1998 Kia Sportage Review

The Kia Sportage finally is becoming widely known, although it debuted several years earlier than the instantly popular Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4 in the hot market for smaller sport/utility vehicles.

The problem for the four-year-old Sportage is that Kia has built its U.S. dealer network slowly, starting only in Western and some Southern states. And, although large, South Korea's Kia is hardly a household word like Toyota--not to mention U.S. rivals such as Jeep.

But Kia has added more dealers throughout the country to sell its small cars and trucks and finally has a fair number of Chicago area outlets. Kia U.S. sales totaled 55,325 units last year. That's hardly an overwhelming number, but it did represent a 66 percent increase over 1996 sales in this country.

Asia's financial woes have adversely affected Kia, but industry observers feel it is a viable outfit that won't disappear.

The Sportage has been revamped for 1998, with a bolder-looking grille, new instrument panel, flashier wheel designs and a more user-friendly spare tire carrier.

There's a new tilt steering wheel and new passenger-side air bag to accompany the driver-side air bag. Kia stresses that this vehicle was the first to feature a knee air bag for the driver. Also new for 1998 are $490 four-wheel anti-lock brakes that replace a rear-only anti-lock system.

The Sportage comes as base and higher-line EX models with four doors and with rear- or four-wheel drive, which is a part-time system not for use on dry pavement.

Base prices range from $14,895 to $17,295 for rear-drive models and from $16,395 to $18,495 for the four-wheel-drive models.

All Sportages are decently equipped, with power windows, locks and outside mirrors, reclining front bucket seats, rear defroster, power steering and split folding rear seat. The EX adds air conditioning, AM/FM/CD player, cruise control, body color mirrors and alloy wheels.

Among new options are $900 leather upholstery for the EX.

The Sportage has rugged body-on-frame construction and is nicely painted. The attractive, generally quiet interior has smooth controls and decent room for four tall occupants. Occupants sit high for good visibility, although the outside-mounted spare partly blocks rear vision. A low step-in height facilitates entry and exit, but rear doors should be wider.

Front seats are supportive in curves. But the audio system has tiny controls, including what looks like the world's smallest on-off switch.

Cargo space is decent and becomes impressive when the rear seat is folded forward--a thankfully simple operation. However, the straps used to pull forward the rear seat bottoms look flimsy. It's easy to swing the spare tire out of the way, and the rear hatch moves up a lot, sparing the head from being bumped.

The 2-liter, 130-horsepower four-cylinder is noisy when pushed and calls for lots of revs and much use of the rather notchy five-speed manual transmission to give the fairly heavy Sportage decent acceleration. The dual-overhead-camshaft engine provides average 65-75 m.p.h. passing times and turns over at a high 3,100 r.p.m. at 65 m.p.h. in fifth gear.

The manual works with a light, rather mushy clutch. Adding the $1,000 four-speed automatic transmission stifles performance, although both manual and automatic Sportage models are rated at 19 m.p.g. in the city and 23 on highways.

The Sportage has precise steering and easily modulated brakes, which have been enlarged for 1998 and work with an improved brake booster. This sport/ute at first feels high and ``tippy,'' but has good handling thanks to such things as a suspension designed with help from sports car builder Lotus and a fairly wide track (distance between wheels on the same axle).

A supple suspension and generally long 104.3-inch wheelbase combine to provide a soft ride. Off-road capabilities are good.

It remains to be seen if Sportage resale values will match those of better-known rivals. But this is a practical, economical and affordable sport/utility that is small enough to make sense in urban areas and roomy enough to be a decent family vehicle.