Hyundai Tucson 2004 test drive - 2009 SUV

Five in geography

Hyundai analysts predict the growth of consumer interest in compact SUV. In their opinion, the world market of ordinary cars from 2004 to 2008 will increase by 3.3% annually, and the sale of small SUVs - by 6.6%. Including at the expense of the novelty of Hyundai Tucson ...

Taxon? Tuskan? Tuxon? Ahhh, Tussan. If the name of the Korean company Hyundai our citizens in the very least have learned to pronounce, then it took the resource of the entire journalistic fraternity - the first articles about the new Sports of the Hyundai Tucson came out with remarks: to read the right thing - Tussan.

In fact, in a geographical atlas, the city in Arizona is noted as Tuson. And he is larger than Santa Fa, located in the neighboring state of New Mexico (with named in honor of cities, the opposite is true). By the way, from the language of local Indians, Tuson is translated as spring at the foot of the Black Mountain. The Korean manufacturer chose this name with a clear desire to please the American buyer. It is time to devote a separate car toponymy - not even an article - a book.

Well, we will go to Riga to pass the test for susceptibility to new Korean technique. For many Russians, Latvia is a blessed. Those who adopted the Antisanitaria of the All -Union Georgists fled to this almost foreign republic. But here are journalistic tests in Latvia - something new. Although, after all, Hyundai transferred its Central European headquarters from Warsaw to Moscow! Yes, and Latvia is now in the European Union.

Tucson is built in front of the Radisson-Sas Daugava hotel, from which a beautiful view of Old Riga opens. A few cities in the world have an equally expressive silhouette: the towers of St. Peter, the Dome Cathedral, St. Janis. It is like a fingerprint, like a retina - nothing to confuse with anything. There is a great temptation to direct Tucson to narrow medieval streets, but first of all, for such a car, the conditions should be simultaneously that the Latvian traveling or going to the Dachu Muscovite will encounter. Tucson is a real geographical puzzle. Despite the American name, fifty thousand cars will annually produce a machine -building monster at the other end of the world, in the South Korean Ulsan. Production was entrusted to plant No. 5 of this largest automotive complex in the world. Terracan is made on the fifth.

TUCSON is offered with a 2-liter 112-horsepower Common-Rail diesel engine, 2-liter gasoline with variable phases of 140 liters. with. or with a 2.7-liter V-shaped six Delta, at the output of which 175 liters. with. This motor, which appeared four years ago, is the pride of the company. On Santa Fe and Tucson, it is supplied only with a four -speed automatic. In Russia, TUCSON with 2.7 V6, velor salon, climate control, heating of the wiper and front seats will cost from $ 29,990.

Even the creators of the most beautiful in the world of the SUV should come up with bait for the buyer, while trying to save. Say, do you equip the car with a multi -band automatic transmission or focus on the little things, like improved sound insulation? Often, it is the little things that are overcome by those who have a full arsenal of engineering outskirts. The excellent sound insulation Tucson is largely triple door seals and six -layer sandwich inserts in the rear wheel arches. Or, for example, instead of gas underpants, the Tucson hood supports a trivial poker.

Is V6 to live under such a canopy? But among competitors, or rather, those who were chosen by the rivals themselves representatives of the company - Honda CR -V, Mitsubishi Outlander and Toyota Rav4 - there is no such motor! The hard plastic of the salon and the archaic key with a separate key fob - again concessions to the budget. But the back of the back row when folding really form a flat cargo site, which many promise only in pictures in advertising booklets. And everywhere useful trifles - such as hooks for hanging bags and eyebrows near the salon mirror, into which, by the way, an electronic compass is mounted. However, in search of priorities, the developers did not escape incidents. So, with six airbags, the car is deprived of sound indication of unsted belts.

The excessively balanced Tucson chassis is the merit of German engineers (RUSUSLSHAIM - another point on the Hyundai map) and those who drove the prototypes of the machine for the new test training ground in California. Suspension settings allow you to go at maximum speed along the highway with patches and transverse waves. In front, Tucson has a macpherson with a section of 21 mm, a multi -link with a stabilizer of 14 mm, and the monotive version of the machine (there is such) the rear suspension is different. Here, both the front and the rear nodes are collected on subframes. TUCSON suspension has an impressive energy intensity. The body does not experience significant shocks and vibrations and, which surprised, does not respond with the creak of the turtle shell of the salon upholstery.

As decisively as Latvia stepped into the EU, the car holds a course, and only dosed signals come to the steering wheel to avoid nervous correction of the course. There is no swing, the rolls are small. TUCSON is discharged for the discharge of gas trajectory very smoothly, without frightening failures into ski. Equally smoothly, the arc begins to straighten after adding gas. A moment, when the front wheels (and almost 100% traction in the usual mode in Tucson is transmitted to them), the rear comes, it is not possible to catch. Back, with the help of a multi -disable clutch with an electro -hydraulic drive, there are up to 50% of the torque.
The drive system is called Inter Active Torque Management (ITM-I) and is supplied by the American company Borg-Warner. Even before the Hyundai Tucson, the company has determined a similar node under the bottom of Acura MDX. Moreover, it has already been announced that the ITM-I system will receive a new generation Santa Fe, the production of which will begin in June 2005 in Ulsan and in January 2006 at the first American Hyundai plant at Hope Hill, Alabama.

The ITM-I system uses electronic sensors and microcomputer monitoring of the front wheel slipping. To connect, it is enough that the front wheels are ahead of the rear by only 1/8 turn. When the slipping is eliminated, the system lowers or stops the transfer of traction to the rear wheels. There is no center differential. The coupling can be blocked by pressing the key to the left of the steering wheel, and then the torque will be divided strictly in half.

The sports style of driving a little interfere with the long (3.1 turns from the stop to the stop) The steering wheel and the dreamy box. When overtaking, it is better to go into manual mode and block the mechanism in second gear-you will not achieve anything from the Hyundai Matik. But how many will be equally demanding? Women who are mainly intended for Tucson are not aggressive. Brakes are their main weapon, and you can get used to them. Although at first it seemed to me that at the end of the pedal, her resistance weakens, and this small failure interferes with the exact dosing of the effort. However, when I had to slow down in emergency mode, the brakes worked excellent. By the way, the organizers of the test brought comparative data on the brake route at a speed of 100 km/h: Tucson stops after 40.9 m, and not these, but the involved competitors - after 43.9 and 45.1 m. Again, due to price rationality, part of the Tucson will receive a dynamic stabilizing system ESP, And others are a less complex couple ABS+TSC.

On gravel, with the extent coating, the car suspension again demonstrates the miracles of energy intensity, and again, like partisans during interrogation, the interior is silent. At the end of the trip, I was occupied by the issue of participating in the creation of a machine of venerable firms, for example Porsche.

Understand, ”explained Hans von Gent, the head of the planning department of the European engineering center Hyundai,“ with the level of complexity of modern SUVs, you have to consult, for example, in the Austrian Steyr -Puch - by determining the optimal angles of shaft installation. But we can’t say that Santa Fe or Tucson are designed by the same Steyr-Puch. So it is with the design. Do not expect that I will call you the name of Michael Finn, the chief designer of our studio in Rüsselshaim. Hyundai has four of them - in Rüsselsheim, California, Korea and another, interior, in Japan. Everyone participated in a new project on competitive conditions. Some project, in this case, was German, but at the stage of refinement it was supplemented by ideas proposed by other applicants.

Okay, - I did not stop. - And where does Hyundai get such a cool V6 - with four ramparts, with excellent return? Also yourself, without the participation of Mitsubishi?
You won’t believe it, but we have developed it ourselves! - answered Mr. von Gent and looked at me so that I really did not believe.
 

A source: Magazine 4x4 [9/2004]