Anorak corner 8 - Kia cee'd indicator stalk

This is the indicator stalk of the Kia cee'd SW I was testing recently. The hatchback version of the cee'd that appeared on the Verdict last year had a right-hand indicator stalk. Now, as the photos shows, it has migrated to the left.


In fact I think this is the second or third change since I first tried a pre-production cee'd at the original launch in late 2006, I believe it was. Although I think there's much to be said for a right-hand stalk on an RHD car, I hope Kia's now finally made up its mind!

What's outside today 38 - Kia cee'd SW

This is the Kia cee'd SW - a welcome visitor to my drive, although it did overstay that welcome slightly when there was a glitch in the arrangements for returning it to Kia.


Just in case you thought Kia's very busy Department for Silly Names hadn't got its hands on this one, perhaps I should mention that in some countries, this estate version of the cee'd isn't called the SW but the Sporty Wagon. Actually, the more I think about the name Sporty Wagon the more I like it - it just sounds so cheerful.


Anyway, I'm a fan of the cee'd and in particular the value for money it offers and the SW has done nothing to dent my enthusiasm for it, offering, as it does, generous rear seat room and luggage space.


This test car has a petrol engine, but the sweet 1.6 diesel that's available is better; I notice Kia still has a special offer that means you can get a diesel cee'd for the same price as the equivalent petrol model. That deal's a steal.

Car of the Year

The European Car of the Year rankings are great fun but the organisers' insistence on using a large, diverse international jury has produced some very strange results indeed over the years.

Nobody could complain about the NSU Ro80 (1968), Peugeot 504 (1969) or the Citroen GS (1971), but what about the Talbot Horizon (1979) or the Renault 9 (1982)? Mercedes has only won once in the CotY's history while BMW has never won at all - barmy.

I haven't yet driven this year's winner, the Fiat 500. Anyone who likes cars will want it to succeed in order for Fiat to have a secure future but I still have a few doubts. The 500 probably has even the BMW Mini beaten for cute retro looks, but it will struggle to match the Mini on the road. Unlike that car, which is based on an expensive bespoke platform, the 500 shares with other small Fiats. Then there's the ownership experience; will the 500's quality levels and Fiat dealers' performance be able seriously to compete with the proposition offered by the Mini - just about the best resale on the market and staggeringly cheap multi-year servicing packages? We shall see.

Of the other cars short-listed this year, I particularly liked the new C-Class (brilliant steering - the thing everyone keeps mentioning) and the Kia cee'd - a great car with keen pricing and a fantastic warranty. But the new car that really got under my skin this year didn't even make it onto that short list. I'm talking about the Land Rover Freelander 2. Normally I think of soft-roaders as being a particularly pointless class of car, and the first-generation Freelander scarcely registered with me at all. But the all-new model is a supremely polished product. Subtly improved styling, a great diesel engine, a beautiful interior and a commanding driving position surprisingly reminiscent of that offered by the larger Land Rover models. Great stuff.

Euro NCAP ratings for the Fiat 500, Renault Twingo, Kia Cee'd and Peugeot 308

The Euro NCAP results have just been published for these four cars. When these ratings were first introduced, it was quite common for even fairly grand models from manufacturers with a good safety reputation to achieve only two or three stars out of five on the main Adult Occupant Protection score.

Over the years, it has sometimes been argued that the tests don't capture the complicated sorts of challenges presented by real-world accidents and that manufacturers may be designing their cars to get good test results rather than for ultimate safety. But I suspect these grumbles are overdone and that the tests have played an important role in driving up standards.

Now, a five-star result for Adult Occupant Protection has become almost essential in market terms, so when a mainstream model gets only four stars, that tends to attract a bit of comment. All of the models listed here get five stars except the Twingo, which gets four. What's remarkable about this is that, of the mass manufacturers, Renault was the one that really appreciated early on how important these ratings could be in building its reputation, and, over the years, it has bagged a whole series of five star scores for its cars.

These days, with the five star rating for adult passengers becoming so common, it's the ratings for the protection of child occupants and pedestrians that really separate cars. None of these four models achieve the maximum five stars for Child Occupant Protection, or four stars for Pedestrian Protection. In fact no Child Occupant Protection score is published for the Twingo at all. Not sure what is going on there.

Oh, and a quick PS - sorry to be so boring by going on about the Kia Cee'd again but the five star rating awarded to this car is yet another piece of evidence that it is right up there with the best comparable models from the european manufacturers.

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.

Hyundai in the Czech Republic

News that Hyundai has just held the ground-breaking ceremony for its new Czech plant at Nosovice - handy timing given that many of Hyundai/Kia's top people will already have been in eastern Europe for the opening of the Kia plant at Zilina earlier in the week.

There are other links between the two sites too. The new i30 model which Hyundai will build at the plant bears more than a passing resemblance to Kia's cee'd, and Zilina will provide engines to Nosovice as well.

It will be interesting to see how these two rather similar Korean brands develop now that they are under the same corporate roof. Hyundai is positioned as a more sober, up-market proposition than Kia, which is supposed to be rather younger and sportier, but I suspect that this distinction has escaped most potential buyers so far. My guess would be that to most people, Kia and Hyundai badges still both say more or less the same thing - good, solid, if slightly anonymous, value-for-money motoring from Korea.

That's probably going to change, though, as the more of the two brands' increasingly impressive new models come on stream, and as Kia raises its profile through its sponsorship of major sporting events.

Kia cee'd - the car from Carpathia

A fascinating day at Zilina finding out how those clever people at Kia, with the help of a few thousand eager Slovakians, turn this:



into this:



in what will be Europe's most productive car factory once it is operating at full speed. The full story should be coming to a copy of the Independent near you shortly but here are some of the headlines. When it's running at full tilt, Zilina is expected to pump out 100 cars per employee per year, beating the levels achieved by what I believe are Europe's current most productive plants, Nissan at Washington in the UK and Opel/GM at Eisenach in the former East Germany.

Zilina's main product, the cee'd, is Kia's first car designed and built in Europe. The company is confident enough in this new model to provide it with an unmatched seven year guarantee. After seeing the outstanding conditions for car-making at Zilina, it's easy enough to see where that confidence comes from - and the car itself is very convincing too. For the time being, the Golf has an edge in terms of its badge while the Focus probably remains the driver's choice in this category. And it's still hard to get past the combination of quality and value for money represented by the Skoda Octavia. But I think the Astra, 307, C4 and the like are all looking very vulnerable indeed to the Korean/Slovakian advance.

En route to Zilina

A quick post from one of my favourite European cities, Bratislava. The beautiful Slovakian capital is a worthwhile destination in its own right but tonight it is just a staging post on a journey to Zilina in the north of the country, where Kia will tomorrow carry out the official opening ceremony for its new European production facility.

The Zilina factory is already turning out Kia's impressive new Golf-sized car, the cee'd. I think the cee'd and Zilina are one of the most important industry stories at the moment in Europe, so I'm expecting an interesting visit tomorrow.