2004 Kia Optima LX Review - A Lot Has Changed Since 2004!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 18 มิ.ย. 2024
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The thoughts, feelings, and opinions expressed in this video are the sole thoughts of Zack and no one else. The thoughts expressed in this video do not reflect the owner, dealership, or organization that owns the vehicle featured. The purpose of this video is to provide entertainment with the hope that you will take what you see and formulate your own opinions. DO NOT make a financial decision based off of this video.
#Kia #Optima
Timecodes:
0:00 - Intro
1:02 - Drivetrain
2:33 - Interior
3:49 - BFB Test
4:05 - Interior
4:30 - Back Seats
5:21 - Trunk / Cargo Space
5:49 - Exterior
6:17 - Final Thoughts
7:39 - Outro - ยานยนต์และพาหนะ
Some Kia fun facts:
They own a Korean pro baseball team the “Kia tiger”. Hyundai had one back in the early 2000s called the “Hyundai unicorn” but since folded.
Kia was a bicycle manufacturer before making motorcycles then a motorbike/pick up hybrid that was ubiquitous in Korea many decades ago, then went into car production. Their motorcycles were equipped with Honda motors. Occasionally I find Kia vintage bicycles for sale on Facebook market.
Hyundai and Kia were competitors before they merged. Until 1966, the Korean government only allowed one car manufacturer (shinjin motors 1955-1981) and one truck manufacturer. Shinjin cars were the most common in Korea back in that era. They also made cars for Toyota including the crown, corona, ace pick up, etc… yes Toyotas made in Korea! They were branded “shinjin publica” “shinjin corona” “shinjin crown”. After 1966, other companies were allowed or make commercial cars for the public. Hyundai was approved in 1967 and Kia in 1971.
Hyundai first model in the US was the excel (never got the pony) in 1986, Kia with the sephia in 1992. They were not merged at that time.
I've never been this early on a Shooting Cars video before... Kia was a totally different brand back then.
It’s such an interesting car
Honestly, Kia cars were way more reliable back then, despite the revisionist history aimed against them. At least this classic '04 Optima won't catch on fire or be stolen as easily as the new Kias.
@@hakeemsd70m Good to know. Previously, I thought the opposite. xD
My Grandma had a 04 LX for years. She loved that car, and it was honestly very reliable and felt solid. She eventually gave it to my cousin and I'm pretty sure he has it to this day.
I am the owner of this Kia. I bought it from an old lady who had it since new. She not only kept the first aid kit as seen in the video but also kept the window sticker and the delivery inspection checklist. I paid $2,700 back in May for the car and drove it 7,000+ miles since. Only thing I had to do to it was replace a wheel bearing. I have taken her on two road trips, one to Trumansburg, New York and the other to Troy, Michigan. It is one pleasant cruiser on the highway.
Fun fact:
The optima engine is literally a mashup. Block is 4g64 head is 4g63.
Also Hyundai Kia bought left over rear end molds from Chevy ecentially having the rear ends from the late corsica.
Weird timing. My daughter totaled my 08 this morning, Shes ok. It served me for 300,000 miles with no problems.
Really love the variety of cars you review - thanks for keeping that going!
but please clean them before the test, FGS!
That's the nicest condition Kia I've ever seen. How the kept it from falling apart in Ohio is beyond me, well done car owner.
This is the owner here. Honestly, she isn't perfect but I bought her that way with one intention - to be a great work vehicle. To which it is. It has served me well, that I will say. I have driven it 7000 miles in the last four months, taking it on two trips and going up to my grandma's, 50 miles away, twice to three times a month. Only thing I had to do to it was replace a wheel bearing.
I inherited one from my grandpa that was immaculate and had 46,000 miles. I gave it to my niece and she destroyed it within 1 year 😢
So much has changed and yet, it's still hard to believe this thing is nearly 20 years old...
And yet drives perfectly. I love driving this thing. I would drive this over a brand new BMW or Tesla. She is fun in her own ways.
@@McElroysMotorsI agree, this old Optima is way more reliable than anything Tesla has ever made.
At the time, this car was supposed to be luxury at half the price of its competitors. You could get an EX edition for under $20K, or possibly a little over that mark. Plus, it still had an available 100K mile warranty. I had one as a rental in college and I thought it was fine for what it was. What I remember best were the ads. “Frank” was showing off his new Optima to all his friends and his wife and whenever someone would point out it was his car, he’d quip “It is, isn’t it?”
That gen was called the Magentis here in England,the last two gens were called Optimas here though,which is a better name,in my opinion! I had a rental on a trip 'home' to Pennsylvania in the early 2000s that was the Optimas sibling,the Sonata! It was comfy,albeit the steering was a bit too over-assisted.
Every mundane car from back then is totally fun
Agreed!
This was my very first car although it was the EX with leather interior but still the 2.4 four cylinder and I loved it. Never had major issues with it for the 6 years I own it. I drove it hard and sold it with 188,000 miles and the engine and transmission were still good. Sometimes I just miss this car.
Takes me back. I worked car rental in the early 2000's.
Cars back then had only what they needed, no fancy screens, no too many assistances, no unnecessary tech and one thing specially: no overprices
Damn this thing is 'crusty' at the rear arches.. Design wise I really like these things. :D
I really like these cars because it barely even competed with the Camry and accords of the world but i rooted for the underdog and I remember some car and driver magazine saying it had some monster looking front end
Neighbor had one of these. I really like the looks. I drove hers once and went out and bought one.
In 2009 my sister bought a 2008 Kia Optima from Enterprise car sales with thirty thousand miles on it. It is now 2024 and she is still driving that car. Currently it has about 150,000 miles on it and I have always done the oil changes on it. It has been a really good car for her and at 77 she has no plans to buy another car, like she said it is paid for I don't go that much and how much longer am I going to be driving.
Hola, tengo un Kia Optima 2.0 año 2004, caja manual con 167.000 kilomentros. Muy comodo y un andar suave.
Lo unico lamentable que aca en mi pais CHILE, se descontinuo el modelo, es dificil encontrar algunos repuestos. La distribucion la consegui en ROCKAUTO por el modelo 2.4, a excepcion de la correa larga y la correa compensadora que le encontre aca.
Me falta cambiar los opticos delanteros pero salen muy costosos comprarlos en Korea o USA.
Saludos!!
Una de las reviews mas cortas tal vez
Kia made substantial improvements to its designs in the years since.
My uncle used to have one of these, I think his was a 2004. I used to call it the poor man's Jag!
That was the KIA Amanti lol
@@MandusahRamirez his was a Kia Optima.
@@MandusahRamirez I owe you an apology; I was talking to my uncle today & I asked him if he remembered that Kia he used to have, he said "Yeah, that Amanti, I remember that car!" I guess I was wrong & you were right, I apologize.
Side profile looks like a Jaguar and 4 headlights reminds me of early 2000's Lexus Gs 300
Bring back velour upholstery.
I had a EX v6 and it was an excellent car. Powerful enough and problem free till I sold it with 200k on the clock
These 2.4s are generally regarded to be more reliable than the ones that came later in the 2010s. It had more power and got better fuel economy, but at the expense of reliability.
Kia and Hyundai went from the bottom to one of the best brands. If only other brands would improve themselves instead of being so greedy.
2.4 liter 4 cylinder and 138 horsepower. My 1.8 4 in my Corolla made the same horsepower.
My grandma had a black one for some reason it stopped locking completely had to manually lock them but 2011 and up optimas definitely have improved though some of them did have a built-in camp fire but I do currently drive a 2012 Kia optima LX it's nice car for what it is
My dad had one of these when I was little and it did the same thing, specifically the driver's door 😂😂
@@darthdarthbinkss yup that's the door I remember it very well 😂😂
I think if you were gonna get this car, black or grey were probably the colors to have. It made it look nicer, somehow. I think the rental I had was black and it looked good on this design, to me.
Now you should do a 2008 Kia optima
I just bought one 97k miles almost mint conditions
How much are one of these things worth under 100k miles
I don't think I've ever heard someone pronounce the word Mitsubishi like that. (Meet-soo-bee-she) is how I'm familiar hearing it
Nowadays, these are very good and reliable cars if u can find them..
Known as the Magentis in other countries
Well, that was a typical Korean D-class sedan of its time - "big car, small money". We had the 2006 Hyundai Sonata (which was the same car) - slow, cheap looking, not very exciting to drive, still very durable.
That is set up a lot like my moms XG350
I don't like Nissan, but in those years the Nissan Altima was miles away in the looks departament compare with all other sedans in the segment
I also don’t like Nissan as well but I love the 80s and 90s Nissans especially the dachshunds they started going downhill in the 2000s and started instead of making better cars. They started making worse cars and now it’s the crappy cars and crappy minivans that you see today that are not reliable.
I drive a 2004 EX fully loaded, entirely different vibe 😂
Crappy cars these are, though I still see them regularly. These things will run poorly longer than many cars will run at all. This one looks well taken care of and doesn't look bad for a 00s car.
I never understood the luxury appeal of leather. Leather is hot in the summer, cold in the winter, requires conditioning, and doesn't breathe. Soft cloth used to be the luxury option while the chauffeur got hardwearing leather to sit on.
Kia Magentis in other matkets like Canada.
Kinda looks like a 2000 Mitsubishi Galant especially in the rear bumper & tail lights
Early 00s Kia copied everyone as they were trying to figure out what to do. Look at a Kia Amanti. It looks like an unfortunate knockoff of a Jaguar and a Mercedes-Benz.
This was what Subaru once dubbed as the "2011 Mediocrity." With the way Kias look now, who's mediocre now, Subie? 😅
It should have a V8!
This Kia looks just like a Hyundai. I don't know if Hyundai owned Kia back then but they are both Korean car companies
I may have details wrong, but i believe they were closely connected when Ford sold its Kia stake to Hyundai in (I believe) the late 90s
Kia always seems to he 10 years behind...even today...
Kia will always be behind
Not everyone can afford or even wants brand new technology in car.
Modern Kia is doing very well and has competitive vehicles.
@@bwofficial1776 Of course you have the right to your opinion and I respect that but for ME I wouldn’t touch a Kia Hyundai product with a 25 Foot pole
If you take a Mercedes S-Class or some Tesla product with a super-futuristic and minimalistic interiour (and no- it is only cheap to do it that way), most cars are behind...
Looking to the average-car-level, Kia / Hyundai products are today fine and well built
I had an 05 sonata v6 while the v6 is Hyundai the transmission is a Mitsubishi transmission on both engines. Really reliable but not perfect, interior is eons more comfortable than a Camry of the same year and drives better and rides better over potholes. Not more power than the Camry 3.3 v6 by any means but I'll take more comfort over the horrid Camry interior of the same year. The AC is a weak spot on these though the clutch bearing wears out on all of them.
The interior fit and finish of these cars is very impressive. My mom had an '03 Hyundai XG350L and this car kind of reminds me of it.
man these things were hideous and disgustingly cheap feeling, looks like a wish version of a regular vehicle
As this cars owner, I agree, it is ugly. Like, REALLY ugly, but no doubt filled with character. But, I do like the ugly, underrated, overlooked cars. And yes, some bits feel cheap, but she has held up for almost 20 years, and to be fair, some cars can't do that. My 2012 Chrysler 200 made this feel like an Audi and it's much easier to live with.
While Hyundai & Kia have gotten better then the cars from 20 years ago, their build quality is still not as good as the Japanese especially with the engine/transmission which don't last as long as a Toyota
Their build quality is great, Kia and Hyundai have the most reliable V6 on the market.
Well according to JD powers and others they are very reliable great quality cars
Hyundai's reliability has actually taken a nosedive since these days of the early-mid 00's.
@@hakeemsd70m lol no they have definitely improved since then
@hakeemsd70m Hyundai is one of the most reliable brands today, what are you talking about? In the early days, they were using Ford parts which caused reliability issues.
very Midwest way of pronouncing Mitsubishi lol
Another victim of theft 2004 sad
Kia sucks!!!
Nissan sucks
They suck, and they’re terrible with their crappy cars and crappy minivans and little mundane cars and crappy cars that are honestly just junk
We owned a 2013 quest V6 and I own a 2004 Kia optima V6 do you want to know which one is the better car? The Optima. The Optima in every way is better than the Nissan because it feels better even though it’s about 20 years old it feels better and it’s very solid and reliable. At least we have a reliable machine to take us back-and-forth without worrying about it breaking down. The Nissan quest looked terrible. I liked it at first, but. had my second thoughts terrible the Nissan it’s terrible we got the car when it was three years old we were getting rid of our old car that was getting old and giving us problems. This car looked brand new, but then when we drove it for a while issues started to occur. The transmission started feeling the brakes started feeling engine issues later on stalling issues. It would stall out tire issues other issues and honestly it wasn’t good. It looked like a clean car when we got it but then when we got rid of it, and when we were finished it with it it looked like crap. It was all full of crap and full of junk. also, this is a 2013 car we’re talking about and it looked about 10 years behind. Yeah that’s correct it looked 10 years behind. It was very basic the van head manual sliding doors a manual trunk manual seats all round the radio unit was probably some old one that they slept in to all different sorts of Nissans from 2005 it had a six disc and auxiliary there were no USB ports which is OK for a car of this era it had at the front one single cigarette lighter port. There was none in the middle row. There’s one in the trunk. These adapters were fine but it could’ve been nicer if the middle passengers could’ve gotten an adapter , the car did have pushbutton start though, but that was it. That’s only the modern feature that it had. On the other hand if I were to buy a Kia from that era, it would’ve had a lot more to offer. Even this 2004 Kia had a lot more which is honestly good. I honestly love the Optimus they’re nice and big and long and comfortable they’re not like a fancy luxury car like a Cadillac but they’re not like a poor little cheap crappy Munden car like a Sentra or a versa, they’re a good car for a good family. I still try to keep it nice I have various other Hyundai and Kia’s as well which try to keep nice. I am not buying another Nissan again because they’re complete junk if you want to buy a car or minivan and you’re considering the Nissan quest will cross it off , you can get better offerings from Hyundai and Kia and even Toyota and Honda