FOURTH battery in 4 years of ownership 06 Tucson

[momguam]

Just returned from mechanic's with my FOURTH battery for this 2006 Tucson Limited. Cause??? Beats me, but the odds are against coincidentally getting 3 bad batteries in a row. Nothing is left turned on while the car is turned off, no alternator issues. Can't think of anything else that would cause this problem.

This vehicle has been a huge disappointment, from the crappy gas mileage, to the lack of pick-up, to getting stranded every time the battery drops dead.

The price was cheap (relatively) but I would never buy another Hyundai because of the lousy reliability.

[DSHornet]

You need to see what's causing the battery to die, assuming you aren't getting defective batteries (it happens!). A light can be left on without you knowing. A defective brake light switch can keep the lights on and drain a battery quickly and, if it's parked outside, you'll never notice. Maybe an electronic device is causing the problem - but if that were true, a battery would go dead in much less than a year; more like a week or less if something were draining the battery. If the batteries last a year, it's probably cheap (not necessarily inexpensive, but cheap) batteries. Keep your warranty card handy.

As for the gas mileage and power, that depends on a lot of things, like your expectations. Do the V6 Tucsons use more gas than some people think they should? Yes, but don't forget that almost all gasoline in the USA has up to 10% ethanol in it, which decreases power and increases fuel consumption. My '01 Santa Fe and my wife's '07 Tucson saw less power and less MPG's two years ago at the very same time when the local gas stations all went to 10% gasahol. Both cars lost about 2 miles per gallon. Complaining is pointless. There's nothing to be done about it since that's all we can get.