Without doubt, the
Hyundai Coupe or
Hyundai Tiburon in North America - is the best looking Korean car yet – and the styling competes well with anything in its class. There are 2.0 liter four, and 2.7 liter V-6 engines available, and the V-6 is a super-smooth unit that gives the car a good turn of speed with quite sporty handling.
Performance is useful rather than outstanding with a top speed of only 136 mph and the 0-60 mph sprint in 8.2 seconds. Not very quick. However, mid-range acceleration through the gears in the 40-80 mph range is good.
Now a smooth coupe
The first Hyundai Tiburon Coupe didn’t quite look right, but the new one certainly does – it’s also a clever design. The not-quite rectangular headlamps fit in well with the shallow grille and the extra grille beneath the bumpers, while the smooth, curved wedge sides fit in neatly with the fastback coachroof. The tail is nicely sculpted, and has a low spoiler. Drag coefficient is not bad at 0.342. For 2005 the front end and rear lamp clusters have been redesigned, giving a slightly more aggressive stance.
From all views the Coupe looks good and it is hard to tell that this is a front-wheel drive car with the engine slung across the frame. If you look carefully you will see that the car would look a bit better if the cockpit was a bit further back. That would improve balance - with that large engine, the car is nose heavy, despite the aluminum cylinder block.
Practical interior – clear instruments
When you slip into the car, you feel you’re in a grand tourer. Good forward visibility, good instruments, and pretty good rear vision too. But the scuttle is rather on the high side, which is inevitable with the front-drive layout. The steering wheel is adjustable for height, but not reach, and I found it was a bit too high for comfort and for me to be able to see the critical parts of the instruments.
Another niggle in that area is the bright orange miles-to-empty display between the speedo and rev-counter as it distracts the eye from more important things. The seats are excellent, giving good lateral support, though.
Excellent gear shift
Once you’re on the move, you notice the nicely weighted steering, and the notchy but very positive gearshift – impressions that remained throughout the test. The gear lever of the six-speed box has a strong spring bias toward the third-fourth gate, which works very well. One of the best boxes around.
Over one of my ripply test roads, the Coupe gave a pretty joggly ride, but at speed the rid is pretty supple – overall very good for this type of car, and much better than many a competing grand tourer.
As far as it goes, the V-6 engine is excellent. It is a very smooth engine, but seems to need quite a lot of power to get going up to about 5 mph – as if there’s a lot of resistance in there.
It’s not a big deal, and is soon forgotten when you put your foot down. At lower speeds the Coupe has plenty of oomph, but starts to tail off at higher speeds. There’s no shove in the back, but you’ve always got plenty of acceleration when you want it, so long as you get in the right gear. Speeds in the gears are about 35, 55, 80, 105, and 130 mph, with 136 mph being reached in sixth presumably.
Smooth engine
At low and medium speeds this V6 is a delight. It ‘s quite a compact engine, found in other Hyundais such as the Santa Fe and Sonata. It is also a modern unit with its aluminum block, and big bore. With a displacement of 2.7 liters, this twin ohc 24-valve unit develops 165 bhp at 6,000 rpm, and 182 lb ft at 4,000 rpm. Doesn’t sound too much when you’re used to sports cars and supercars, which you’d expect to develop more like 190-200 bhp.
But don’t be put off. The performance is good. You can get off the mark as fast as more powerful engines, and at low speeds the engine is well behaved – quiet and smooth. Put your foot down and the engine note gradually changes to an increasing but muffled growl as the needle whizzes round to 6,500 rpm or so when you shift up. The cut-out limits you to about 6,800 rpm, but with plenty of mid-range torque, 6,000 or thereabouts is a good place to change up.
Sure, I’d like another 20-30 bhp, but this Hyundai does go, and the performance is just the job for real roads.
Michelin tires give progressive handling
. What about the dynamics? Does it handle? The coupe comes shod with Michelin Pilot 215/45 –17 tires which give pretty good grip in the wet and dry, and which help give good feedback when the understeer builds up. Feedback of what’s happening at the tires is much better than many a competitor.
It’s not all roses, though. As soon as you turn the wheel to turn off the straight and narrow at speed, you can feel the car resisting, as it wants to keep going straight on. After a while you get used to this classic front-wheel drive characteristic – it’s caused by all that weight between the front wheels.
On fast country roads, the car handles well within itself, so you can put the miles away pretty quickly, winding around the curves with very little roll – the suspension is quite firm and there are anti-roll bars front and rear. Push the car hard into a slower corner, and the understeer builds up – and up.
Understeer and more understeer….
OK, so you expect understeer from a nose-heavy front-driver, but I didn’t expect it to get so strong at fairly low cornering speeds – not much different from a saloon with fat boots. There is a big difference though. With most front-drive saloons and hot hatches you either understeer or understeer more.
..But with some control
With the Hyundai Coupe you can control it. The trick is to wind into the corner quite quickly, and as the nose runs wide, you lift off, and the tail swings out obligingly. At that point you pour the power on, ands off you go.
But….if you go into the corner too fast, the car just runs wider, the grippy tires scrubbing off some speed. Lifting off doesn’t help. Bad news this, because if you overcook it badly – especially when going fast - you probably won’t scrub enough speed off, and could end up in the weeds. This is true of almost all front-drivers. Get it right, though, and the Coupe is fun.
In fact, overall this is both a practical and enjoyable car to drive. No tearaway kid, but a smart job that can give a lot of pleasure. Without doubt the sportiest Korean car yet - and a very competitive front-drive grand tourer. It even has a decent-sized trunk for heaven’s sake.
