Driving This 2016 Hyundai Veloster Turbo Tells Me We Need More Small Car Coachwork

Timothy Cain
by Timothy Cain

The 2016 Hyundai Veloster Turbo I’m driving this week is not a great car. Ride quality is abysmal. The dual-clutch transmission chronically delays the actual act of transmitting. Present are a number of negative symptoms with which we associate “sportiness,” but few and far between are the dividends we expect to be paid in exchange for those negative symptoms.

Yet more than five years into its run, the Hyundai Veloster continues to produce healthy volume for Hyundai USA while also providing the market with something it lacks: unique, interesting, “sporty” proposals for the small car buyer who doesn’t want a ho-hum everyday sedan.

Remember when other automakers used to do the same? The Mazda MX-3, Nissan NX, Geo Storm/Isuzu Impulse and Toyota Paseo, for example — cars with humble foundations that reached higher with unique bodywork. We need more of that.

Again, the Hyundai Veloster Turbo isn’t a great car. It won’t go down in history beside performance bargains such as the Acura Integra GS-R and Volkswagen Corrado. It lacks the flexibility of a Hyundai Elantra GT, the affordability of a Hyundai Accent, the refinement of a Hyundai Sonata, and the performance of a Hyundai Genesis Coupe. To be frank, the 2016 Hyundai Veloster Turbo doesn’t excel at much at all.

But it’s not boring.

And the fact that Hyundai can make it work, selling 2,400 per month in the U.S. alone, suggests other automakers could, too.

It’s not that the memories of a Tercel-based coupe are littered with opposite lock splendor. The Mazda MX-3’s 1.8-liter V6 sounds nifty, but that V6 produced only 130 horsepower. The Storm and Impulse looked interesting but were hilariously unrefined. Nissan’s NX was a handling dream but looked more than a little silly.

But the Paseo wasn’t just a Tercel. The MX-3 wasn’t invariably linked to the humble Protege. The Storm resembled nothing else in Geo’s lineup. The NX2000 was more than a Sentra SE-R in new clothes.

Cars such as these are where custom coachworks came to the people. These are not Zagato versions of 1950s Jaguars or Pininfarina one-offs. These are the cars even you — yes, you — could buy for less than the average new car transaction price.

The Veloster isn’t a conventional beauty, but it doesn’t look like anything else on the road. Sure, the three-door execution makes you wonder why Hyundai didn’t add a fourth door, but at least they tried something. Rear headroom is paltry, but the Veloster buyer doesn’t need rear headroom, so why should we force him to drive the same Elantra as his mother? And while the optional turbocharged, 201-horsepower 1.6-liter powerplant doesn’t instantly turn the Veloster into a baiter of Mustangs (not at all), it’s a big upgrade from the standard 132-horsepower 1.6-liter from the Accent. And it would embarrass a Nissan NX2000 in a straight line.

More than anything, however, the Veloster is different. It’s not merely a sedan with two rear doors lopped off à la Hyundai’s former Elantra Coupe. It’s imaginative, unlike the Fiat 500, Mini Cooper, and Volkswagen Beetle. It’s alive, unlike the discontinued Scion tC.

We need more cars like this. More Volkswagen Sciroccos in place of all the Golf GTIs, wonderful though they may be. A new Ford Puma, not just a Fiesta ST. A proper CRX replacement from Honda, not just a CR-Z.

But don’t hold your breath. It’s more likely that we’ll see a crossover squeezed between the Mazda CX-3 and CX-5 — it’s called the CX-4 — than a coupefied Mazda 2 offshoot. And Honda’s much happier to automatically achieve volume bliss with the HR-V than fight for individualistic consumers who believe nothing can live up to the CRX of yore.

Still, we can hope. And we can look at the Veloster Turbo, imperfect as it is, as evidence that it can be done.

Timothy Cain is the founder of GoodCarBadCar.net, which obsesses over the free and frequent publication of U.S. and Canadian auto sales figures. Follow on Twitter @goodcarbadcar and on Facebook.

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  • Vulpine Vulpine on Oct 20, 2016

    I've been looking at these almost as long as they've been on the market; I really like the concept. However, its drawbacks such as those describe above have kept me from committing. The Veloster could potentially replace ONE of my three vehicles, but my wife loves her little Fiat 500 too much and it has none of the functional issues described by the author; the shifter is quick, the acceleration is surprising and it is remarkably agile. And when the back seats are folded down, it can even handle a Sams/Costco/BJ's run for two.

  • Xcalibur255 Xcalibur255 on Oct 20, 2016

    I own a 2013 Veloster Turbo, purchased new. Some insights I can offer from 3 years of ownership: - As you noted the ride quality is crap. It doesn't get better over time. It's not *brutal* but kind of walks the line between jittery and flat out unacceptable. Part of the cause is the cheap Kumho tires. Many owners switch to Continental DWS06 tires and see a big improvement in ride/noise/steeering feel. - The car being noisy on the highway is mostly due to aforementioned Kumho tires. The wind noise is actually quite good for a car this price, it's all road noise generated by the tread from the tires. - The older Turbos with the traditional torque converter automatics drive better than the new dual clutch AT cars. The 6AT in my Veloster is actually very nicely calibrated. It doesn't hesitate at all when you get aggressive with the throttle and snaps off clean, smooth upshifts and downshifts. If you drive the car calmy it shifts so smoothly the transmission just disappears entirely from your perception. I hate automatics in general and am picky about them. This car has the best automatic I've ever personally driven. - Between the 2.0T and 1.6T many Hyundai owners feel the 1.6 is the better all around engine. The 2.0 is known to underperform, where as the 1.6 is known to overperform when given the right conditions. In particular the engine is fussy about engine oil temperatures. The turbo will not make full boost unless it thinks oil temp is completely stable. The difference between a well warmed up Veloster Turbo and one that's only been running a few minutes is quite large. The little motor pulls hard, harder than the 1.6T engines from Ford and Nissan, when it's ready to go. It's also a pretty refined engine that doesn't get thrashy near the redline and idles with impressive smoothness. - As long as you didn't get an exploding sunroof the cars are pretty reliable. I've had no issues with mine. The car has many small design details that make it feel premium in unexpected ways. The lighting on the car is a good example. Light pipes are used for the side mirror turn signal indicators and tail light tracer curves. They light up very evenly and look expensive compared to much more expensive cars that just stick clear plastic lenses over their exposed LEDs. - For me, and I imagine most people, the 3-door design is a selling point. When you walk up to the car you get to see a coupe, but for those times more than one passenger is along (or you are heading out to do laundry), the passenger side has better access than the traditional "contort yourself into the 10" opening between the door jam and the flipped up front seat" routine so common to real coupes. - The car is not overtly sporty or eager feeling, but it does have more personality than most cheap cars. It also feels well sorted for something that's basically made of parts from other cars. The steering, brakes, and throttle are all well calibrated and don't feel crude, abrupt or darty. If you drive the car slowly it plays along with that intention well, outside of the brittle ride. Put it in sport mode and corners well if not enthusiastically. I like my car and don't regret buying it at all. When it eventually gets sold it will be for 2 reasons: the lesser one will be wanting to get away from the hammering ride quality but the major reason is because the car does NOT like snow/ice roads at all and feels unsettled on them. It's stressful to drive in those conditions. Sadly some soulless compact SUV with AWD will probably replace my Veloster, but I will miss my car when it's gone. I can't say that about most other vehicles I have owned.

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