Kia Pro_cee’d review (11/09/2013)
It is not so much that Kia used to make utilitarian and cheap cars which bore more resemblance to communist-era production from a variety of Iron Curtain countries, or that its
designs were about as attractive as a biscuit tin on wheels, it was also that Kia was to motor manufacturing what Guinea-Bissau is to international diplomacy — small but well-
intentioned.
Following the Asian rim economic collapse of 1997 Kia was taken over by its fellow South Korean manufacturer Hyundai and to this day the two companies share a huge amount of technologies — from engines to platforms to electronics and so on. Hyundai now owns some 37% of Kia and therefore much of what the two companies do is inextricably linked.
Back in 2006 however, Kia appointed former Audi and VW designer Peter Schreyer to head its design department and since then he has led a team which has not only given Kia products their own visual identity, but a desirability which it never previously had. The result in terms of worldwide sales has been spectacularly successful.
Even though the company sold over 1.2m vehicles worldwide last year it still does not have the cachet many of its European rivals enjoy.
Even so, it currently has a range of well-built, economic, good looking, competitively priced and — just to
illustrate Kia’s own belief in its’ own products — fantastically warrantied machines on offer. Thus, for a growing number of supporters, Kia has continued to build its image to the point that mainstream public acceptance has already been achieved.
There are those, of course, for whom the brand represents little more than another cheap eastern import, but that attitude is changing quicker than the political landscape in the middle east. Kia are here to stay and will, I have no doubt, ultimately become a truly global player.
That fact was underlined recently when I tested the awkwardly named Kia Pro_cee’d (why the underscore and the apostrophe, I wonder). A sort of coupe version of the successful Cee’d, it retains many of the components of its siblings, although it is considerably lighter and has had its dynamics sharpened up considerably. The exterior has also been changed considerably with only the bonnet and front wings being retained and front and rear bumpers redesigned.
The visual effect has been dramatic — never has a Kia had such an effect on people. From its ‘tiger nose’ front end with its striking headlamp design, across a lowered roofline and redesigned B pillars and its haughty hip line, though to a distinctive rear end and, in the case of the test car, its’ ‘Techno Orange’ exterior colour scheme, the Pro_cee’d certainly has presence.
In many ways Kia are to be commended for taking a leaf from the respective Ford and VW books on ‘how to do things right’. Thus this car has independent all-round suspension, disc brakes at all four corners and, on those cars with 17” alloys as standard, up-rated dampers and revised steering characteristics. The engine is the familiar 1.6 litre turbodiesel unit and while it might not be a world-beater in performance terms, it is certainly very liveable-with. There are actually two variants of this engine, one with 81 kW (109 bhp) and the other with 94 kW (127 bhp) and it was the latter of these we tried.
There is a broad range of power available, provided you keep the engine spinning in its optimum torque band. It might be misguided to suggest the engine has sparkling performance, but allied as it is to a very nice six speed gearbox, it is possible to extract decent, zesty characteristics.
If Kia has learned a lot from Ford and VW in terms of the mechanics of its cars, then the same can be said of the manner in which it specifies and decorates them. The interior is a really nice place to be and the level of build quality and the surprisingly appealing materials impressed.
One thing that did not particularly impress, however, was the manner of accessing the rear seats. The mechanism used to allow you tilt the front seat forward was clumsy and the memory function which is supposed to allow you put the seat back in the position it was in, seemed to have a mind of its own.
That said the amount of room
available for rear seat passengers was surprisingly commodious, the thought of being back there for a long journey was thus not the potentially horrendous prospect you might have envisioned.
I was surprisingly taken with this car and impressed with the strides Kia continue to make coming soon, then you can clearly seen that Kia’s only going one way now — and that’s up.
from 22,900-23,950 as tested.
a familiar four cylinder DOHC 1.6 litre turbodiesel.
94 kW (107 bhp) @ 4,000 rpm; 240 Nm of torque between 1,900 and 2,750 rpm. Top speed is 197 kph and 0-100 kph is achieved in 10.9 seconds.
4.1 l/100 km/109 g/km.
LED daytime running lights and rear clusters, ESC, ABS with EBD, leather trimmed steering wheel, gearknob and handbrake, air con., steering wheel mounted stereo and cruise control functions, Bluetooth, UBS and AUX ports, 60:40 split rear seats
A very appealing Kia indeed.
****
