Ken Gratton•29 Sept 2012
NEWS
PARIS MOTOR SHOW: Kia Hybrid 'banned' from Oz
A decision to scotch right-hand drive production has excluded Kia's Optima Hybrid from OzKia launched the European version of its stylish midsize Optima Hybrid at Paris.
Flaunting the same drivetrain technology parent company Hyundai has already introduced in the North American market for its Sonata [i45] model, the Kia is, alas, a left-hand drive only proposition for the foreseeable future.
The Optima Hybrid features a 'parallel hybrid system' capable of achieving 5.4L/100km fuel use (125g/km of CO2 emissions) and a 0-to-100km/h acceleration time of 9.4 seconds on the way to a top speed of 192km/h. It stores electrical energy in a lithium polymer battery pack that the company is guaranteeing for seven years or 150,000km.
Unlike Toyota's Hybrid Synergy Drive system, the Optima uses a system adopted previously by German prestige companies like BMW and Porsche.
Instead of a conventional torque converter, the Optima Hybrid features an electric motor with a separate clutch to decouple the 2.0-litre petrol engine from the transmission, leaving the electric motor alone driving the wheels through the six-speed automatic.
At other times, and as required, the petrol engine drives through the conventional (epicyclic) automatic transmission to the final drive system.
The electric motor operates at speeds up to 100km/h, but above those speeds the petrol engine takes care of propelling the car mechanically. While cruising or decelerating the electric motor acts as a generator to recharge the lithium polymer battery pack. In heavy traffic the car's IHSG auto-stop/start system leaves the petrol engine switched off to conserve fuel.
Kia has dreamed up other design and engineering virtues for the Optima Hybrid, including more efficient styling to reduce the drag coefficient from the standard car's 0.29Cd to 0.26Cd.
A little like the Camry Hybrid, the Optima Hybrid sits apart from other variants in the Optima range, with a unique instrument cluster and its own model walk-up comprising three levels of trim.
But while the technology has legs and may be the sort of setup that will appeal to buyers more than CVT-based systems, we won't see it in Australia in the foreseeable future. It's built in South Korea for European markets and in the US for North America. Like the Sonata Hybrid that's also built in the US, the Optima isn't being built for right-hand drive markets like Australia.
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Written byKen Gratton
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