[demuire]

So, the wife has had the car close to 3 weeks now, and close to 900ks. I've done possibly 1/3rd of those k's, and been a passenger for quite a lot of the rest of it.

My thoughts so far:

Pros: all round great car. Well priced, well equipped, comfortable, easy to drive. Good looking car too.

Fuel economy is really quite good. Handles pretty well, feels sporty without being harsh.

Climate control works very well.

Cons:  rear view mirror does not have enough adjustment to be able to be set correctly, so I have to use the "night mode" in reverse, which means when I dim it at night, it shines the light onto my face. Had the same problem in the Yaris.

Accelerator. Overly sensitive in the lower range, I understand Hyundai probably want to make the car feel sporty, but they've made it pretty difficult to accelerate slowly and smoothly. Every little movement gets the car going really quickly. Something we will probably get used to eventually, but having a number of different cars in our household makes this a bit harder. 

Cruise control doesn't control speed very well.  Or at least not as well as my old XTrail or Camry. Slows down to easily under 10km under the preset going up hills, then drops down 2 gears and accelerates up over 15km over by the time it gets over the hill and speeds down the other side!  Works well on good flat highways, not so great in hilly areas...

Steering. Totally disconnected and unnatural. I understand this is relatively common with electric power steering, but this is possibly the worst of its kind I've driven.

Screen: why can't you dim it any further than "low"?  Driving in darkness (we live out in the sticks) it's far too bright so we have to turn the display off all the time.  System is also sometimes unresponsive, we have already had it in for a warranty claim once to reload it when the maps went for a walk and the software decided to get corrupted.

Clock. Why oh why didn't they put a "normal" clock in?  Having to have the screen on to see the time isn't great. Also not having a clock in GPS mode (maybe I've missed the setting?).

Maps: kinda out of date, and what's with the lack of spoken street names?

Boot protector could have been made of something a little more grippy so all your stuff doesn't go flying everywhere?  Minor gripe.

Rear view camera is completely distorted and looks like its a 320x240 resolution or something. Maybe this is not "normal", maybe there's something wrong with ours?  I don't remember noticing the lack of quality in the camera in the Veloster.

Hope I'm not sounding too critical of the car. It's a great car and we love it, but these are the few little annoying things we have found (every car has some of them!)





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[demuire]

Oh, another con - headlights next to useless, although I suspect this is due to bad adjustment. Will try to get the dealer to readjust them on the first service and hopefully will actually be able to see where we are going after!  At the moment it looks like the right headlight is pointing at the sky and the left one on the ground 2m in front of the car...


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Accelerator. Overly sensitive in the lower range, I understand Hyundai probably want to make the car feel sporty, but they've made it pretty difficult to accelerate slowly and smoothly. Every little movement gets the car going really quickly. Something we will probably get used to eventually, but having a number of different cars in our household makes this a bit harder. 

Your issues with accelerator are interesting.  Both my wife and daughter have commented that the resistance of the accelerator in our diesel is heavy, meaning they have to apply more pressure to get acceleration.

Cruise control doesn't control speed very well.  Or at least not as well as my old XTrail or Camry. Slows down to easily under 10km under the preset going up hills, then drops down 2 gears and accelerates up over 15km over by the time it gets over the hill and speeds down the other side!  Works well on good flat highways, not so great in hilly areas...

That all sounds rather disappointing.  Diesel doesn't have these issues, probably due to the extra torque of the diesel engine.

Screen: why can't you dim it any further than "low"?  Driving in darkness (we live out in the sticks) it's far too bright so we have to turn the display off all the time.  System is also sometimes unresponsive, we have already had it in for a warranty claim once to reload it when the maps went for a walk and the software decided to get corrupted.

Did you realise that maps have a night mode?  Haven't experienced issues with system software as yet. Hopefully you get that sorted otherwise I'd be pressing for a replacement unit.

Clock. Why oh why didn't they put a "normal" clock in?  Having to have the screen on to see the time isn't great. Also not having a clock in GPS mode (maybe I've missed the setting?).   

Did you realise there is a clock button on the top right of the unit?  Just press it anytime and the time comes up for a few seconds over the top of the display, or, if the unit is switched off, an analogue clock comes up and remains visible until the unit is switched on or you turn of the clock using the clock button.  A digital clock can be displayed on the GPS display, along with heaps of other stuff.

Boot protector could have been made of something a little more grippy so all your stuff doesn't go flying everywhere?  Minor gripe.

Asked for a boot protector, but it didn't fit the Premium.  Dealer got a carpet guy in to make up a special carpet liner that is edged.  Even has slots for the luggage net hooks.  We're happy with the result.

[pidim]

I definitely agree with the accelerator sensitivity. Even after a year, there's just no way of getting a normal start. You either race off, or get left behind trying not to scare your passengers. I heard VW Golf is quite similar??

Also, I actually prefer cruise control more like this (which was how  an earlier car I owned was - Ford Territory), but on the other hand my previous Toyota Kluger was manic in it's cruise control and just made it too scary on undulating roads.

[demuire]

Your issues with accelerator are interesting.  Both my wife and daughter have commented that the resistance of the accelerator in our diesel is heavy, meaning they have to apply more pressure to get acceleration.

I have a feeling it's something to do with Hyundai trying to get the car up into its power band, because it's only overly sensitive from idle.  Touch the accelerator and it immediately races until it gets into the power band and then eases off in sensitivity.  Probably no such issue in the manual version?

Did you realise that maps have a night mode?  Haven't experienced issues with system software as yet. Hopefully you get that sorted otherwise I'd be pressing for a replacement unit.

Yes, we have night mode for GPS, however usually have the radio screen on.  And well, all of the screens are bright, even the analog clock.  The issue with the system software has been rectified.

Did you realise there is a clock button on the top right of the unit?  Just press it anytime and the time comes up for a few seconds over the top of the display, or, if the unit is switched off, an analogue clock comes up and remains visible until the unit is switched on or you turn of the clock using the clock button.  A digital clock can be displayed on the GPS display, along with heaps of other stuff.

Yes, found the clock button very early on, but even the clock screen is very bright.  If they had just put the clock against a black background that would have been ideal, instead of the bright blue background.  Will look for the setting to put the clock on the GPS display, thanks!

[demuire]

I definitely agree with the accelerator sensitivity. Even after a year, there's just no way of getting a normal start. You either race off, or get left behind trying not to scare your passengers. I heard VW Golf is quite similar??

Also, I actually prefer cruise control more like this (which was how  an earlier car I owned was - Ford Territory), but on the other hand my previous Toyota Kluger was manic in it's cruise control and just made it too scary on undulating roads.

The issue is that on hilly roads it's impossible to use the cruise control effectively, because if I set it at the speed I want to be at (say 100km/h), the car is dropping down to 90km/h on the start of the uphill sections (not really much of an issue), and then racing up to the top of the hill, and then I'm doing 115km/h by the time I get to the top of the hill, and if it's a big hill I'm doing 125km/h down the hill and way over the speed limit!  So in order to stay within the speed limit I have to cancel the cruise control halfway up the hill on most hills!  Easier to just drive without the cruise control...

[Phil №❶]

I find CC in the Diesel Auto very good, much better than my Holden which goes berserk. On the same hills, the diesel stays in 4th gear. 

But you have bigger hills than we do, in your location.

[demuire]

Sounds like we should have paid the extra for the TD...


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[Dazzler]

Sounds like we should have paid the extra for the TD...

The extra Torque of the CRDi is a revelation

[demuire]

Sounds like we should have paid the extra for the TD...

The extra Torque of the CRDi is a revelation

We test drove the petrol and TD back to back, and it didn't feel as different as I expected it to. Mind you, it could have possibly been the route the dealer took us along too...


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[Dazzler]

Effortless up hills and when overtaking 

[Phil №❶]

Sadly, the only correct way to evaluate a car is by driving it yourself, over a period of time. You would have liked the diesel if you'd had a decent test drive. Well, you have petrol, so my advice is do not use cc in hills.

[Just Rick]

demuire
I can't answer many or any of your pros and cons as I do not have the new GD,but as I have said many times before,styling wise I personally think Hy went backwards,but interior wise they seemed to have taken a small step forwards,but after your comments if I ever decide to trade either Bruce or Cyril,I won't be looking at another I30.

I only wish to say that I found the mirror in the FD had heaps of adjustment,so they must have changed something in the GD,as for the cruise control,the one in Cyril(poverty Pack SX)he has an aftermarket CC and this does Exactly what your discribing and it annoys the crap out of me,now Bruce the SLX fully optioned has the factory fitted CC and I am stunned at how well it holds the speed you set,going up or down hills and even mountains for that fact(when we went over east)then you say the steering in yours is disconnected,both our cars are excellent,if you antisipate either the over steer in one(Cyril) or the understeer in Bruce,but it is not that bad that the cars are uncontrollable

[demuire]

The power steering doesn't make the car uncontrollable, just unnatural feeling. Kinda like driving a video game.

Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad car, there's lots to love about it. These are just the gripes I've had about it so far.


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[Just Rick]

fairy nuff

When we test drove the i30 GDs, we drove the petrol and the diesel over the same route (without the sales rep.).  We were prepared to give the petrol a fair trial, but when we drove the diesel, there was no question as to which we preferred.  Of course, as we already had an FD manual that we had as a measuring stick, meant we knew what we would be missing if we chose the petrol.

Having only had cruise control on diesels, I can't comment on the behaviour of a petrol vehicle with cruise.  Our diesels have (3 vehicles) with cruise have been faultless.

[demuire]

Well, truth be told both my wife and I did prefer the way the diesel felt, but couldn't justify the extra cost as she doesn't usually do all that many k's, and in the route we took (with the sales rep) while the diesel felt better, they didn't feel very different to either of us.

Probably should have insisted on more test drives, but oh well, we have a petrol now

And hey, they petrol is quieter


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[Dazzler]

Don't feel bad. We had a diesel hatch for over 2 years which we loved. I traded it on a Toyota Hybrid and then bought the wife a petrol cw which she loves. I couldn't justify the extra for the diesel because she only does 8k a year.

[Just Rick]

Don't feel bad. We had a diesel hatch for over 2 years which we loved. I traded it on a Toyota Hybrid and then bought the wife a petrol cw which she loves. I couldn't justify the extra for the diesel because she only does 8k a year.

so what does that consist of, driving from the garage to the letterbox and back 

[Dazzler]

Don't feel bad. We had a diesel hatch for over 2 years which we loved. I traded it on a Toyota Hybrid and then bought the wife a petrol cw which she loves. I couldn't justify the extra for the diesel because she only does 8k a year.

so what does that consist of, driving from the garage to the letterbox and back 

That's nearly 200 metres...

[Carlyboy]

I've also got a GD petrol Elite. One thing about the clock, you can turn the whole display off i.e. the radio and satnav etc and just push the switch I think it;s on the top right of the switches around the display, this turns on an analogue clock only. Try it, if you can;t find it I'll look in my car and describe it better.

I also agree that cruise control in any car is really made for flat roads like freeways etc and never really works as well on hilly roads.