Owners of nearly 500,000 Kia and Hyundai cars and SUVs in the U.S. face fire danger in their vehicles from foreign contaminants in the anti-lock brake computer control module that can short circuit and possibly start a fire even if the vehicle is turned off.
Hyundai is recalling 357,830 vehicles with the problem, while Kia is recalling 126,747.
Owners are being told to park outside and away from buildings to prevent fire damage.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration issued a consumer alert on Tuesday.
Kia issued a recall notice on Feb. 2 while Hyundai issued a notice on Feb. 3. Both companies will notify owners by mail telling them to bring their vehicles to a Kia or Hyundai dealer for free repair involving installation of a fuse designed to mitigate the risk of fire by reducing the power into the affected module.
Affected vehicles include select models of 2014 to 2016 Kia Sportage, 2016 to 2018 Kia K900 and 2016 to 2018 Hyundai Santa Fe. Owners can visit NHTSA.gov/Recalls to enter their 17-digit vehicle identification number to see if a vehicle is under recall.
Kia is aware of three vehicles that have caught fire, but there were no injuries. Both Kia and Hyundai are based in South Korea and Hyundai’s parent company, Hyundai Motor Group, owns a controlling interest in Kia although they are separate companies in the U.S. The two companies share some engineering components in various models.