Test Drive: 2013 Hyundai Elantra Coupe

By Kevin Harrison

I was in Italy a few months ago. Let me tell you, Italy might be my favourite place in Europe. The people, the history and of course the food is amazing. There really is nothing like having authentic Italian food made from authentic ingredients. Their parmesan cheese, prosciutto and pistachios are 10 times better than the ones we get here.

I’ve always been a fan of Italian food ever since I was a kid. It used to be the only type of food I would be guaranteed to eat. This stuck with me into my adult years but obviously I became more open to trying other foods along the way and as a result, I became severely addicted to any food that was intensely spicy. It didn’t matter which culture it came from; Thai, Indian, Vietnamese, Mexican – you name it. If it’s spicy then I’m all over it. This became a bit of a problem when it came to Italian food, however. Italians don’t do spice at all.

While in Italy, I was looking for any way possible to get my spicy food fix. I would sometimes ask the locals. Either they would look at me as if I was asking them to marry me, or they would simply say to look elsewhere. When I found myself in a convenience store asking for the spiciest thing they sold and was preparing for the dumbfounded look or answer, I actually got an answer I was looking for. The young Italian man, who could speak English quite well, pointed me to a bag of chips. Not exactly what I had in mind, but at that point I decided I would take anything. The bag had a picture of a chili pepper on it and said ‘extra spicy’ in Italian.

Apparently the same sort of thing has been happening in Hyundai dealerships. Hyundai’s Elantra sedan has been selling quite well, but when youthful minds enter the dealership they are supposedly looking for something with a bit more spice in their Elantra. That’s when Hyundai decided to make a coupe version.

Does it have what it takes to satisfy those spice oriented taste buds?

First things first with any coupe is to either make it look performance oriented or to make it stand out. Unfortunately I don’t see either with the Elantra coupe. That’s not to say that it’s an ugly or awkward looking vehicle, however it’s clear that Hyundai was uninspired when designing the coupe as it resembles the sedan a bit too much. Aside from obviously having less doors, the only other changes to the exterior is the dual exhausts, slightly revised front fascia, slip spoiler and new wheels. These design elements are something only a car nut would notice. As a result, despite its bright red colour, the Elantra coupe went unnoticed by pretty much everyone. I would suggest that, since the purpose of a coupe is to stick out a bit, Hyundai put a bit more thought into differentiating it from the sedan when it’s time for a refresh. With all that said, the design is still sleek.

Inside, Elantra sedan owners should feel fairly at home. As with the exterior, there are only minor changes to the interior of the coupe. That’s not necessarily a bad thing in this case since the layout is stylish and futuristic looking. Usually rear space is a sacrifice in most coupes but there is a surprising amount of rear leg room back there – more than the Honda Accord Coupe according to Hyundai. The only downside is that sloping roof line impedes headroom. Cargo capacity is the same as in the sedan, which is to say that its decent and the rear seats can fold flat for added versatility.

The Elantra coupe gets its power from a 1.8 litre 4 cylinder engine which produces 148 horsepower and 131 pound feet of torque. As a result, the Elantra coupe is far from being blisteringly fast. There isn’t much to the exhaust note so you won’t be grabbing anyone’s attention with the sound it produces either. Still the engine is a fairly smooth unit, as is the shifts from the automatic gearbox, but I found that the shifts mostly neutered any amount of power that the engine was willing to give. You can of course shift the gears yourself but shifts are quite delayed. There is a six-speed manual available which should allow the driver to take care of available power all while shifting when it’s supposed to.

The Elantra coupe with an automatic transmission is rated at 7.3 L/100 kms city and 5.0 L/100 kms highway with a combined rating of 6.3 L/100 kms which is pretty decent on paper, however in the real world by combined driving returned 9.2 L/100 kms. This is rather disappointing since one of Hyundai’s main marketing strategies with the Elantra is its class leading fuel efficiency. And aggressive driving can’t be blamed since the Elantra coupe does absolutely nothing to make you want to drive it aggressively. The only time I opened it up was the one time I was testing the 0-100 time and handling abilities. The rest of the time I drove it quite normally.

Speaking of its handling abilities the Elantra coupe performs rather oddly in the sense that when you first turn in, if feels as if everything is good and stable but then seemingly everything goes awry halfway through the turn and suddenly the suspension starts to waffle, the steering becomes a bit more numb and body roll becomes more apparent. This naturally causes the driver to back off, which then returns the coupe to its original stability. It’s a very strange sensation and definitely does not exude any confidence to the driver. My tester was the SE model which supposedly has stiffer tuning of the suspension, but it’s rather inconsistent.

In the end, I came away from the Elantra coupe the same way I came away from the convenience store in Italy with my “insanely spicy” chips that turned out to be just BBQ. The Elantra coupe looks great – it looks like it should act and perform the way a true coupe should. But unfortunately it’s not spicy cayenne, it’s just plain BBQ. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with BBQ, but if you’re looking for BBQ, you might as well go for the Elantra sedan. If you’re looking for cayenne, you may have to turn to elsewhere. And the thing is, there’s lots of great coupes to choose from in the $25,000 range not least of which is the Honda Civic Si coupe, Scion FRS and Hyundai’s own Veloster Turbo. With all that said, if mere style matched with a competent ride and decent quality than the Elantra coupe just may be for you.

Price As Tested: $25,199

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