New Hyundai Kona Road Trip Part One | Better Than Ever?

This is the New Hybrid Kona from Hyundai.

The model we have is the N Line S HEV 1.6 Litre – join us as we travel over to Wetherby in a proper Northern Adventure!

Full review coming soon.

@HyundaiMotorUK #Hyundai #Kona #hyundaikona #konahybrid

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Good afternoon – Hello Cabie, and welcome to a rather overcast day in the brand new Kona. And a Hybrid you say? Well, that means road trip. So we’re heading through to Wetherby for the SMMT Test day,

Where we get to drive a lot of cars, and, yes, I’m in my comfortable attire – but when we go on a road trip, I will wear something where I feel nice and relaxed. It’ll be about a two hour journey,

And what we’ll do throughout the trip is take a look at MPG – as it’s supposed to return around 60, which I don’t think’s bad for an SUV of this size. For a start, Iit’s longer, so you’ve got more cabin space.

And I think that was pretty much the only complaint about this vehicle. And it wasn’t really a complaint. It was: I feel a little bit cramped. Be nice to have a little more room. But on top of that, they’ve revised the full interior

And the outside, but it still bears a resemblance to Kona. If you don’t fancy the Hybrid, you could go full Electric or you could go ICE. Yeah, there’s a 1.6 turbo and a one litre turbo. This has got four cylinder petrol engine. It’s turbocharged and it’s got an electric motor.

It’s the Atkinson cycle system. Prices – anything with hybridity or electric technology, you always see a premium on, but it is slowly starting to come down. This is around £36,000.00 The one litre turbo is going to be a fair bit less than say the Hybrid. And this is the perfect stepping stone.

If you thinking actually I may go EV in the future when you’ve got a Hybrid, especially when you don’t have to charge it, you just get a feel for how the vehicle drives because so many people jump in something like, say, a PHEV or a full EV and go, I can’t do this.

And that’s it – you have to change your mindset and also your view of the vehicle. Thing is, we’ve been driving these for about four years now, road trips, length and the breadth of the country. Looking forward to this one.

It certainly looks sleeker, but it still retains the look of the Kona, which is really important. This sold exceptionally well and it won a shed load of awards and I think you’d agree with me – the N-Line trim really sets it off. You can get solid colours, metallic colours or pearl,

And just wait till you see the light show. Front camera, rear camera. Parking Sensors. Cross-Traffic Alert Mitigation Systems detects pedestrians, bicycles, AEB. The safety suite is something else. And what a vehicle to go in! You’ve just got to love Gesture control – one shake of your foot, That’s clever,

You’ve got to stay there. So if you decide not to, you can walk away and it won’t open the boot. Decent size and no boot lip. I’m rather impressed with this new variant. To be honest, I do prefer it to the previous Gen.

It’s certainly going down the Hyundai design route and that’s a really good thing. That aggressive front splitter. Love it. Anyway, I don’t want to give too much away. Throughout the journey we’ll stop off at various places and we’ll take a deeper look at the styling, the interior and the practicality. Yeah, very nice.

And yes, you’ll likely recognise that – and seen it in various Hyundai group vehicles. Looks like the weather is picking up, but with things like lane departure warning and lane mitigation systems, this we probably won’t even notice it. Time to jump in the driver’s seat. So no key as you’d expect.

But you can also get smart key, which means if you’ve got, say, an iPhone, that’s the latest. You can use that to open your car. Keyless entry, and blind spot detection on the mirrors. It’s sporty. It’s rather aggressive. They’ve certainly revised the Kona.

It wasn’t a bad looking vehicle and the powertrain was great across the board. But this one, I suppose they just made more of it. And to be honest, the powertrain is pretty much the same. But there were no complaints when it came to that. I really enjoyed it.

So once again, it’s time to climb aboard the Kona and go on a road trip. You can tell it’s N-Line because of the red accents. And yes, it’s easy to climb into and I can drop my seat a fait bit, to be honest. Very nice.

The one thing that is different to the previous one, a column shift. Anyway, that’s enough whittering on, let’s set off. See you soon. That’s similar to Ioniq five. And if I remember correctly, that symbolises Hyundai. So we’ve got 429 miles of range. So there’s no pure electric range on this. Drive modes.

It’s a little rotary down here, eco sport, snow making the drive train more responsive or less responsive. If it comes to eco. We’ll try and avoid that one. Next stop, Wood Hall. Actually, let’s head to Booths first, drop.. Ooo! dropped into electric mode and the petrol engines kicked in.

Very smooth transition, – look BEV, which is kind of ironic because they’re not full electric vehicles. But anyway, very nice escort. Selina is looking a little busy. It’s peppy, nice, sharp steering, not too heavy, traveling at around 20 miles an hour. I can feel it quite a lot. Was agile.

Wow. That’s a warm day, isn’t it? It is, yes. Okay. Exceeding the speed limit beep. You get full bongs. 21. It doesn’t seem to do much. So when? So when you get up to 23, it’s worth noting. So we’ll be doing three counties today. Lancashire, Cumbria and then Yorkshire. See how it handles

On this little section of road I call the rollercoaster and it is national speed limit. In case you’re wondering. Very nice but decent. Paul. I’ve hardly got my foot on the accelerator. It’s well poised, balanced, even on this little b-road going around the corners, very little body roll.

I mean, obviously I like Chris to go a bit faster and to say as that bend, but probably at normal speeds along here. Very cool. Yeah. How is that? So under the bonnet we’ve got a 1.64 cylinder turbocharged unit and it’s an Atkinson cycle system. But the electric motor and battery.

Oh, this is just the region. I didn’t know whether it’s the gearbox or the region. Right. And if you don’t fancy an auto, you can get a petrol manual. This is a six speed dual clutch, but on some of the other variants

You can get a seven speed dual clutch, which is automatic, a very clear cluster, nice and easy to see when you’re charging and when you’re using your power. I do like what they’ve done with the interior. It feels massively refreshed. That said, I suppose the cluster part has kind of lived its life,

So to have bigger screens, it just makes things a lot easier. You can glance and just see the information you need. Ooh, look, Spaceballs, one miles on there. We have a new Tucson. It’s nicely refined. Turn. Right. Quiet. Very little road noise to hear a little bit of the time. Noise. Wind noise.

We’ll look at when we’re going, say, 50 or 60 miles. Now, you don’t need to accelerate very much. It seems to coast for England. Get ready for a beautiful view. So this is outside. If you’re lucky enough, you might see the border. And that’s a strong, powerful

I suppose it’s like a wave that comes of that body of water will be dropped into electric mode as a polo with that indicated, very smooth, isn’t it. Yes, it’s really refined. Drive it Well you don’t notice it change modes. No, it’s seamless. They’ve just helped everything. Kona was

To be honest in point you got Miles. Well, it’s always a delightful surprise to get in it and go, wow, it was good before, but look how much more they’ve done to it to make it really good. Sorry, Mark left. No, no, you’re right, sport. A cyclist. Nice, seamless drop of the gear.

Then if I kicked down now, it can propel itself. Yeah, it does make a little bit of noise when it comes to the territory, when it comes to Atkinson Cycle systems. Rest assured, it’s not as loud as an old school CVT. Now we’re on this worst road.

You can hear a bit more tire noise, another beautiful view, the estuary once again. Wow, a of a beast. Fix it down. This floods. Shows you nature at its finest, doesn’t it? Yeah. It’s beautiful. Little bit body roll off an excessive was it. No, but it’s nice enough to keep you comfortable.

Oh yeah. That’s it. If you make it too stiff, it’s just not very bearable. This if you’re driving a passenger? No, I like this. So up about right. To be honest, for a b-segment SUV. Very comfortable drive thing. Is it? It’s still engaging enough to be fun too, which I think is possible

Like into electric mode. I click on the launch. Lots of safety across the board on this detection systems and mitigation systems. It’s the cars, pedestrians, bikes, AEB and sensors and cameras all throughout. Next stop, this will drop off a myriad of carrier bags.

Christakis and Breadbox be nice if they did some curbside recycling. And yet here we are not aware of this and it has a while to get some food out. Yeah, the vegetables are high quality, aren’t they, that Well, I think that’s why I actually started a trial.

The market that continues. I would explain it. Make a U-turn whilst Annabel’s in the shop picking up something to cook to commence the bulls cheese and onion pie. And this is on the postcard. If you know what that references from. I’ve a walk around and look at some of the styling

I mean a fan of opens the camera now you can see that the dashboard has changed immensely but the thing is you still got rotaries and buttons after this. It looks like something out of the DeLorean. I love the way that we’ve got the proper exhaust and it’s rear diffuser styling. Okay,

Cut back. Okay, This is going to take some time. So I used to be a Hyundai de styling certainly changed, hasn’t it? Thing is, there’s what you call a certain charm to these, especially with their three spoke wheels. But this an inline trim. Oh, it carries it off very nicely.

This light bar at the front which is a cross between Cylon and nitride I’d say chunky front bumper and LED lights all round. Okay, I’m close enough. You should be open your door if you press the button. Oh. Oh, yes, I like that. 360 view grill. It is. It’s exceptionally handy Still.

It’s taken me a while to get used to the column shape. Dependent on what you see. It is you might not. Yeah. See when it’s in Drive Park, etcetera. It’s strange to not have it there. So we’ll leave in bays and we’ll head towards the M6, but instead

We’re going to head through Kirkby Lonsdale on the 65 and that’ll take us pretty much to Skipton and then we can head over to Harrogate and Wetherby. The road’s empty and we pull away an electric kick down and that’s the engine. And yes, because it’s Hyundai when you indicate

You’ve got camera view in the cluster like segments where a bit of a more green. Ben I thought oh look Dorothy’s coming towards us. Wow. Not just that that was a facelift as the M6 in front of this comfortable supportive seats only. Yeah they really help turn the rest under load.

It does make a bad noise, but that’s only if you look for it from a junction 95% of the time. It’s just sounds like a normal engine. Thing is, as I mentioned, that comes with the territory of the system. It’s got decent torque and considering it, I think it’s about 140 brake horsepower.

So it’s not big outputs, but that’s a benefit of an electric motor. Instant torque. Well, it’s really quiet and done. The cabin now hasn’t happened. So we’re traveling at about 30 miles an hour. Yeah, like you mentioned before, it’s well refined. It’s it must be rather well insulated because

There’s a feral window there. You can’t hear it, can you? You know. Oh, certainly. Track to Ali. Isn’t that a well aren’t you. We are getting up to Kirkby Lonsdale so it’s not really surprising. Also Cumbria around here, he was about three.

But if you noticed the vehicle didn’t think that’s coming at me, even though it did come a little close to the light. So that’s one that you can rest assured of. It’s not going to just anchor up something like that’s coming at me because some safety systems are a little overzealous,

But this seems to be spot on. You feel that electric motor? Can you test the adaptive to this is all singing and dancing. Okay, so we’ve used six miles of range to weight more than likely. Yeah, we have. Yeah, that’s that’s. Hmm. It is beautiful. Yeah.

I live in a lovely part of the world. We don’t normally drive this section of the road either. Do it now. So it’s nice to be able to see it. And it’s coming into autumn cars as well. On other vehicles coasting, which is so efficient,

Is holding it 36 miles an hour through here. But any acceleration. So we’re about three miles away from Kirkby Lonsdale. But these are proper driving roads around this sweeping bend. It just maintains composure. Yeah, it’s the drive is going to be Lonsdale, the home of Devil’s Bridge. And there’s another booth.

An interesting thing about the booths known for they’ve adopted it’s the Volt rapid charges. We don’t need it for this. It’s very handy if you’ve got heavy, reliable, easy to use. And there’s a Tucson Skipton 32. So we’ve got what, round 80 miles would you say about

64 now from where we are 40 miles away. I’m going to put my foot down 60 and it would exceed it for an echo. So in sport it’s considerably quicker. A bit tire noise now, but to be honest, it’s expected on 18 inch wheels. The best road round here. I

No I reckon look Harley-Davidson F-150 import I love it. Right This looks like a sport moment to me. So as sport cluster has changed now, it’s kind of just because we’ve got into snow now we’ve got we’re in sport, we’ve got red. So at 30 oh it’s readying itself and to 50,

60 thing is it’s not jarring is it. Not always a very smooth transition and it’s punchy and it just goes and there we go. It’s not leveled out even in sport mode. Nice. Okay. But we can. Oh, you just entered North Yorkshire, so we’re in our third county already. Ingleton once again.

I seem to be living here that way. Yeah, but the outdoor pool here was great. It is? Yeah. I mean, we were here two weeks ago. Yeah, for the Greek merchant. Like you fill in the lane, keep assessed. It’s not invasive. You just know it’s there. Especially when you’re going round six.

Being relatively quick bends. Well, I said this journey is all about those kind of bends, isn’t it. Because it’s a 65, isn’t it. It’s very fast and it’s, it’s got a variety of roads. That whole test is very across the board. We like the way that everything’s

Going to the driver, but it’s still open enough for the passenger in the front to be able to see it, access it, whatever. Well, I’d say that’s good design, isn’t it? Yeah. Thinking of everybody in every eventuality. Plus it’s nice and responsive. It’s quick navigation, which I can display here

Apple, CarPlay, Android Auto, DAB Radio and a myriad of car settings as well. Yeah, that’s a firm favorite mine as well. No haptics, real buttons, screens, everything. They definitely know their audience well. It doesn’t look old, outdated or anything like that. It looks very modern, cutting edge.

It’s just still got the functionality that we all look for need. Exactly. Know in your job, it ticks all the boxes. It does bends like this. It just takes it. And I’m not too buffeted about in the passenger seat either. No. Considering it’s an SUV, it’s relatively nimble and agile

And you’ve got that you can feel the electric motor now just you feel it? Yeah. It’s like you may not launch the quickest, but through normal driving and say accelerator on roads like this, you really feel the power. Oh, give us. To be honest, most of the gear changes while less big

And it was booking it was I think they do on this road done them well it’s I think it’s a faster road than people would give it credit for. Oh yeah. The way it’s driving, I’d say they’ve refined it. So the dampers and then essentially the powertrain is the same.

As I mentioned before, there’s no complaints with that. So it makes sense that they’ve used it. The likelihood is there’ll be some small revisions. You can see why this sounds very enjoyable. Jeez, great cheese again. And finally, cheese 57, traveling at 57 to the gallon. I think you could exceed that

By easily rubber buttons on the steering wheel switch. Yeah, it switches in a quarter of a mile around on this tight roundabout. I Look, you’ve got an empty bar here. Look all the same sports yards. Wow. Ooh. Now long, Preston. Look at that. That’s awesome.

It’s like a little city t 25 and, yes, the Audi toothpaste. Oh, my word, they’re uncovered. But what is everyday driving? It gets up to speed quickly and efficiently. So be honest. You don’t really notice it, but certainly no problem for it. It’s just steaming up there.

Yeah, it was effortless. Well, that was my biggest hope. It is something to manage before it breaks. A lot of people do underestimate that in me. By the sound of it. Just, you know, I think it’s just more of a lovely surprise as this has got smaller brake horsepower but still delivers

The performance. I mean, it’s not the quickest thing, it’s the light. But when you when you get going, it keep going. And then it surprises even more because it’s still very nippy, nimble and fast, still comfortable. We’ve got heat if we do need it, to be honest and Brendan

Hargrave has to think about the 65 from here is not. Yeah, it’s just picturesque after picturesque after picturesque hamlets of villages. Now that it’s a lot about. Well, we’ve got plenty of time to dig down further into this one. So you get to say chew the fat.

It’s not like those aliens of The Simpsons chew the fat. This a long Bob Yeah. Similar. Yeah. And a different different genre. Yeah yeah. Well no different genres additional different film. Sarsgaard That was nice. Skipton and the Roundabout, take the second exit. It’s getting close to the motorway speeds, 1960.

After some research on the A-Roads, I can safely say, no, it doesn’t scrape off speed when going into corners. I’ll have to test it with the traffic. They will do an adaptive and things like that. But when in normal mode, just driving without any kind of cruise on it just

Continues to coast, which I suppose makes it more efficient. That is a heck of a lawnmower. Yeah, we’re heading towards Portland. Abbey, you go right? You could look into Becky’s and lot. What can you do? You don’t have the right get yourself a nice fresh. I’ve noticed when you’re going down steep hills

It doesn’t just free roads so it does keep a fair bit of control. Oh Stelvio in many of those. So that’s nice, because otherwise it would feel like it was in neutral and it might be a bit. So it’s good that it doesn’t do that. It’s really quiet down. Now.

We do that 60 miles an hour, very little speed, to be honest. Yeah, No, they know a thing or two about and don’t mind to know what they’re doing. I can’t hear any wind noise of the mirrors either, usually at this speed center in the signs.

But if you’ve noticed the shape of them because of a blind spot detection and it’s a damn good system, it’s like a mini Devil’s Bridge, isn’t it? Is the thing. Decent infotainment screen. And as I said, responsive. Do you like these red touches? Nice and clear. Everything laid out really easily.

For example, you’ve got the clock in the top left corner, and that’s an interesting thing. You’ve got the map, but you’ve also got the road sign recognition on that sneaky, sneaky camera down there. Welcome to one of the quietest sections of road ever. And now the complete opposite.

It’s not just the limit that pops up, it’s also things like Time Bend. It would have been nice to see a little bit more power, to be honest. Nine times out of ten, it’s perfectly fine. I mean, take this hill here.

It’s rather steep, which explains why the 44 has gone down king and into it. So he’s got enough momentum to climb. Five, maybe seven miles later, there’s another camera chair. I was a bit excessive. Yes. And it’s a straight a-road Looks a bit of a rollercoaster road, isn’t it?

Yeah, it’s very tactile and it’s got grips. Is kind of like a grip to it, isn’t it? It’s harder, more than soft, but it doesn’t feel like, say the top of the door cos it’s nice to the touch store pocket. It’s huge. It’s quite cavernous actually.

You can get loads to finish because we’ve got the press back here. You can easily get a bottle or glass in there but you’ve also got a couple thing here and on the long journey you can put your arm there and it’s comfortable.

And we’ve got a padded armrest, a very nicely cushioned, padded off rest in the middle. That’s big enough for both you and the driver. Now, this is what you call I suppose it’s like mining subsidence, but this is just it’s eating them up. It’s not jolting and it’s not to wallow.

We either, whether it’s an a-road b-road something that’s more like a roller coaster or something that looks like it’s had a large muddles, it still offers a rewarding driving experience puttering through the villages that you will be typical around someone like this. It’s lovely. You do about 12 miles now.

We still get 58 to the gallon as well. You know, there’s a lot of refinements and changes. I think it’s about 15 centimeters bigger. And that might not sound like a lot, but it gives you more legroom in the back and this just I don’t know, it feels more open. Yeah.

Obviously some of it’s to do with the redesign of the dash, but it is very roomy in here, as you said. Yeah. No, it’s good for its size isn’t it. Hedgehogs. Oh, to be honest, that was quite a quick launch and we got wheel spins.

How come whenever we get to this point we always get stuck behind the bike so we can’t quite work out If we need to follow the bicycle, pass it to him. And to be honest, I think we’ll follow the bike, follow it and have a journey. Right. There you go.

There’s a demonstration of the sharp steering. It’s nicely weighted and it gives good feedback. It’s direct too, so you can just wait. It goes, Oh, nice wall. We do like a good wall. It’s like, beautiful that with, like, flowers and stuff. I knew this. We should strike straight from Wetherby.

This was some lovely big houses around here. It’s a steep ish hill, and that’s not flood. That’s just a little bit point one, Miles. It’s not running, actually. Very nice. We still get 58 to the gallon, even though I keep doing standing stance, essentially turn right, turn right hand hose it

But there’s somebody running towards us like a steam train. Yeah. So we’re about a mile away and here we are. So long that just a driveway, isn’t it? Yeah. So was not having drinks in the car. Hmm. Peaceful. Well, here we are, our first destination. Time for some barbecue.

Oh, look, he’s flying over lovely. Let’s go and get some food, have a chill, and then we’ll come out. We’ll have a look at the lights and we’ll head to our hotel that we’re staying over. And tonight, which is the rolling park. And then we’ll pick it up tomorrow with SMP. But you.

No, they’ve improved it tenfold just upon them. Brake, which is on the right hand side here is a little. So yeah, electronic, no old school. And if you hit P on the end just puts it into park and nice thing if I turn this off. Well you can tell

And it’s an automotive journalist event and that’s just this car park you thank you would hold and next stop including Park hotel about 20 minutes.