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-   -   Kia Sonet - Body colour missing inside the door, below the panel (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/technical-stuff/238926-kia-sonet-body-colour-missing-inside-door-below-panel.html)

My two-month-old Black color Kia Sonet has a silver color inside the door, below the door panel. It's there on all the doors, though the driver-side one is better. Not sure if it's a factory issue, looks more like the robots couldn't reach this area.





The service advisor said it's common for all their cars when I contacted them on phone. I'm yet to get a response from Kia support.

Even if it's common for all the cars, isn't it still a fit & finish issue?

What do you guys think?

Mods, please move to the appropriate thread if this is not the right place.

Can you please describe this 'silver' colour?

Is it silver colour paint or it's just unpainted steel surface?
Most likely it is the later.

I don't think this is a Robot-Could-Not-Reach issue, as the painting robotic arms do their job before any of the door panels are put on, in full availability of space, for the arm to move about.

As per my experience, the inside panel of the door should have been completely painted.
It's painted in other Cars anyways like VW, Maruti Suzuki etc.
These expose parts will get wet every time the car is washed. So, the paint is definitely required in those areas.

It's a paint failure and needs to be covered up with paint. The SA is talking nonsense, it has nothing to do with the robot not being able to reach. You can catch the SA and take a look at several other cars to confirm. If all of them have patchy paintwork then it's a quality lapse on Hyundai's part.

Hyundai/Kia definitely have issues with paint. White paint flaking off on multiple cars and also the recent thread with mismatched paint on the bumper and body of both Hyundai and Kia cars.

It seems the doors haven't been removed at all for painting on the assembly line and painted separately (like they should be). I think you should check out other Sonets from the same batch and see if those have the same defects.

Having all four doors showing the same sort of paint issues points to an assembly line goofup. Hyundai and it's framed quality and their paint issues have assumed another form now it seems. The S.A is talking absolute rubbish.

Please take better photos preferably during the day and post in this thread. One of the outside colour of the car visible in the same picture will be helpful.

Based on your description of the issue, it looks like a defect to me. I’ve never heard of such incomplete painting, it looks as though they’ve taken a silver car and painted it over. Better pics will help.

Either this is a quality miss at the plant (highly unlikely) or this is repainted at the dealer before delivery.

The door might have been damaged, they have either repainted it and forgot to do this spot or they took door of silver car and repainted it black to match.

No way this is a factory job. The robots at the factories are well equipped and versatile to paint a car properly. However cant comment further since the pictures posted here seems to have a flash reflection. Trying taking some snaps during daytime in a lightly shaded area to get a better picture.

Perhaps other Sonet owners on the forum can share how it looks on their cars to give a better idea. Even repair painting jobs are less likely to leave such an area out.

Skip to 1:32 to see the paint process

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3rom2EuNpw

The easiest way is to check other Sonets at the dealer. If it is the same then you have nothing to worry about. If it is unique to your car then you can take it up with your SA and get it repainted/replaced!

Like vid6639, I too thought that the door was damaged at the dealership and hence repainted.

But you claim that all four doors have the body color missing at this spot. Now, probability of all four doors getting damaged at the dealership is extremely low.

Accidents (like overturning) can damage all four doors but these will be accompanied by the structural damage to the body.

So please observe all other Sonets. Members who own Sonet are also requested to chip in.

Thanks, everyone for all the inputs.

I'm not able to make out if it's silver paint or unpainted steel surface. I think it's more like an unpainted surface. However, it's even and I can feel the clear coat. There is no unevenness when I run my fingers from this area to the properly painted side.

Yeah, I guess the same. This section is a hidden spot when the door is closed, so if they painted it with the doors closed it may not get covered. I'm trying to get photos from other Sonet owners. I got a few responses, but those were of the new Sonet and there is no such issue. Mine is April 2021 model having the old Kia logo.

Sure, I'll share more photos in the morning. I'm attaching a couple of photos I already have, showing a bigger area. The color I see is like the one I marked in the below screenshot. The same color can be seen near the door hinges or hard-to-reach areas.






Okay, just FYI, the car was with the dealer for around 12 days as there was a delay in delivery due to new RTO rules.

I hope so too. Because if this car walked out with the "All OK" tick at the factory Quality Control inspection checkpoint then KIA has a BIG problem at it's hands.

Either way I hope the customer is duly compensated.

I think it's very much possible something was done at the dealership with respect to the painting on the doors during this period. Many dealers across brands and cities are just notorious for such things, so, as customers we just need to be extra careful.

Just curious, did you do a PDI before registration ? (hopefully you did another PDI when taking delivery ?). That could/would have helped with narrowing down on the cause.

There is absolutely no way this is a factory miss; there are several coats applied during the painting process and the panels and robotic arms are swung 360 deg several times to ensure a complete and even paint.

A pile of BS. As Viddy said, either this door has been painted over or was originally white/silver. How does the surface feel when you glaze your hand over the area - do you feel roughness over the white part? The SA's theory can be refuted quicker than you can spell KIA - ask him to produce two more Sonets with this issue - or even better - ask him to measure the paint thickness using the gauge.

Raise hell on social media - while the paint mismatch is unacceptable, the SA's lies are worse.

This is entirely uncommon for cars out of the factory. Whatever can happen, may happen during transit / at the dealer.

The easiest way to confirm is to just walk into the showroom and ask the SA to show you the same issue in the other cars there. They will give all sorts of stupid reasons when you contact them on phone.

Hyundai/Kia is not known for putting pressure on dealers like Maruti. But still worth a try contacting Kia management as well along with posting on social media after you confirm the issue.

I did PDI before the delivery and there were no issues, no signs of accidents, and the ODO reading was less than 100km. They transported the vehicle by road from their main yard which is 70km away.

Honestly, I missed this area during PDI. This spot is not very easy to see due to reflections.

I just checked all the doors and all of them are not like I said earlier. For some doors, It's smooth when I glaze my hands over the area towards the properly painted area. No roughness, just like the glossy clear coat. However, I see it is rough on one door, and the unpainted area is much more than what I saw earlier.

I have to figure out a way to get better pictures, it's like the spot is very difficult to capture unless the vehicle is on a lift. Here are a couple more photos/videos.

https://youtu.be/secPQOR66es


I'll try this, but a possible problem is that the cars they have now are the new models. And as I can see from other owners, there's no such issue with the new model. In case if it's a specific batch, I have to see how I can find owners having the same batch of cars.