Hyundai and KIA

[Nicks90]

I was torn between a kid sportage and hyundai tucson. Decided to go with tucson. Glad I did because kia released a face-lift of the sportage not long after I ordered.

Anyway, I love the tucson. It's a PHEV automatic. Previously I drove Qashqai diesels and was happy with them, but this tucson is a joy to drive.

Erm the old petrol head in me would say no suv is 'joyous' to drive.
My XC90 is very comfortable - probably the comfiest car I've been in this side of a Toyota century - but not a joy.
Now my C class amg. That was a joy. The noise for the 6.2l V8 was just an orgasm of joy. Aurolly it just made every journey an event. A roads dissappear in a blink of an eye and a gallon of petrol.
My fiat uno turbo was a joy. (takes me back) huge turbo lag, but keep it bouncing off the rev limiter it would demolish a B road or any inner city circuit with alacrity and pizzazz, as it weighed about the same as a fox's biscuit tin.

Suv... Joy.... Never.
Comfy, yes. Accomplished at towing, yes. Capable of swallowing loads, yes. Joyous, no!
And that includes my go in a friend's porsche suv thing. Utterly pointless. You may as well be at home on your xbox. The computers did 99%of the driving, or you would be in the nearest hedge.

 

[Begbie]

Erm the old petrol head in me would say no suv is 'joyous' to drive.
My XC90 is very comfortable - probably the comfiest car I've been in this side of a Toyota century - but not a joy.
Now my C class amg. That was a joy. The noise for the 6.2l V8 was just an orgasm of joy. Aurolly it just made every journey an event. A roads dissappear in a blink of an eye and a gallon of petrol.
My fiat uno turbo was a joy. (takes me back) huge turbo lag, but keep it bouncing off the rev limiter it would demolish a B road or any inner city circuit with alacrity and pizzazz, as it weighed about the same as a fox's biscuit tin.

Suv... Joy.... Never.
Comfy, yes. Accomplished at towing, yes. Capable of swallowing loads, yes. Joyous, no!
And that includes my go in a friend's porsche suv thing. Utterly pointless. You may as well be at home on your xbox. The computers did 99%of the driving, or you would be in the nearest hedge.

My priorities in life have changed considerably over the past decade. Family man now, who swopped nippy hatchbacks (I say nippy because I never was a complete petrol head - just a little) for family SUVs. A Mazda 3 MPS was as nippy as I got - and that was actually a very practical family car...just a bit of a guzzler.

When I say the Tucson is a joy to drive, I'm comparing it to my previous Qashqais and the fact that they were manual diesels. The Tucson is very comfortable, spacious, smooth and quiet. When I need some power, I can now confidently overtake with the 260bhp available rather than needing to wait for a big enough gap in traffic with the 110bhp diesel.

 

[dcbrookes]

I guess nothing really its badge snobbery, i can guarantee the first time i go to work in my KIA at least one of the Ford *clitoris owners will ask why i bought a KIA and when i tell them i have a 7 year warrant and the car has everything you could possibly want on it and it cost thousands less than the ford equivalent they will still look down their noses at it.

*The Ford clitoris = every c**t has one!

Ford owners looking down their noses? They must be seriously deluded if they think having a Dagenham dustbin gives them the right to do that.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Ford owners looking down their noses? They must be seriously deluded if they think having a Dagenham dustbin gives them the right to do that.

I know and it makes me laugh, they gladly pay thousands more for a less specked car because they think their mates will take the **** because they have a KIA badge on the car.

 

[dcbrookes]

I know and it makes me laugh, they gladly pay thousands more for a less specked car because they think their mates will take the **** because they have a KIA badge on the car.

That just proves that their mates are f**kwits as well.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

That just proves that their mates are f**kwits as well.

Spot on, this says it all VW vs Hyundai -

 

[Graz]

I was fairly sceptical when we bought our Kia Sorento a few years back, at the time would have much preferred something from the VW/Audi group, BMW or Landrover but at the time it was a much more affordable option for a 7 seat car that would pull our caravan and has four wheel drive if we needed it to get off a wet or muddy field. Was looking for quite a while for either a Sorento or a Hyundai SantaFe and then one came up a our most local Kia dealer seeming almost too good to be true. Good price, low mileage, single owner, full service history by that dealer, had a tow bar, couple of years of the 7 year warranty left, and the clincher was it was a top of the range model (KX4) having pretty much every extra fitted as standard.

Test drove it the same day I saw it advertised, the dealer seemed keen to make a sale, knocked a few quid off and I got them to throw it some mats. Picked it up a few weeks later.

It's been great, admittedly the interior doesn't seem quite as refined as a BMW or Audi but it's not far off, tows brilliantly, and (touch wood) not had any issues. The dealers are also pretty good so I've continued to use them for servicing.

That said if I were changing it now I'd take a serious look at the Skoda Kodiaq or the Seat Taracco if examples were available in a comparable price range to the Kia/Hyundai offerings.

I'd still also like a VW Touareg but we didn't pursue that last time around as it didn't have 7 seats which whilst we don't need a 7 seater it is convenient to have one. The 7 seat equivalent is the Audi Q7 but they sell for silly money.

 

[Nicks90]

Beware going down the VAG group for a tow vehicle
They are still suffering issues with the DCT gearbox when used heavily - big car or towing - and they are definitely not 'sealed for life mate'. Failure rates are frightening post 60k miles compared to manufacturers that specify oil changes every 40k on the zf autos.
Also the 2.0l diesels are still showing up as some of the most problematic soot chuckers on the market.

I wouldn't touch a VAG product for towing or as a large car unless it was brand new or covered by a cast iron warranty.

 

[Graz]

Beware going down the VAG group for a tow vehicle
They are still suffering issues with the DCT gearbox when used heavily - big car or towing - and they are definitely not 'sealed for life mate'. Failure rates are frightening post 60k miles compared to manufacturers that specify oil changes every 40k on the zf autos.
Also the 2.0l diesels are still showing up as some of the most problematic soot chuckers on the market.

I wouldn't touch a VAG product for towing or as a large car unless it was brand new or covered by a cast iron warranty.

Interesting thanks. I wasn't aware of issues with the DCT boxes but then haven't done any research as the Kodiaq/Taracco/Tiguan Allspace were outside of my budget when I bought the Kia. I would have done some digging though as they are relatively new technology so would want some confidence in reliability.

The Sorento I have has a good old fashioned slush box that works well enough though perhaps a little lazy and agricultural but the technology is well proven for towing. If I had have gone down the VAG route at the time then it would have been for a Touareg or Q7 both of which would have had traditional autos mated to a lovely 3L V6 turbo diesel. Not sure if they've gone down the DCT route on the newer models of these.

The BMW I had before the Sorento has a ZF auto then was supposedly "sealed for life", gear box itself was truly a masterpiece of engineering and that was only the older 6 speed version, I can imagine the 8 speed is even better but both are scarily complicated. However mated to the 3L straight 6 twin turbo diesel in my 535D is was nothing short of immense! General consensus seemed to be that an oil change at no more than 80k miles was a sensible thing to do but even that was a specialist job requiring an overnight stay for the car in a workshop.

 

[Nicks90]

Hi graz, the 8 speed ZF is used by about a dozen different car manufacturers nowadays and it is a fab box. Landrover recommend an oil change at the 64k major service and our local auto transmission centre can do it in about an hour. You just reverse flush them from the outlet pipe to the oil cooler. Pump 10l in and allow 10l out from the oil cooler inlet pipe and you have an 80% oil change.
Unless you are having problems with the box, you don't even need to drop the sump off and check/replace the filter, as reverse flushing pushes any debris off the filter screen and out of the box with the old oil.

The whole sealed for life thing is an absolute con and is quoted by the manufacturers to reduce end to end service pricing. Hence why so many autos from those manufacturers end up going bang at 100k miles.

As for the 535d, epic machine. Epic engine. Proper continent smasher. Very jealous as that's been on my list of cars I want to own for a few years.

 

[Rodcx500z]

I don't care what anybody says i love my pug 2008 1.2 82 bhp, it's comfy will do 80 all day long return 47mpg, so far we have been lands end jhon o grotes and east and west, just coming up to 37,000 miles and never missed a beat, we are off to the highlands of Scotland in September, next year we plan to do the west coast of France and northern Spain

 

[Jim Brewster]

I don't care what anybody says i love my pug 2008 1.2 82 bhp, it's comfy will do 80 all day long return 47mpg, so far we have been lands end jhon o grotes and east and west, just coming up to 37,000 miles and never missed a beat, we are off to the highlands of Scotland in September, next year we plan to do the west coast of France and northern Spain

Been to Germany in my 2005 Fiesta, also going to do the Highlands in a few weeks. 125,000 miles on it.

Kia Rio is now my main car but nowhere near as fun as my Fiesta, although the Fiesta is pretty modified which helps.