First road trip.

[ShaPoopieZ]

Just took our new to us GT AWD on a road trip to Seattle from Spokane.
My initial thoughts are this.
Loved the comfort and the power delivery.
Loved the Milage. We averaged 28.6 mpg going 80+ with 3 people and luggage In the car.
Traffic was flying that day . I was getting passed by Transit vans going well into the 90's

For the bad
I thought the suspension felt a little unsettled and twitchy at higher speed.

The rear end doesn't feel like it tracks well while lane changes or sweeping corners.
It may be just the truck ruts or the road surface but it just feels twitchy or drift compared with the front end and what the steering wheel input is telling me it should be doing. My thought is the sway bar in the rear is too soft. Or the staggered wheel setup wasn't tracking the ruts well.
I expected a way more controlled feel from it on the interstate. Twitchy and nervous was not expected
In town Seattle driving was amazing. The cars ability to react to traffic and all around agility was great in town.

Although it being alot tighter feeling comparatively to my lifted grand cherokee . The feeling of the rear end occasionally wanting to do its own thing then the front end was similar.

Maybe I'm just not used to how responsive the wheel input is yet. Which may be a part.
There is not much dead play in the wheel and I just have to have lighter input .

 

[JSolo]

What tires and PSI are you running? If it's like most cars, they come over inflated from the dealer.

 

[MerlintheMad]

You are reacting to the rear "stepping out" and the rear end "float" of the OEM sway bars. The car won't do anything but it sort of feels like it wants to. Just putting in an aftermarket rear sway bar will settle that feeling down a ton. And adding the front sway bar will make the steering feedback very gratifying: I was a year and a half on the Eibach rear bar only: and I could feel incipient oversteer (almost never pushed it far enough to snap to actual oversteer, but I could feel the steering starting to get light, like the wheel was going to snap tighter): when I put the front bar on, my word what a difference: now I don't feel any oversteer coming until I can hear the tires "hiss", so, a lot of safety room there.

I've had this car up to 155 on an undulating road (Hwy 95 heading for Nevada out of Oregon), and the OEM sway bars were fine: the car felt even more hunkered down at those speeds than at freeway speeds: so, I have experienced the great job of a high speed GT that Kia created with the Stinger.

 

[ShaPoopieZ]

I have the Michelin pilots 4s . I just checked my pressure and the fronts are at 34 and the rears are ar 42. That seems a bit high or to big of a difference.

 

[JSolo]

Those are nice tires. Such a difference in psi front/rear will cause weird handling. You checked them cold (car sitting for at least 6 hours) or after driving? If you didn't already know, tire PSI is set cold (ideally after not driving the car at least over night). I'd start with the recommended psi's on the tag on the driver side front door frame. Use a proper gauge, don't rely on tpms. Depending on trim level/wheels/tires, front and rear recommendations may be different.

I'm probably over picky, my gauge shows resolution to 1/10 psi. I set them all to show the same psi (front/rear).

 

[WRXtoStingerGT]

I have the Michelin pilots 4s . I just checked my pressure and the fronts are at 34 and the rears are ar 42. That seems a bit high or to big of a difference.

Yeah that is way too high for the rear...

 

[MerlintheMad]

Yeah that is way too high for the rear...

Actually, it is way too low for the front; the edges will wear faster than the center tread. I keep my tires close to 40 psi all around, cold. Tread wear this set of tires appears to be even edge to edge.

 

[RogueIV]

I have the Michelin pilots 4s . I just checked my pressure and the fronts are at 34 and the rears are ar 42. That seems a bit high or to big of a difference.

that will definitely make the car wander and feel twitchy at highway speeds. Set them to what the door sticker says.

 

[WRXtoStingerGT]

Actually, it is way too low for the front; the edges will wear faster than the center tread. I keep my tires close to 40 psi all around, cold. Tread wear this set of tires appears to be even edge to edge.

Oh my bad!

 

[ShaPoopieZ]

Thanks for the input all . I will adjust the pressure this weekend and see how it feels.

Also looking at the different sway bar set ups.