Well Clutch My Injector: 2012 Kia Soul
Read out loud and really fast for best effect: Hello car fans and welcome to another edition of Unlikely Manuals — the game show where even if you lose, you go home with a sore left leg and copy of our home game. Today’s next contestant is a late model Korean economy car with a plastic engine cover emblazoned with a meaningless acronym related to its particularly fuel injection strategy (nobody ever said; I wasn’t gonna buy this car because I wasn’t sure about the method of fuel injection, until I popped the hood and saw the chromed GTDiMqVPDQ badge and then I was sold) and you’d expect to open the door and be greeted with some steering wheel mounted buttons that were connected to a CVT that has all the positive engagement and auditory appeal of an immersion blender in a can of marbles. Lo and behold, if you look past the low rent cloth seats and black plastic interior trim that was inspired by the Harbor Freight free coupon lineup, you’ll find a manual gearbox shifter. Granted, that shifter might have the feel of an immersion blender in a jar of kimchi, but if I’m gonna drive an economy car and save on fuel, it better be manual gearbox…and I don’t care about the injection. Find this 2012 Kia Soul with 6-speed manual offered for $4,500 in San Diego, CA via craigslist.
From the seller:
2012 kia soul
condition: excellent
cylinders: 4 cylinders
drive: fwd
fuel: gas
odometer: 127500
paint color: silver
title status: clean
transmission: manual
type: hatchback
more ads by this user
2012 Kia Soul ( Manual transmission)
Odometer 127k MLS
Great condition, clean title, clean carfax, pass SMOG, no mechanical issues, no leaks, AC, CD, AUX, power steering, power windows , ready to test drive
Dealer#98592, 6920 Miramar road, San Diego, 92121
By APPOINTMENT only
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Can’t believe I’m saying this, but these are surprisingly fun, and the stick isn’t a bad one at all. Probably the best bang for the buck right now on the used car market for a fun small car with surprising utility.
I have to second that. Recently picked-up the twin of this, though auto, for my daughter. It is the 2nd Kia for us, and I have found them to be reasonably sprite, easy to work on, and generally reliable. Noisy suspensions however.
Agreed. I bought an alien green one with the bigger motor and stick shift first year out. Generally 1st year is a bad move, but I put 100k relatively trouble-free miles on it in the 5+ years I owned it. Honestly miss “Boog” the mean green party machine, I was a bit sad about it when I traded it in for more power/luxury. Lots of good times in it.
It was amusing to get a number of offers from the car dealerships around here for my soul.
I would add highly durable to the description of the cloth interior. My mom had a Hyundai with the same interior material and they were oddly soft and durable after 100K miles they still looked new.
These are essentially a tall Fiesta sized vehicle, so they can be enjoyable to drive.
As an owner of a 2011 Scion XB w/ 5 sp manual, I gotta chime in. Kia beat the bag out of Toyota w/ the marketing (Dancing Hip-Hop hamster commercials) and ran the XB out of town (and business). But I tells ya, my XB is a pretty good alternative to the Soul. It’s a toyota fercrhissakes, that also is made in Japan (better build quality). if you can find a manual 2nd gen XB (08-17), you can probably get it for under $5K and under 120K miles. I also got some TRD performance parts off of craigslist (sway bar, cold air intake) for a song…. I think you can even get a supercharger for the 2.4l camry engine, if you are that much of a psycho.
A friend in Brooklyn had a Xb and every time I rode in it I thought that it would make a perfect taxi. Roomiest back seat I’ve been in other than a 1932 Packard limo that was in the family.
We got a pre-owned 2016 model for my step daughter and, to date, it has been flawless for almost 3 years now. (*knocking on wood/formica*). It drives well and feels like it’s more substantial than it looks. Granted, we opted for the 2.0 ltr. 4-banger as the 1.6 ltr. is less peppy and you can tell it’s working harder. Maybe I missed it, but not sure what this one is….
Do you have to wear clown shoes when you drive this? Does that make it harder to shift? I’m also converned that so many DT’rs own one. Is it a secret club or something? There’s a handshake I’ll bet.
No special handshake (can’t do that with Covid), but ya do need to know the Hamster Haiku.
I bought mine because of 10yr 100k warranty and the utility since I had just bought my home.
Is the most commented DT post of all time going to be on a Kia Soul? Lordy what have we come to? With that said, I happy to report that I am live, and not a cat.
71 on the Honda N600, just sayin’.
http://dailyturismo.com/affordable-classic-1972-honda-n600/
Zach and I were geeking out. Some great links in there.
Years back we had some epic 100+ threads here. Partly, that was the Stan thing. I’ll ask Vince about putting together a list of some of those.
Not sure how I missed that! N600 is so much more worthy.
-300D, who is still not a cat.
Wait! I participated in that for 89 and 88. Life is weird right now. Like forgetting what happened a week ago. Ugh.
The same thing happened to me yesterday. I drew a couple of blanks in conversation, which rarely happens. Sleep deprivation, social deprivation, both too much and not enough coffee, cold weather, getting old, etc., etc., etc. :(
Nothing a nice “run out” (Britspeak for road trip) wouldn’t fix, if it didn’t come with a max penalty of 10k quid and 10 years in the hoosegow.
I almost feel like I want to visit a hoosegow. But considering the context, probably not.
One lousy comment on an 84 Volvo 244 and 17 comments on a Kia Soul? DAILY SOULISMO, here we go! All Soul, all the time. :) Lovin that you guys are lovin this Kia.
It was, after all, an automatic.
Plug for the Honda N600 thread, lots of great cars discussed, 71 comments!
http://dailyturismo.com/affordable-classic-1972-honda-n600/
Average number of comments per post this week is strong. Huzzah!