The Koreans have pretty good sales with their i30 hatchback but that’s not really enough given their recent results in the field.
In order to boost sales and attract new interest in their i30 model, Hyundai is considering making a hotter version of the hatchback.
The logic is fairly simple, sell more cars thanks to the new model and the sporting credentials attract more customer to showroom, even if they end up buying the “lesser” versions.
Since the car is still just in the “drawing board option” state, details on the hot hatch version of the Hyundai i30 are pretty scarce.
Price is very important for this segment of the market and therefore Hyundai will most likely not develop a new engine for the hot i30.
Given that situation, the Hyundai Veloster’s 1.6 liter T-GDI (turbocharged gasoline direct injection) engine is the most probable candidate to power the hot hatch version of the i40.
This powerplant develops 204 horsepower and 195 lb-ft of torque. With this sort of performance the i30 would pretty much be on par with the Volkswagen Golf’s GTI version.
Allan Rushforth, Hyundai’s European division boss, is the one “fighting” to bring the performance version of the i30 to life and at the other end we find an army of businessmen.
Making a business case, crunching the numbers, probing market placement, so on and so forth is what will determine whether or not we’re going to get a properly cheap hot hatch for our generation.
