Kia Optima, model year 2016. Filed by Kia Motors America and reported to NHTSA on 3 October 2016. 12,214 vehicles potentially affected.
What the notice says Kia Motors America (Kia) is recalling certain model year 2016 Kia Optima vehicles manufactured November 13, 2015, to April 23, 2016 and equipped with a 2.4l engine. The right front axle driveshaft may crack and fail.
Is your vehicle included? Check with your VIN at NHTSA, or ask a dealer. This page is an independent copy of the notice, kept so you can see what changed after it was published. It is not the authority, and the authority’s own text is the one to act on.
Kia's own number for this recall: SC139. That is the number on the owner letter and on the dealer paperwork. 16V705 is the number NHTSA gave the same campaign, and the number this page is filed under. They are one recall, written two ways.
What owners ask about this recall
- Which vehicles does recall 16V705 cover?
- Kia Optima, model year 2016.
- What is wrong with them?
- Kia Motors America (Kia) is recalling certain model year 2016 Kia Optima vehicles manufactured November 13, 2015, to April 23, 2016 and equipped with a 2.4l engine. The right front axle driveshaft may crack and fail.
- What can happen if it is not put right?
- If the driveshaft cracks and separates from the vehicle, it will not be able to move forward. Additionally, if the parking brake is not applied upon exiting the vehicle, the vehicle may roll. Either scenario can increase the risk of a crash.
- Is there a fix yet?
- Yes, and it is free. Kia will notify owners, and dealers will replace the front axle driveshaft, free of charge. The recall began November 2016. Owners may contact Kia customer service at 1-800-333-4542. Kia's number for this recall is SC139.
- What should I do now?
- Check your own vehicle by its VIN with NHTSA, which is the record to act on. Kia calls this recall SC139, which is the number on the owner letter and the dealer paperwork.
Answered from the register this site holds. NHTSA is the record to act on.
What the authority says can happen if this is not fixed: “If the driveshaft cracks and separates from the vehicle, it will not be able to move forward. Additionally, if the parking brake is not applied upon exiting the vehicle, the vehicle may roll. Either scenario can increase the risk of a crash…”
affected
in the notice
caught
| Campaign | 16V705 |
|---|---|
| Filed by | Kia Motors America |
| System at fault | Power Train:Axle Assembly:Axle Shaft |
| Reported to NHTSA | 3 October 2016 |
| Model years | 2016-2016 |
| Vehicles named | KIA OPTIMA |
What the notice says today
The consequence
If the driveshaft cracks and separates from the vehicle, it will not be able to move forward. Additionally, if the parking brake is not applied upon exiting the vehicle, the vehicle may roll. Either scenario can increase the risk of a crash.
The remedy
Kia will notify owners, and dealers will replace the front axle driveshaft, free of charge. The recall began November 2016. Owners may contact Kia customer service at 1-800-333-4542. Kia's number for this recall is SC139.
What it said before
This campaign is in the register but not yet in the dated wording archive, so we cannot yet say whether its text has moved. It enters the archive on the next pass.
This is one of 816 notices in the record whose component field names power train. Across that group the median wait before owners were written to was 42 days.
Last checked . No change has been recorded in the wording.
The same recall in other countries
This campaign carries a manufacturer code that also appears in another country’s register, which means the same defect was recalled there too.
- Canada: Transport Canada recall 1981088, recorded 19 August 1981
Matched on SC139, the manufacturer’s own number for this campaign, which is the only field the registers share. Exact match, nothing paired on brand and date. The two dates are adjacent instruments rather than the same one, so a difference of a day or two means nothing.
How often the two countries file on the same day · The European alerts
The models named here, across their whole recall history
How to cite this record
Quoting the wording on this page means quoting a version, so the date belongs in the citation:
CarsMultiverse, recall 16V705, wording as read on 16 September 2026. https://carsmultiverse.com/recall/16v705/
The cross-border matches used on this site are deposited as a citable dataset: doi:10.5281/zenodo.22087136. The recall wording itself is published by the national authority named above and is theirs, not ours.
The recall record and its wording are published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and are US Government public domain. The dated archive, the comparison and any before-and-after above are CarsMultiverse. How fresh every engine behind this page is, is public on the status page. To check a specific vehicle, use NHTSA’s own VIN lookup.
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All 164 Kia campaigns we hold · Every manufacturer in the record
The fingerprint of this notice
We take a SHA-256 of each of the three blocks of text the authority publishes and keep the first eight characters. As we last read campaign 16V705 on 23 August 2026, they were:
- Defect summary
47d876f8 - Consequence
3a06676b - Remedy
f6213be3
We first read this notice on 21 August 2026. It has not moved since. If it ever does, these characters will not match, and the change will be dated here.
The wording we hold for 16V705 · how the whole register is watched
This notice names one vehicle among several registers that have written about it. Every notice this site holds for the Kia Optima, in all seven, is kept on that vehicle's own page, with the newest in each.
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Owners of these cars
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