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A Nevada couple is suing Hyundai over an alleged transmission defect that causes the accelerator to become unresponsive in certain vehicles leading to spontaneously stalling.
Plaintiffs Nicholas and Shawna Wylie filed the complaint Tuesday seeking to represent a group of consumers who purchased or leased any Hyundai Veloster, Sonata or Elantra vehicle equipped with a 7-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission (DCT).
In October 2014, Hyundai premiered its 7-speed DCT, designed to “provide an improvement in fuel consumption and CO2 emission compared to a conventional six-gear automated transmission, while acceleration performance increases” and featuring two dry clutches that transfer engine power “independently into the odd and even gear train to always be ready to shift into the next gear.”
However, the Wylies, who own a Veloster Turbo, allege that Hyundai’s 7-speed DCT contains a design defect in the Transmission Control Module (TCM) that causes, among other problems, failure to shift, stalling, delayed acceleration, or loss of power.
The TCM is a small electronic component within the powertrain that processes data from various sensors throughout the engine in order to determine the optimal gear for shifting and fuel-economy.
“These conditions are hazardous because they severely affect the driver’s ability to control the vehicle during normal driving conditions and prevent drivers from accelerating to maintain safe speeds in traffic,” the Wylies contend.
“Class members (as well as members of the general public) remain subject to dangerous transmission malfunctions that can occur without warning,” they stated.
For example, the TCM defect may make it difficult for drivers to accelerate safely from traffic stops because Class Members’ vehicles hesitate, fail to shift gears, and stall when drivers try to accelerate from stops.
Since at least 2015, through consumer complaints and dealership repair orders, among other internal sources, Hyundai reportedly knew or should have known that the 7-speed DCT in these vehicles contains a design defect that impairs drivability and causes safety hazards, in part because the same concerns were expressed regarding the 2016-2017 Hyundai Tucson that is equipped with the same 7-speed DCT and TCM.
“Corporate officers, directors, or managers knew about the TCM defect but failed to disclose it. … Hyundai either refused to acknowledge [the problems’] existence or performed repairs that simply masked them,” the lawsuits says.
In fact, in August 2016, Hyundai issued a Technical Service Bulletin for Hyundai Tucson vehicles equipped with the 7- speed DCT and a limited recall in September 2016 for certain models of the same vehicles informing its dealers that a faulty “transmission clutch application logic can result in a delayed engagement when accelerating from a stop” or fail to accelerate at all “if the accelerator pedal is repeatedly cycled.”
According to the lawsuit, Hyundai dealers were instructed to reprogram the TCM in the affected vehicles. However, both the TSB and the recall were limited to the 2016 Tucson, despite owners complaining of similar issues in other Hyundai vehicles equipped with the same 7-speed DCT.
The Wylies claim that if they had known about these TCM defects when they purchased their Hyundai vehicle, they and other potential Class Members would not have purchased or leased the vehicles.
The Wylies are represented by Jordan Lurie, Tarek Zohdy, Cody Padgett and Karen Wallace of Capstone Law APC and Troy Isaacson, Norberto Cisneros and Barbara McDonald of Maddox Isaacson Cisneros LLP.
The Hyundai Defective Transmission Class Action Lawsuit is Wylie v. Hyundai, Case No. 8:16-cv-02102, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
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158 thoughts onHyundai Class Action Says DCT Transmissions Are Defective
I own a 2017 Hyundai Tucson Eco. Bought it brand new in May 2017. Pretty much since the day I took delivery I’ve had a problem with stalling & hesitation when pulling out onto a street or from a red light. The car has been into 2 different dealerships and I was told they can not replicate the issue even though they only drove the car around the block. I was told the issue maybe related to the ‘dual clutch’ and that it’s a common misconception that there’s an issue with the transmission and I need to relearn how to drive. And I was told that you ‘just need to give it more gas to “wake” the transmission. Well I think at 50-yrs old and a clean driving record I know how to drive. 6-weeks ago while merging onto the highway the car once again hesitated, started to buck and then smelt like something was burning. Less than 500 ft later the dash lights lit up like Christmas morning and then the car completely died. A week later the dealership called me and said the motor had blown. I truly believe the motor blew because the transmission kept slipping out of gear, over rev’d the motor and blew it. It’s been 6-weeks, Hyundai dealership has been dragging their feet to fix my car, saying the Corporate office wants pictures on my oil pan. A week later Corporate wanted pictures of my Valves. A week later they told me they tried to start the car to get it into the garage to look at it but it wouldn’t start (duh) so they would have to find time to push it in. A week later I was told they were going to order the engine. A week later they needed to order additional parts. Now i’m told the dealership is just too busy to work on it. I’ve been in touch with Hyundai corporate and was assigned a case manger. He called me once and left me a voice message introducing himself and to call him any time. I’ve now called him 4 times asking if he could give me an update and maybe help speed things up but he never calls me back.
Hyundai is a joke and I’ll never buy another car from them again. They need to be sued out of business.
I have a 2016 Hyundai Tucson turbo 1.6 and it continually hesitates when I take of from a start and you can not drive under 10 mph without the car accelerating and stopping trying to maintain the speed. I have had my car in to Hyundai over 8 times . They replaced my trans 3 times, turbo charger once, air conditioner compressor, and my steering column.
I have 39,000 miles know. The problems have been going on from the day off purchases.
Hi all,
I’m sorry about my English .
I’ve same problem – issue with my i40 (i40 is mark in Europe same like Sonata) in central Europe. I listened from dealers service many times same answers like you!
I’m in judicial science in this time. It’s very danger issue!!!!!!!!!! Shame on you HYUNDAI!!!!!!!
I will not buy Korea car never time!
I heard about official service repair info with modified spare parts and modified software for this issue.
Does anybody have number of this official service repair information or more details about it?
Good luck everybody! Destroy those scammers!
I have a 2017 Hyundai Veloster. I bought it used from Lampe Dodge in Visalia, Ca. It had 44k miles on it. Since then I have experienced the car suddenly not being able to accelerate and stays stuck on 4k rpms. This has happened 8 times now. Once when I was meging onto the freeway. It was a very scary moment. I took it into the Hyundai dealership and they checked it. They said it sort of did what I had said, but couldnt get it to replicate again. They said to bring it back in if I encountered any more problems. Well it did it again!!!
We had a 2017 Hyundai Tucson less than 1 year before it started stalling and lunging forward. We had several service appointments and finally decided to contact corporate. They sent someone to drive the car and we were told that we simply had to “get used” to the dual clutch and to “drive differently”. I informed them that i felt unsafe in the car qs it was defective. I also knew that there were many others experiencing this. However they did not want to take the car back. Instead they offered to trade it in for less than it was worth and rolled over the negative equity into a 2017 hyundai sonata. I was misled and now stuck in a car that i am paying almost $700 a month for. I am so done with hyundai and something definitely needs to be done!
We are leasing 2 Hyundai Tuscons a 2017 and a 2018
Both have had transmission problems with both replaced less than 2 months ago and now having the same alarming problems. We want out of them but will cost us to do so. We have lodged our complaint through their complaint line and were told we would hear back from our assigned case manager within 3-5 days and we never did. We made a second call into their line and told it was being sent as forward as ” national alert” we were told if we don’t hear back in 3-5 days we can call in and make another complaint. It sounds like a game. We are outraged at Hyundai as they appear to have all of the facts to support their faulty transmission yet they are not being proactive to resolve this issue. It scares me to think about the dangers associated with these transmissions and fear that it may take a death or serious injuries before they take responsibility for their negligence.
We bought two new Hyuandis a Tucson and a Volester in 2017 the Tucson hesitates when starting from a stop ,very dangerous and the Volester with 19,000 miles has two transmission failures and they don’t cover the cost of a new clutch ruined by the falty transmission extremely disappointed I fell for the supposed great warranty a sadder note every time I tell the to fix the problem with the hesitation in the Tucson they say nothing’s wrong
I had issues with my 2016 Tucson ECO as well. It drove fine for 12,000 then the transmission issues started. The first time I took it in for repair the dealer reset the computer which didn’t fix the problem. I took the car back to the dealers several times after that and they said they weren’t able to reproduce the problem so i was stuck with it and eventually traded it in. Unfortunately I lost money because I had only had the Tucson for 18 months. Very disappointed because I’ve purchased 6 different cars/SUVs from Hyundai and they do not stand by their customers.
We have had so many issues with our 2016 Hyundai Tucson starting with the transmission then the air conditioning, next was the door locks and now the engine block is cracked. They want $6600 to fix it.
I have the same problem withy 2017 Tucson. I took it into the dealership and all they said they could do is reset the computer, it didn’t help. They said Hyundai is aware of the problem but they weren’t doing anything about it. How do I get added to the lawsuit.