Reliable value, even from an unloved rental!

By Warren Brown

Special to The Washington Post

Sunday, September 13, 2009

It doesn't surprise me that Hyundai's August sales topped those of its rivals. Nor should it surprise anyone who

lately has driven a Hyundai.

Hyundai is the Wal-Mart of car companies. It has turned "value" into a word meaning substantially better

than "cheap." It has given dignity to the concept of "bargain."

Anyone doubting that needs only to drive the base version of the 2010 Hyundai Sonata sedan. It has more

standard safety equipment than any model in the midsize family sedan class. It offers good, four-cylinder fuel

economy without sacrificing acceleration or handling. Fit and finish are among the global car industry's best.

So is price, assuming that "best price" means getting the most for money spent.

To prove my point, I eschewed the opportunity to drive a manufacturer-prepared and delivered Sonata in

favor of selecting one from a rental car company. I chose Enterprise Rent-A-Car because it is near my home

in Northern Virginia and because Enterprise usually carries Hyundai products.

Rental cars aren't the specially prepped babies delivered to automotive journalists by automobile

manufacturers. Rentals often are children of lesser care, abused and misused by rental customers and

marginally maintained by their corporate owners.

My 2010 Sonata SE had 7,000 miles on the odometer at delivery. Its pale blue-gray fabric seats and fabriccovered

door panels bore signs of wear. (It matters not how much or how well you clean light-colored

automotive fabrics, some grease and grime will show through.)

But overall fit and finish on my Sonata were excellent. After 7,000 miles of what the Enterprise people said

was mostly Washington-area driving, there were no loose fits, no rattles, nothing threatening to come apart at

the seams. In fact, the car felt and looked solid.

The Enterprise people eyed me with wonder when I specified a four-cylinder model. The Sonata, a

front-wheel drive sedan, also comes with an optional 3.3-liter, 249-horsepower V-6. Real men supposedly

prefer the V-6.

But I figured that if anything showed wear in a rental car fleet, it would be one of Hyundai's little, sometimes

over-stressed four-cylinder engines. But it turned out that I was the victim of my own shortsightedness. To

wit: All Hyundai four-cylinder engines are not the same.

Some, such as the 2-liter 138-horsepower four-cylinder engine in the compact Hyundai Elantra and the

1.6-liter 110-horsepower four-cylinder job in the subcompact Hyundai Accent, primarily are meant for

fuel-efficient, urban-suburban commuting. They do not perform particularly well on sustained, high-speed

highway runs. Nor are they ideal for climbing mountain roads.

But the 2.4-liter, 175-horsepower four-cylinder engine in the 2010 Sonata was up to all of those tasks. It

smoothly delivered acceleration on demand -- and it did so at a combined city-highway 27 miles per gallon,

22 mpg in the city and 32 mpg on the highway.

Handling, the way a car moves around curves, the way its body behaves in emergency maneuvers, was quite

decent, certainly acceptable for normal drivers -- people who generally obey rules of the road and who have

no need to turn every trip into a race or a test of their prowess behind the wheel.

Braking, employing ventilated front discs and solid discs in the rear, was spot on -- as good as anything from

the Sonata's more expensive rivals.

I have no proof of this, but my hunch is that the people at Hyundai studied the people at Wal-Mart to learn

how to consistently deliver a higher meaning of value -- excellent products and excellent service at an

excellent price.

It's why Wal-Mart is the nation's largest retailer. And it's why Hyundai sold 60,467 cars, crossover utility

vehicles and SUVs in the United States last month, 47 percent better than its August 2008 sales, 33 percent

better than its July 2009 performance.

In any economy, consumers positively respond to companies that take the meaning of "value" seriously.

© 2009 The Washington Post Company