Hyundai Sonata Hybrid & PHEV: Can Green Be Normal?

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What do you expect out of a mid-sized family sedan? More and more, you hear “fuel economy” as one of the top factors in buying a new car. I mean, sure it’s important. We all like our sports cars and German super sedans until we have to fill them up with premium unleaded, yeah? Fuel prices are back down to an acceptable level, enough that truck and SUV sales are back through the roof, but we all know that won’t last right? When it hits the fan again, and we’re fringing on 5 dollars a gallon, hybrids will be all the rage again. So which one do you buy? Do you need a plug-in hybrid?

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The day began with a nice presentation at Hyundai’s North American Headquarters. After breakfast we were all shuttled over to their building, and introduced to a number of higher-ups that clearly were quite proud of what they were showing off. There were even a couple of gentlemen that had come over from Korea to oversee the media launch. It was obvious to me that this is an important car for Hyundai. In an effort to show how green-conscious they are, they told us all about the engineered-in pieces of their new headquarters that help them reduce energy use, their drought-resistant plantlife installations, as well as the preservation efforts they made to keep the local ecosystem intact. That’s all well and good, now lets get to the car.
Similar to their headquarters, the new Sonata Hybrid and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle make use of incremental changes to increase fuel economy. As shown above, the grille has automatic aerodynamic slats that open and close when the car goes faster, or the engine gets a bit hot. Active aero works great for hypercars to manipulate air to go faster, so why not apply similar techniques to make a car more aero efficient? The cars also make use of Low Rolling Resistance tires (The Hybrid uses Kumho Solus KL21, and the PHEV uses Hankook Kinergy Eco tires, natch) to increase their economy numbers a few ticks. Even the engine has been given a working over to improve fuel economy. Hyundai’s ‘Nu’ architecture 2.0 liter GDI engine has taken over from the old Sonata Hybrid’s ‘Theta’ architecture 2.4 liter. The ‘Nu’ engine has gained a lot of little things to help improve economy over the outgoing engine, including an electric water pump, an oil warming system, a high intensity ignition coil, a variable pressure oil pump, and a new high-tech piston coating to reduce friction loss.
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So, lets hop in a car. Journos paired up and each pair got a car of their very own. For the first leg of the journey, we were installed in a PHEV car. Routebook in hand, we hit the road. There was a bit of driving down the Pacific Coast Highway, then a hop on I-5 south, and we ended up going from Huntington Beach down to Torrey Pines. This is apparently a favorite route of Hyundai’s as they frequently use Torrey Pines as the site of their launches. Regardless, the route was pretty indicative of what the normal driver would use this car for. There was some stop and go driving in town, a bit of low-speed cruising along the coast, and then a good 30 miles of highway driving. An hour behind the wheel isn’t enough, perhaps, to become intimately familiar with a car, but it’s certainly enough to learn the ins and outs of how the car drives. No, we weren’t burning the tires off pulling away from traffic lights, and we weren’t exactly testing the lateral load grip of those hard tires, but we got a good feel for how the car performs, you know, as a car.

Journalists occasionally get quite jaded, and I’m as guilty as any other. The last three press launches I’ve been on have been for Porsche, and they don’t exactly pull any punches on their cars or their abilities. Even the Macan launch was directed to run directly down the Angeles Crest Highway to test out the amazing handling. This car, and this launch, was a little different, giving us a clear vision of the car’s daily use, which was nice, because that’s what it’ll be used for. Logical, to say the least.
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As a daily driven fuel miser, the Hyundai doesn’t do a bad job. The interior, where you spend most of your time, is plush and comfortable. The seat bottoms are nice to sit in, and I assume they would continue to be nice to sit in for hours on end. The heated and vented seats sure helped on our drive when it was that weird weather where it’s too hot to run the heat, but too cold to run the air conditioning. We turned on just a little bit of heat to keep us warm, but turned on the seat vents to prevent our backsides from getting too swampy. Pleasant is a good word. I really liked the dash and door trim, which was a black faux-wood accent. It looked nice, and flowed well through the interior design. It was easy to tell that it was made from plastic, though. Pretty much everywhere I put my hands had good padding. I’m a bit tall, so I found the door-mounted arm-rest to be just a tad on the low side for me, but the window sill was a nice place to rest my arm when the window was rolled down. The center console arm rest, however, was the perfect height.
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Furthermore, the inside of the car wasn’t too loud, either. My experience with LRR tires is that they tend to transmit quite a bit of road noise, and either they’ve engineered around that, or the cars were just vault quiet. Noticeable especially at highway speeds, the interior was quiet enough that it was easy to have a normal volume conversation. There was a bit of engine noise, and a bit of wind noise, but certainly less than I’ve experienced in other contemporary mid-sized sedans, and considerably less than I’ve experienced in buzzy economy cars.
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I’ll admit, I’m a bit of a confused person when sent on a hybrid press launch. My experience with hybrids thus far has been limited to a first generation Prius, which was a lesson in hating yourself. For that matter, thus far my time with any Hyundai has been limited to a Canadian market 1980-something Pony. I was as surprised to see how far hybrids have come as I was to see how far Hyundai has come. I drove in complete silence in full electric mode, I accelerated away from several stops, I felt the nearly seamless shifting of the 6-speed automatic gearbox (most of the competition uses CVTs, and I think I would not have liked the car as much with a CVT), and I tested the regenerative braking system. The PHEV drives exactly like it’s a car. I’m not being caustic, this car is better than I expected it to be. It drove like I expected a mid-size car to drive. There was no hesitation with the engagement of the engine. If you didn’t know any better, aside from it being super quiet when running on electric only, the PHEV drove just like a ‘normal’ car. That’s probably the praise Hyundai were expecting, if I’m honest. In discussions with others who own hybrid cars, they are something of a ‘hair shirt’ in that you have to sacrifice something in order to be green, and you have to let everyone else around you know that you’re giving something up. This car, though, you give up nothing, and receive all of the benefit.
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I take that back, you do give up one thing; a spare tire. The spare tire well has been used to house the batteries and the control unit for the electric drive unit up front. Worry not, Hyundai provides a can of fix-a-flat, and you’re a damn adult, you should have AAA coverage by now. Chances are, you wouldn’t want to get your slacks and shirtsleeves dirty anyhow. The load floor of the Sonata’s trunk has not been appreciably changed, and Hyundai is quite proud of their solution, as it allows the trunk space to remain as large as you’d expect in a mid-size. Even the larger battery pack of the PHEV car remains nice and hidden. The competition simply places a massive battery pack behind the rear seat, which eats up valuable space. Personally, I’d rather have the big trunk and no spare.
On the way back from Torrey Pines, we jumped in a standard hybrid and tried to compare the two, but there really isn’t that much difference. The PHEV gets a slightly stronger electric motor, but in day-to-day operation, I think you’d be hard pressed to notice the difference in acceleration. Other than that, the only thing I could really see that was different was the PHEV’s 24 mile electric-only range. They both drove almost identically, and were equally comfortable.
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So what do you cross shop these cars against?
Well, if you’re in the market for a PHEV, there’s very few options on the road. Porsche makes a few, but none of those are remotely in this market. There’s the Prius Plug-in, but that’s a compact, and only has an all-electric range of 11 paltry miles. So if you need mid-size room for five, a decent EV mode range, and don’t want to spend more than 40 grand then you’ve really only got three options. The Sonata PHEV, the Ford Fusion Energi, and the Honda Accord Plug-in. I can’t attest to which is best, but the Sonata has best in class range at 24 miles compared with the Fusion’s 21 and the Accord’s 13. The Sonata comes in right around the competition on economy, as well, at about 93 MPGe (This hasn’t yet been confirmed by the EPA, and is an internal Hyundai estimate. A representative of the company may have said something along the lines of “We’ve learned our lesson about overestimating fuel economy.”). The PHEV market runs from about $30,000 for the Prius to just under $40,000 for the Accord. Pricing for the Sonata has not yet been announced, but should be in the middle of those two numbers somewhere. Likely toward the higher end of the spectrum.
So what if you’re in the market for a non-plugin hybrid? You’d probably be comparing this to any number of other mid-size Hybrid models. Even Kia has one in the Optima Hybrid. From a few of the assembled journalists, however, I got the feeling that this was one of the better put together hybrids out there. One guy said he was driving a loaner Toyota Camry Hybrid that week, and the Optima was miles ahead in implementation and build quality. Again, I’ve not driven any of the competition, so I can’t really substantiate these rumors, but it did feel like they had nailed it. It was good at what it did, and that’s more than I expected, frankly.
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Greats – 
The 6-speed transmission was fluid and smooth. There was talk among the group that the electric motor was providing some cushion to each of the shifts. If true, it’s well implemented.
While also true of the traditional Sonata, I really like the bold and edgy styling of this car, especially in comparison with pretty much every other mid-size sedan on the market. This is less jelly bean and more wind-swept sand dune. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s “inspired”, but it’s certainly fetching.
The power is more than adequate for daily driving and merging onto fast highways. It’s not drag racer standard, and certainly not a hoon-machine, but it does what it was designed to do quite well.
If I’m being a pragmatist, 40 miles per gallon is quite good, and the PHEV has an impressive 24 mile EV range. That’d be great for saving fuel when it’s expensive again.
Also the low emissions thing. That’s good I suppose.
Seats! Those seats were practically Barca loungers. I’ve never felt more comfortable seats in a practical sedan. Maybe not on par with a Rolls, but certainly better than any cars I actually own.
Hyundai also built a pretty neat smartphone application for the PHEV that allows you to not only see the current state of charge from your phone screen, but also allows you to schedule out your overnight charging in order to optimally make use of the inexpensive watt hour rates from about midnight to about 4AM. A cheaper charge is always a better charge. The app also applies to the Apple Watch, in case you’re moronic enough to own one of those.
Today, Hyundai is announcing that all cars with the 8″ infotainment screen (optional on the Hybrid, standard on the PHEV) will be eligible for an update to include Android Auto usability. The update should be currently working its way through dealer lots, or you can download the update through the Hyundai owner’s portal website and install it yourself with the instructions provided. So that’s neat!
The batteries have a lifetime warranty! I was pretty impressed with that. Unfortunately, the warranty only applies to the first owner, so to take full advantage of it, you’ll need to buy brand new (that sentence should be considered a gripe…)
Gripes –
The gasoline engine will tend to hang on deceleration. For example, if you gun it away from a stop light up to about 40 miles per hour, then abruptly let off the accelerator, the engine seems slow to fall down the revs. Because of this, the car provides very little, if any engine braking off throttle. This might be a feature, the more that I think about it. Perhaps the engine is decoupling from the drive on decel to prevent momentum from being wasted and further increasing fuel economy. Either way, maybe I’m overthinking it. It just felt strange to me.
There is a LOT of chrome on this car. The headlight surrounds, the window frames, the door handles, the badges, the grilles, etc.
The big gaping maw of a grille is a bit much for my taste. They offer a honeycomb grille for this car as well that may have been more aesthetically pleasing, but none of the tested cars were so equipped.
The black trim piece that goes across the foremost shut line of the hood is unwelcome in such an attractive design. I was told that this had something to do with pedestrian crash safety standards, but I have to think that there was a better way of implementing that.
No burnouts.
Not particularly adept at being a manual transmission convertible two seat sports car. Really, I’d like this car a lot better if it aspired to be more Miata-like…
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Would I drive one every day? Not a chance.
This car was not built to appeal to me. I daily drive an 18 year old Porsche. My “fun” car is a 20 year old turbocharged Audi sedan. Without wanting to sound smug or pompous, I can afford the premium gasoline that they guzzle. My commute is short enough that I’m considering doing it on a bicycle. This is not the car for me.
Would I consider buying one? Yeah, maybe.
This would be an excellent commuter car for my wife. She works about 22 miles from home, so she could theoretically get to work without having to burn even one teaspoon of fuel. Her employer is one of those ‘forward thinking’ millennial type companies, and if she asked, they’d probably pay to install a charging port for her car at work, so she could get all the way home without burning even a teaspoon of fuel, too! It has everything she looks for in a car, including comfort, and visibility, and attractive design, and I dunno what, probably seats and a steering wheel. She knows about cars, and can drive quite well, but doesn’t particularly care about dynamism… Especially not the way that I do.
On the plus side, if my wife were to get one of these, I could tell my car friends that I was “just driving the wife’s car today”. It’d be nice to have a road trip car that got better than 24 miles per gallon, too.
Should you buy one? I dunno. Do you need one? It’s your life, do what you want.
The Sonata Hybrid will be available soon, launching summer of 2015 to all 50 states. The Sonata PHEV will initially be rolled out this fall in California and Oregon before being rolled out to the rest of the ten ZEV states (CT, NJ, NY, MN, MA, MD, RI, and VT). After that initial roll out, the PHEV will be available for special order from most Hyundai dealers, but will not be stocked on the lot.
[Disclaimer: Hyundai wanted us check out their latest (greener) Sonata examples. They flew me to Orange County, booked me in a nice trendy hotel across the street from the ocean, and fed me fine Hawaiian cuisine.]

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  1. PotbellyJoe★★★★★ Avatar
    PotbellyJoe★★★★★

    I sold Toyotas from when the original Prius was practically special-order only to the most recent rendition of the damn things. I also sold numerous Camry Hybrids to fleet customers.
    The appeal of the hybrid is partly for the feelings that the owner gets in driving something they see as a statement for the environment (ignore the fact that a small, fuel-efficient used car is better for the environment than buying a new car that has a massive nickel deposit in its trunk, but I digress.)
    The other part, and this is what made the Prius so successful, is that it has to look like a hybrid. The Honda Accord made a wonderfully fun hybrid in the early 2000s. It was pretty damn quick too, but the hybrid buyers were turned off because it wasn’t a “true hybrid” in that it would get 40+ mpg and make your neighbors think you were environmentally conscious. So it died.
    Many of the sedan based hybrids have trouble breaking through for this very reason. They don’t look different enough from the rest of traffic for people to get excited in their artisanally curated hemp panties.
    The other reason is, the sedans are, by very definition, a compromise. They likely have gas or even diesel powered alternatives in the same stable and therefore somewhere in the process could never be built to extract all of that hybrid goodness. That’s why you get weird trunk floor shapes, or no fold down seats, or all of the other weird things that happen to hybrid sedans that you never see in the Prius or Insight, etc.
    I would never buy a hybrid sedan because 1. gas isn’t expensive enough to justify the extra cost on my commute, and 2. if it ever were expensive enough, 100% electric cars are getting good enough that the hybrid STILL wouldn’t make sense.
    Hybrids are rapped in image, and sedan hybrids do not fly the flag noticeably enough for many buyers.
    /rant

  2. Tiberiuswise Avatar

    I’ve got about 20,000 miles on a Fusion Energi. Like other Fusions, it is a very likable car. Very likable. Especially on the Long Island Expressway where it qualifies as a clean vehicle and can go in the carpool lanes.
    One thing to note is that in the winter you will be lucky to get 15 miles on the charge if you turn the heat on. As a result I didn’t bother plugging it in for January and February. Fortunately the A/C isn’t so bad. maybe 20 miles on a charge instead of the 23 I seem to get.

    1. Bradley Brownell Avatar
      Bradley Brownell

      You know, I actually asked one of the Hyundai reps about the effect using the HVAC system had on the EV range, but they said they didn’t know and would have to ask an engineer.
      I never got around to finding an engineer before I left. I assumed it would be relatively adverse, however.

      1. Tiberiuswise Avatar

        Trust me. The heat is a killer. It’s especially annoying when it burns through the battery for the first 15 miles, only to then have the gas engine kick on once the cabin is already up to temp.
        Does the Hyundai have the option of saving the battery for later? That can be very helpful on the Ford. I also got into the habit of using the seat heater instead.

    2. Scoutdude Avatar
      Scoutdude

      But can’t you have it preheat the interior while still plugged in? I know my friend’s C-Max Energi does that and she uses it extensively in the winter.

      1. Tiberiuswise Avatar

        Sure, now you tell me.

        1. Scoutdude Avatar
          Scoutdude

          But it is not free heat you have to burn that fuel to make that heat and unless electricity is really expensive in your area I would suspect it is cheaper to preheat with electricity than to burn the extra gas.
          My Wife has a non Energi Fusion Hybrid and using the engine heat costs a lot MPG wise. It doesn’t take long to suck the heat of the engine with the heater. It is not uncommon for the engine to come on while stopped or in other cases when it should go engine off to maintain the minimum engine temp. Because we live in the foothills her trip to work is mostly down hill w/o using heat other than the seat heaters she can get into the high 50’s or even low 60’s on the way to work. Use the heat and it is down in the 40’s or low 50’s at best.

          1. Tiberiuswise Avatar

            I had a non-Energi Fusion Hybrid last year and also found that the heat takes its toll there too. Especially in the scenario you describe. My move was to have the seat heater on and the cabin heat as low as tolerable.
            What if a commute like your wife’s was the opposite? Uphill in the cold morning and downhill in the warmer afternoon/evening. Unless you could also plug in at work, my first thought would be to burn gas on the drive in and save the electric for the ride home.

    3. Sjalabais Avatar
      Sjalabais

      I just have to say, calling a car “Fusion Energi” is a marketing hit. Next out, the “Warp Speed”.

  3. mdharrell Avatar

    “…I think I would not have liked the car as much with a CVT.”
    I make a point of carrying a spare drive belt, but other than that I’m happy with my CVT-equipped vehicles.

  4. Cameron Vanderhorst Avatar
    Cameron Vanderhorst

    Despite my Hyundai hate, I’m impressed that they installed the battery pack in a way that would still allow use of the 60/40 folding rear seats. Even a broken clock is right twice a day, I suppose. Well done, Hyundai.

    1. Bradley Brownell Avatar
      Bradley Brownell

      A week later, and he’s still talkin’ trash…

      1. Kamil K Avatar

        Man… there is another Hyundai article coming tomorrow, too.

  5. tonyola Avatar
    tonyola

    A fascinating article. I consider hybrids being a transitional technology – a stopgap solution until full electrics become truly practical. As an aside, I remember driving a ’77 Toyota pickup (5 speed) which also hung on to its revs while decelerating. The revs would finally drop only when the vehocle was close to a full stop. This behavior was some quirk of the pollution control devices and it was mildly annoying.

    1. CapitalistRoader Avatar
      CapitalistRoader

      The revs would finally drop only when the vehicle was close to a full stop. This behavior was some quirk of the pollution control devices and it was mildly annoying.

      Dashpot. Less annoying when wearing artisanally curated hemp panties.

    2. kogashiwa Avatar
      kogashiwa

      Completely agree, I’m quite sure in 20 years there will be no or next to no hybrids sold and in another 20 people will hardly remember that they ever existed.

    3. Tiberiuswise Avatar

      I suspect that on the hybrid the rev hanging has something to do with the system deciding to capture some energy into the battery. “Hey Mr. Flywheel, while you’re spinning…”
      Full electric is a tall order. Until then, some sort of regenerative braking or hill descent makes sense. Especially if they get the cost down.

      1. Bradley Brownell Avatar
        Bradley Brownell

        I’m no engineer, and I don’t even play one on the internet, but that logic seems sound.

      2. Sjalabais Avatar
        Sjalabais

        Let me introduce you to the 60,000 rpm flywheel called “KERS”:
        http://www.motorauthority.com/news/1091106_volvo-gives-update-on-flywheel-tech-eyes-2020-rollout
        I’d love to listen in.