Hyundai i30 N: Hits and misses

We’ve sampled it briefly on track in prototype form, but until we drive the i30 N at length Down Under we can’t be certain whether or not the German-designed, Czech-built Korean car is indeed a full-blooded, bona-fide hot hatch.

We’re also unsure if the world is ready for a stand-alone Hyundai high-performance brand, so to help us – and you – decide, here’s what we liked least and most about the i30 N, based on our first-hand, up-close look at its world debut in Dusseldorf overnight.

Call it a SWOT analysis, with less analysis.

The more powerful (202kW/353Nm) i30 N Performance model stretches that gap even further, to fall just 11kW and 27Nm short of VW’s range-topping Golf R, which will increase from a current 206kW to 213kW but remain 15kW short of the European version (228kW).

Miss: Availability
But we might not get the base i30 N when Hyundai’s first hot hatch arrives Down Under in October.

Hyundai Oz is toying with the idea of leaving it at home (wherever a child of the world like the i30 N might call “home”), even though its value, simplicity, fun factor and cheaper 18-inch Michelin Pilot Sport Cup rubber makes a lot of sense.

Most likely, Hyundai can’t stretch the posts to give itself a big enough price gap between the i30 N and the i30 N Performance. If it can, the entry-level car will come here.

Hit: Value
If the base i30 N comes here it will undercut the entry-level Golf GTI (currently priced from $41,490) at less than $40K. Meantime, the i30 N Performance is almost certain to cost less than its more direct rival, the VW Golf GTI Performance (currently $47,990), as well as the Golf R ($52,990).

Miss: Opposition
That’s the sort of discount you have to offer to sit at the table built by the Golf GTI. It casts a big shadow, and other rivals will include the Peugeot 308 GTi 270 (from $49,990), Honda’s upcoming Civic Type R ($50,990), Ford’s Focus RS ($50,990) and Renault’s forthcoming Megane RS.

Hit: Tested here
It was partly developed in Australia. The i30 N Performance spent time in Australia hot weather testing, and also complete hot-lap performance testing at Bathurst’s Mount Panorama circuit and the DECA training centre in Wodonga.

OK, so it was more of a promotional stunt than any real testing, but it’s hard to remember VW, M, AMG or Porsche turning up with cars under development, even if Australia is one of AMG’s biggest markets.

The lion’s share of i30 N development driving took place at the Nürburgring Nordschleife, where Hyundai has a 3600 square-metre R&D centre and each prototype banged out up to 480 laps of the place, covering 180,000km in just a month.

They were also tested extensively at Namyang, Hyundai’s shiny and extended R&D centre an hour or so outside Seoul. In its 3.3 million square metres, there is a phenomenally large black lake that’s fully irrigated for use as a skid pan, or it can be used for virtually any exercise.

This includes a handling course (planned by N head honcho Albert Biermann himself), a wet-weather course that can simulate ice, a high-speed bowl and another brake and acceleration test area big enough to land private jets on. Namyang has 34 different roads, more than 70km of test tracks, its own wind tunnel, crash test lab and on it goes.

The i30 N was also tested in North America’s Death Valley for heat, Arjeplog in Sweden for cold and all over Asia and Europe for everything in between.

Hyundai’s N boss insists the i30 N was designed to deliver beats-per-minute (BPM) rather than revs-per-minute, which sounds cute.

Knowing Biermann, however, he means it. He’s not that interested in stopwatch times. He’s interested in controllable lift-off oversteer, exhaust crackle on the overrun, how big your grin is after driving it and whether it’s fun enough for you to want to take the long way to get the milk.

Hit: More to come
There are plenty more N models coming, including the i30 N Fastback, the Veloster N and a stonking 280kW all-wheel drive RN30.

Biermann also insists there’s an inevitability about N delivering faster crossovers and SUVs because “that’s where the market is going”. Including the upcoming Kona, Hyundai will soon have three of them, so Biermann’s troops will be kept busy.

Miss: No more soon
The i30 N will carry Hyundai’s fledgling N brand by itself for at least the rest of this year and probably half of next year, too. And it won’t be available with an automatic transmission for at least that long, until a new eight-speed wet dual-clutch is ready for it.

Hit: Nice name
'N' is supposed to represent both Namyang and the Nürburgring, nicely linking Hyundai’s Korean and European development bases.

Miss: Not quite
It’s also supposed to represent a chicane. No real drivers we know actually enjoy chicanes. Rethink that spin, N.