1997 Kia Sephia
Key Replacement - Save vs Dealer in Ventura County

1997 Kia Sephia MECHANICAL-KEY Replacement - Fast, Affordable & Professional

Got a call from someone over near the UCSB campus in Santa Barbara. She had a 1997 Kia Sephia parked in one of the lots off campus and her only key had snapped clean at the shoulder, right where the blade meets the bow. Half the key was still jammed in the ignition cylinder.

She had already called the Kia dealer. They told her she would need to tow it in, they would have to pull the ignition lock assembly, and it could be a few days before they got to it. She was a student with a class schedule that did not include losing her car for half a week.

I drove out and took a look. The broken bit was sitting in the first couple wafers, not buried deep. I extracted the broken blade piece with a hook pick, took maybe two minutes. Then I decoded the wafers right there in the cylinder using a KI01 Lishi tool instead of tearing anything apart.

Cut a fresh key on the van's code machine, tested the ignition through all four positions, tried both doors. Everything turned smooth.

The whole job took less than half an hour, start to finish, in the parking lot. She kept her car, kept her afternoon, and paid a fraction of what the dealer route would have cost before the tow bill even entered the picture.

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