Main Street Rides

My first encounter with Hyundai (pronounced like Sunday) was a lowly 1990 Excel, it was my girlfriends car and at 17 it was about as close to being the epitome of uncool as a car could get.  Powered by an extremely soggy 1.5L 4-cylinder engine and mated to a clunky 5-speed transmission, the 1990 Hyundai Excel did everything but….. excel.

To say the least, Hyundai and a few other Korean manufacturers were the red headed step children of the industry.  Korean cars were known to be maddeningly unreliable and atrociously ugly; hideous as they were, they were cheap and so people bought them.  After my girlfriends clunky Excel clunked its last clunk, with a seized engine, it became nothing more than an unsightly eye sore parked in front of the house.  I’m happy to say that my first encounter with Hyundai was by far much worse than my most recent jaunt in a Hyundai, one that was most pleasing.

My brother and a good friend of mine recently made a trip to Yellowstone National Park and our ride for the day was a 2011 Hyundai Sonata GLS in Radiant Silver.  While our GLS was the base model offered by Hyundai and a rental car no less, it only added to my opinion altering experience.  In GLS trim, while lacking such things as leather seats and alloy wheels, the 2011 Sonata is light-years ahead of the Hyundai’s of old.  The Sonata is sleek and attractive with clean lines, a functional interior, and a fuel sipping 2.4L GDI engine that produces a stout 200-hp.  The GLS comes standard with a six-speed manual but ours had the six-speed automatic and it was the shining star of or our Sonata.  With six ratios to choose from the engine never had a problem finding the rpm it needed, whether it was passing a semi, cruising at 65, or climbing the 6% grades of Teton Pass.  Fuel economy was impressive at an observed 33 mpg for the trip and while 200-hp may not seem like much compared to today’s standard family sedans it was up for the task while mated to the six-speed.  Not to mention if more power is desired the Sonata is available with a turbo and a hefty 274-hp.

Hyundai is aggressively moving up in the automotive industry, not only in sales, now the sixth largest automaker in the world, but also in style and quality.  Boasting the nations best powertrain warranty of 10 years or 100,000 miles, it’s now hard to go wrong with a Hyundai.  Also of worthy mention is that of Kia, after nearly going bankrupt in 1998 Kia was purchase by Hyundai.  Current Kia’s now share many platforms and powertrains with Hyundai.