Several problems with my Kia Sportage

About car & some background info: Kia Sportage 99 Automatic

My dad gave me this car, but it had been sitting for about a yr before I finally was able to drive it. It had a tune up when I first started driving it (a few months back).

It has since had complications such as: you’d start it & it would chug chug chug & shut off, each time you tried to start it again it was have less power till it wouldn’t start at all. It done this on several occasions & my dad & husband messed with the gas (cleaned the tank etc)replaced a lot of things on it (wish I could give more detail about what but I’m unsure). Anyway finally one day I decided I’m just gonna drive it & see if it will run, & it chugged a bit but finally it started running fine with one time of messing up that way again. Also when it would chug the entire car jerked. I had it checked out a little & they said that there was some bad gas & that the o2 sensor had something wrong. It ran fine though until now.



Current Problem: I will be driving down the road & my car will just shut off. Plain & simple, the steering wheel locks up, brakes still work (although they went out on me the yesterday once, I’m hoping I just need brake fluid) & I can put it in park & start it right back. Well today it shut off as I was trying to get it home & it just wouldn’t start back up. I couldn’t shift it to Neutral or Drive & it wouldn’t let me remove my keys (last night when my brakes stopped working it wouldn’t let me remove my keys then either). I had it towed home today because it shut off in town & now all of sudden it can start & everything is working fine. -I have leakage in my floor board (this has been going on a week or so) from my air conditioner but only when I have it on, so I never use it now. I had the heat on this morning off & on…Idk if that has anything to do with it or not. It’s been mentioned that my fan belt could be hung up or something? -My gas hand hasn’t really worked since I’ve been driving it, but when I’d fill it up it would show it was full & go down slowly but it would be on E & still have gas for a good ways, well now suddenly the hand will barely move above E although I know I’ve filled it completely up because my gas tank wouldn’t hold gas anymore when I filled it yesterday.

-I know very little about cars, Idk what information you’d need to know to help me or any of the terms hardly, but if you think you can help me any advice would be greatly appreciated! Sorry if all this is confusing.



My current problem:

Your car has so many different problems, I don’t even know where to begin.

Gas gauge issue - You can either do two things:
Have someone replace the float in the gas tank, or;
Reset the trip meter every time you fuel up, and when you get to a certain number of miles, fill up the tank. Just like how a motorcycle does it.

Air Conditioning leaking water in the car - You have a clogged drain from the coil in the dashboard that leads to the ground. Get a mechanic to put the car on a lift, find the drain port, and clear it out. Soon, before rust damages the car.

Can’t get the ignition key out - You might either need to replace the ignition lock, or turn the wheel slightly when trying to turn the key to the LOCK position.

Stalling issue - Lots of potential causes. When the engine shuts off, the steering wheel is much harder to turn, and after you press the brake pedal several times, it will get harder to press, as the vacuum assist is used up. Get a mechanic to diagnose the issue.

Some of the things are cheap to fix, others might not be.
Its up to you to determine how much the car is worth to you, versus getting something better.

BC.