1.4 CRDi Comfort 5dr Hatchback

Economical with Diesel but not with Rust...Check those Door Handle Surrounds!

I picked this car up in May this year, as I needed a 5th seat for some visitors from the USA.

The car was in decent overall condition but I was surprised to find rusting at all 4 door handles. Turns out this was a known (inherent) defect with the design of the door handle causing the paint to flake off. Hyundai has a "factory fix" in place to remedy the defect but the standard answer from Hyundai or the Dealer network is to deny the problem exisits....

Overall (other than the rusty door handle areas) the car is very competent and extremely economical. It's unlikely the car will raise your pulse level much but there's certainly ample torque from the 1.4L CRDi engine, as far as I'm concerned.

I tend to average mid to high 60's (since changing my diesel filter - previously it was mid to high 70's!) but I have observed as much as 82.6mpg on a longer run. The car will easily achieve 70+mpg if you keep your speeds below 50mph.

Build quality is pretty decent and so far it's been totally reliable other than a poor connection for the security system antenna (known problem from reading online) which just required a clean up of the connector under the steering column shroud. The symptom is a flashing key icon on the dash and not being able to crank the car. Takes about 20 minutes to resolve this if you can use a screwdriver and clean a connector block up.

If you are in the markey for a reasonable spacious car with excellent economy this should be on your list but make sure you look closely at the door handles and rear hatch for corrosion or rust issues. The car also only costs £30 per year to tax as well, which is a real bonus.

Edit: roughly one year of ownership under the belt.

Generally very satisfied with the car overall. Economy is good and suits my needs perfectly. Fill it up nowhere near as often as the previous KIA Picanto that it replaced.

Had the door handle rust problem taken care of by Hyundai. A few months later the handle surrounds are rusting once more and the repairs have failed. Not impressed in the least. The quality of work looked very good when I picked up the car in late November. Have been in touch with the body shop and they have supposedly passed on the photos and complaint to Hyundai and are awaiting their advice.

It took 6 months for Hyundai to get the rusty doors sorted, so I'm not holding my breath. After the protracted debacle with KIA regarding my mothers Picanto, I may well be off buying Korean products and back to Japanese again.

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