership scoffed at the referral,stated kia motors knows about problems and allegedly checked forte reporting nothing can be done and nothing is wrong. The car continues to have problems and is a total waste of money plus feels unsafe. There should be some accountability with kia somewhere but there isn't...guess that's the business cushion. *tr
The oil engine light came on while the car was at idle. Turn the engine off and it failed to restart. I had the car towed to the nearest dealer and after numerous times of them trying at starting the car, the car started up only to shut off. Then they checked it out again to find that the engine had lock up. Now I am being asked to pay for a new engine or get a new car.
Was driving the vehicle at 50 MPH when an unknown noise began coming from the engine. I was about 3 miles from home, by the time I got home the noise was much louder. I shut it off and immediately had the vehicle towed to my closest kia dealership. The vehicle is currently 2,200 miles under the 100,000 mile warranty (original owner). The dealership called me about 2 hours later and told me that the engine experienced a "catastrophic failure" (later I learned a rod had gone bad) and my warranty was voided due to "oil sludge" in the engine. The service department immediately began talking about selling me a new car, which I declined. I also declined any maintenance to be performed. I then had the vehicle towed to a private certified mechanic who sent a camera inside the engine and determined that there was no "sludge" to be found. The mechanic also determined that there was no way for kia to know this since he could tell that neither the valve cover, nor any other engine part, had been removed to facilitate such inspection. Now I am faced with $3,700 in engine replacement costs since kia refuses to acknowledge the problem. Kia seems…
Also reported on the 2013 Kia Forte
Other brake problem
Complete engine failure or seizure
Tail light, brake light or signal failure
Other electrical problem
Airbag failed to deploy in a crash
Engine knock or bearing noise
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 71 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 engine problem happen on the 2013 Kia Forte?
Across 48 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 90,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 67,500 miles and a quarter after 117,500 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other engine problem on the 2013 Kia Forte?
71 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 2.1 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