Wednesday 8 August 2007

Hyundai i30

I've become a really boring Johnny-One-Note on the subject of the latest Korean cars and the severe competitive threat they represent for some of the more complacent European manufacturers. Give me half a chance and I can bore on for hours about Kia's new Cee'd, its fantastic seven year warranty and the staggeringly impressive Slovakian factory in which it's built.

Today, Autocar gives the Cee'd's sister-under-the-skin, the Hyundai i30, the full test treatment and rates it very highly indeed - I think more and more people are sitting up and taking notice now. Will try to get an i30 booking for the Verdict soon. I'm sure it won't be as popular with the Independent's reader-testers as some of the more exotic stuff we have on the test, but it's a lot more significant in industry terms.

3 comments:

Fourwheelsteer said...

I know what you're saying. I'm a little surprised, given how glowing the road test was, that the star rating wasn't higher.

Curmudgeon said...

Does the i30 have a trip computer?

David Wilkins said...

Not sure about a trip computer - doesn't seem to be explicitly mentioned in the limited info on Hyundai UK's website. However, much of the functionality - e.g. mpg readouts, miles to empty - that car manufacturers previously made a big deal of by calling it a 'trip computer' is now present on many cars without being advertised as such. Not sure if this applies to the i30.