Smart Move: Hyundai Sonata Wagon Spied

All the luxury automakers have their wits about them as most are offering or are about to offer more wagon variants for us to choose from.

Unfortunately for normal folk, the non-luxury mid-size wagon market is quite dry. There used to be lots to choose from such as the Ford Taurus wagon, Mazda6 wagon, the Camry Wagon and the Dodge Magnum. But all of those have bitten the dust and as a result the mid-size wagon segment has been mostly abandoned. If you want a mid-sized wagon these days without spending north of 30 grand, you are pretty much limited to the Subaru Outback or the Volkswagen Jetta Wagon.

Hyundai is apparently seeing the huge gap in the market, and thus lots of potential. Its newly redesigned Sonata is receiving high praise of late, so they figured they could pull off a similar trick with a wagon version. I’m willing to bet that they will. People won’t be forced into buying an SUV if they need versatility, but it will also serve as a good solution for many businesses and would take up the company car role nicely.

Expect the Sonata wagon to receive a 2012 release date.

[Autoblog]

Oh Hi: 2011 Hyundai Sonata Turbo

We weren’t really expecting to like the 2010 Genesis Coupe 2.0T all that much, but we did. A lot. So when Hyundai decided to make a turbo’d version of the all new (and very good looking) 2011 Sonata, we got pretty excited. As it turns out, we had good reason to be excited.

The 2011 Sonata turbo will get same turbocharged direct injection engine found in the 2008 Kia Koup concept which will produce 274 horsepower and 269 pound feet of torque. Impressive numbers, but the real story is that it’s able to acheive 6.9 l/100 kms highway. Given the amount of power, that’s superb.

Hyundai is going to use a broad torque curve which will see peak power between 1800 and 4500 rpms. Again, quite good – low end and higher end torque would likely be readily available. Hyundai is also going to take a page from BMW’s book by using a twin-scroll turbocharger like the one found in the 2011 BMW 535i.

While we will reserve final impressions for a Car Driven Review, it’s safe to say that the 2011 Sonata turbo will be very competitive in the busy mid-size sedan segment.