Fortuner owner buys a new Hyundai Tucson AWD: First impressions

• The steering on the Fortuner has a better feel, while the Tucson brakes are spongier.
• Initial Impressions
• Driving Impressions

The steering on the Fortuner has a better feel, while the Tucson brakes are spongier.

BHPian xantia recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Hello! Here is a quick update: Bought the AWD in Phantom Black. It’s been 2 days.

Initial Impressions

• Buying experience was great. Everything went as per plan and schedule. Delivery with number plates, insurance, accessories, and a brief overview of features etc., took about 90 mins.
• Took it directly to 3M for the PPF and underbody protection. They took about 20 hours to deliver it the next day. Good result. Back in a week to check for bubbles and other issues. Over the past two days, the colour seems to have depended! Or maybe my eyes are going.

Driving Impressions

1. The diesel lives up to the reputation- smooth, quiet, effortless to drive.
2. It is almost like driving a manual, the Tucson reduces speed significantly when you step off the gas, like in-gear braking.
3. The sound system has pretty average bass – my stock Fortuner with a Blaupunkt sub woofer rolling around at the back was way more punchy. My entire “Leading with Drums” playlist weeps.
4. Front seats are snug, the better half loves the better electronic adjustments of the passenger seats (all manual in the Fortuner)
5. The headlights are fantastic. Cornering lights are a boon.
6. While my preferred colour was Silver, black is causing a lot of stress until I get used to it. It attracts other cars! Either I get used to it or get used to the stress.
7. Auto AWD is great. The visuals showing where the torque is being distributed are useful to tune my driving style. But gentle driving should give the best returns
8. The Bluelink app gives the vehicle location accurately. A useful feature of sending destination from mobile to the ICE map. The in-built maps seem to be updated as it is able to locate all the addresses I have searched for. However, for some reason, the app does not have all the information like average consumption which is available from the dashboard. There is still some more to learn.
9. How does the driving experience compare to the Fortuner? Well, you are seated higher and have a better view outside. The steering in the Fortuner has a way better feel/weight. The brakes in Tucson are spongier but it is easy to get used to them.

That’s it for the moment.

Here’s what BHPian vharihar had to say on the matter:

I have a 2016 model manual transmission diesel Tucson. I find it has some kind of in-gear acceleration, in the sense that if I slot it in 2nd gear, it’ll cruise (am loosely using the word) at some speed (like 25 km/h or so, IIRC) even if I don’t press the accelerator at all! And continues this cruising indefinitely as long as the road is more or less flat. If on 3rd gear, it’ll cruise at some higher speed, like 35 km/h.

Why is that?

I’ve never seen this behaviour in my earlier petrol manual transmission sedans.

Sure, a slight acceleration was there (because without acceleration if you just release the clutch it’ll slowly accelerate), but it’d almost always stall if you didn’t accelerate after having once started.

Here’s what BHPian ashis89 had to say on the matter:

It’s the anti-stall mechanism which tries to maintain a minimum RPM at all times where there’s no A input. Couple that with the good low-end torque in diesel and it can continue rolling in all gears without A input.

That said, this behaviour is seen in petrol cars too where the anti-stall+torque is tuned well. I have gone up to 4th gear until it started shuddering.

Keyword: Fortuner owner buys a new Hyundai Tucson AWD: First impressions