Tucson had become just too cowboy. The nameplate just wouldn't suit the very strongly sculpted sheetmetal that sheathes the ix35. This is a car styled for the city as much as for the old country roads.
It's a bigger car too, and the target audience is the affluent families that go on trips together, whether to the sea, mountains or the opera. Who want something that looks as swish as a Lexus RX without having to pay the price.
It's getting very hard for the premium brands to be better in finish and equipment against what their mass-market cousins are offering these days. The ix35 ratchets the game up another couple of notches.
For boulevard swish, actually, it is very hard to beat the front end of this CUV (crossover utility vehicle for the Table Quiz masters this winter). It is strong, dynamic, and something which any other brand's designers might have liked to have achieveds.
The profile is sexy, though the rear quarter is a matter of taste, which in my case gives preference to that on the ix35's cousin, the new generation Kia Sportage. Not at all to say the Hyundai is less smart. Taste is taste, just that. Nor will showing their rear to following cars cause ix35 owners a fit of low self-esteem: it looks very smart from the back.
The ix35 is a roomy and comfortable car. The extra interior dimensions over its predecessor offer a sense of spatial luxury that steps this one up. It holds five with room for heads, elbows and legs that would have required a move up a segment not half a decade ago.
As I write, there's just one version of the ix35 available in Ireland, a FWD powered by a 2.0 diesel engine popping 136hp. And given the car's ambition in the market here, there's no point in offering anything else. Until the new 1.7 diesel comes along sometime by the end of the year.
The specification level is high, especially when you look at the price at the end of this piece. ESP, six airbags, full alarm system. Aircon, cruise control, electric windows front and rear. Trip computer, fogs. Bluetooth (but it didn't recognise my iPhone), hill start assist and downhill brake control. And a 5-year warranty with unlimited mileage.
The 2.0 engine is a refined piece of motive engineering, and in this application it offers a performance which petrol engines of a decade ago couldn't manage. With its 6-speed manual box it makes 5.5L/100km and C Band progress with a minimum of effort.
On good roads the car is impeccable at any legal speed. On lesser ones, such as through the maze of west Wexford ways, it was better to take it easy, as its high-riding SUV heritage showed on the bends. But it does the R-road ambles pleasantly enough if you do just that.
At €27,000 the ix35 2.0 CRDi is very good value for the size and quality car you get. If you're in the active family bracket, it makes a lot of sense for five or six years' investment, and you don't need to compromise on style.
And there's a good reason to think of buying even in this latter half of the year, because Hyundai Ireland is selling the 2.0 at the same price it will sell the 1.7 when it comes. At that point, the current version will jump in cost.
Granted, the smaller engine will be more efficient, providing a B CO2 tax band here. But the difference in annual tax isn't very much, and if you have a busy family requirement, it seems to me a good offer of which to take advantage.
I'm well beyond that family slot, my own children scattered in Ireland, America and Australia. It would have been nice to have had this one available when I needed it.
