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LUCKILY for Hyundai, they finally delivered my new i30 Fastback two days late.
To be honest, when it first arrived I was more impressed by the HYU registration plate than the car.
It was so slow I thought that someone had given it the Fastback name as a joke.
Its handling wasn’t much better either. It rolled around on bends if you tried to tackle them in anything approaching a sporty manner and the experience was beginning to become tiresome.
I was getting ready to hand it back, wondering what I was going to say about it, when I got a phone call from Hyundai. No, they hadn’t given me the wrong car or put the Fastback badge on it for a laugh, but they would collect it in two days.
Two days? Oh, of course! I’d booked it for an extra two days. How could I forget that? Actually, if you knew me you’d soon realise that I can barely remember my own name.
Anyway, those extra two days made the world of a difference to my Slowback experience, because suddenly it lived up to its name.
Now I know this has happened to me before with tiny three cylinder engines like the 998cc Fastback, but if you’re old enough to remember the days when new cars ran around bearing stickers on the rear window with the message “Running in, please pass”, you’ll know exactly what I mean.
Strangely, new cars don’t need “running in” today. But the little three cylinder jobs do. Normally, they don’t perk up until they’ve done about 1,500 miles, but the Fastback showed no signs of a real life until it got to nearly 4,000 miles. Suddenly it was a different car. OK the handling still wasn’t great, but gone was the mindnumbing wait for it to wake up.
Cruised
After a while you find yourself thinking: “How can this be a
998cc engine?”
It cruised happily at 90mph in sixth when I took it on the autobahn in Germany and it felt as though there was plenty left.
No surprise because the top speed of the 998cc Fastback is
117mph. That’s ridiculous for such a small engine and it’s not as if it’s a little car – it’s 14ft 6in long and weighs 1,242kg.
By now I wasn’t looking forward to giving it back.
Its interior is not quite in the posh league, but soft touch trim surrounds a lot of piano black, 16 silver-lined switches, a big sat nav screen and another 16 switches on the steering wheel, which is a smart, thick, leather and double-stitched affair.
Next to the driver is a sensible and spacious 6in deep centre console, it’s got four decent door pockets with bottle holders and twin map pockets on the back of the front seats.
Move into the back and there’s so much leg room it makes this i30 far more than just mum’s school run car. There’s enough space even for the tallest of adults, while moving into the boot you’ll find that it’s an excellent 3ft deep, with a hidden storage container under the carpet with six different-sized spaces moulded into it.
Fold the back seats down and it turns into a flat bottomed 6ft deep luggage lugger.
So that’s a lesson for all Hyundai sales reps… let customers study the car in the showroom, but make sure the demo cars have done 4,000 miles before you let the public loose in them. Premium.
Hyundai i30 1.0 Fastback
– £25,160.
£22,105. Range: £20,310
PRICE (on the road):
cylinder direct alloy, 12-valve, three
ENGINE: 998cc, all
171Nm (126lb) torque). injection turbo (120hp,
0-62mph: 11.5s.
TOP SPEED: 117mph;
54.3. urban: 61.4; combined:
MPG: Urban: 47.1; extra then £140pa. year road tax: £165,
CO2: 120g/km. First
INS GROUP: Nine.