Kia: K5/Optima News
#165
Race Director
#167
Race Director
#169
Punk Rocker
Why has gas mileage become the ONLY thing people want to talk about anymore? Even at $4/gallon its not like gas was impossible to afford. Just eat at home a couple more nights a week and you cover the difference. Seriously, everybody acts as though if they can just get 1 more mpg they will be financially saved. If your finances are so bad that you can't afford an extra $30 at a fillup then mpg are probably the least of your concerns....
#171
Safety Car
iTrader: (2)
i'm currently in korea right now. street is filled with new kia optima aka "K5" in korea and new yf sonata. both cars are really eye catching but optima is amazingly sexy and looks very luxurious. also i love the kia's new K7 and Sportage too. looks like new Kia lines are dominating the streets of Korea right now. K5, K7, Sorento, and Sportage.
#174
LOL these designs are German. The same guy who used to design for Audi is now at Hyundai/Kia and is wholly responsible for all the newer eye-catching designs for these two Korean brands. Best move they could ever make.
#175
hail to the victors
#176
^ look at the "fluidic movement" design in the Elantra's headlight, then look at the Audi headlights. something tells me he's involved
#178
hail to the victors
I'm not sure. but last time i checked the chief designer for Hyundai was Joel Piaskowski then later replaced by Phil Zak in 09. i don't know when was sonata design started and finished. and i have know idea who penned each models though. but most of recent hyundais are designed in Cali.
#181
My first Avatar....
#182
hail to the victors
yeah, that wheel needs to go. it looked slightly better in person, but yeah just little too much wheels there. looks like it will be about to cut my fingers.
k7 wheel looks better.
k7 wheel looks better.
#183
hail to the victors
#185
Burning Brakes
#189
hail to the victors
interior looks very good. maybe little too busy for my taste. but i think quality is on par with most of midsize sedans.
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Last edited by chungkopi; 08-15-2010 at 01:40 AM.
#192
My first Avatar....
Looks like a serious car. Hope those wheels make it to the US.
#193
Why don't you read carefully. Obviously the headlights are not identical, I'm referring to the curving/wrap-around waves housed within the headlights.
that is an Audi design.
^ look at the "fluidic movement" design in the Elantra's headlight, then look at the Audi headlights. something tells me he's involved
#194
I'm the Firestarter
^ That could just be a different guy who saw Audi's headlights and decided to copy them.
#196
I don't see the fluidic design language in the details of those headlights
#197
Three Wheelin'
First Drive: 2011 Kia Optima
http://www.autoblog.com/2010/09/02/2...est/#continued
We admit it – we're genetically preprogrammed to be shallow creatures. Despite our moms' best efforts, recognizing inner beauty is all well and good, but it's physical beauty that first puts both people and consumables on our radar.
Exhibit A? The 2011 Kia Optima. You see, while exactly nobody was paying attention, the outgoing Optima actually became a reasonably competitive mid-size sedan. But with the lackluster reputation of its predecessor compounded by styling so banal that it might as well have had "John Doe" as a model designation, the Optima was seemingly forgotten by everyone but fleet managers.
That's not going to be a problem any more.
If someone had told us even five years ago that Kia would be brassy enough to provide any of its products to test at Road 'Hallowed-Be-Thy-Name' Atlanta, we'd have had a good laugh. If that same person told us we'd be looking at the segment's style leader and possibly the best model in the sector, we'd take their temperature before damning them to a year behind the wheel of a marshmallow white Amanti. And yet, after an all-too-brief first taste, there's good reason to believe the Optima may finally live up to its name.
To begin with, this is a seriously attractive automobile. Penned under the tutelage of lead designer Peter Schreyer, Kia has resisted the urge to apply the shopworn 'four-door coupe' descriptor to its latest creation, but it certainly fits. Compared to its starch-and-suspenders predecessor, the new model has leggier proportions – at 190.7 inches long, it shadows its predecessor by nearly two inches, and it's 72.1 inches wide, an increase of nearly two inches – yet it's also lower. Within its larger footprint, the hood is longer by 2.4 inches, yet the rear deck is shorter by 4.3 inches. Those changes in proportion are well-resolved by the aggressive angles used for the windshield and backlight, the latter of which gives one the false impression that rear seat room might be tight.
The Optima's face combines Kia's now-trademark 'tabbed' grille, bookended by a pair of angry-looking headlamps and aggressive lower fascia. One particularly nice detail that doesn't immediate present itself is the subtle indentation at the top of the windshield glass that echoes the grille's form. The rear is almost Jaguar XF-esque in execution, with narrow taillamps and dual exhausts for all models.
Predictably, the overall aesthetic is somewhat less assertive on LX and EX models than it is on the big daddy SX (we particularly wish that the latter's LED taillamps were standard across the range), but this is still a hard-hitting, handsome bit of design that's likely to draw fewer sideways glances than its slick but more controversially styled Hyundai Sonata counterpart.
Inside, the Optima makes no less of a leap forward. The center stack is angled ten degrees towards the driver and the vents are nicely integrated around the gauge binnacle in a way that suggests you've stumbled into a Saab. You can play a game of 'Spot the Parts Sharing,' with the Sonata, but as the two have unique approaches to nearly everything from steering wheel design to HVAC and navigation controls, common bits aren't immediately obvious. Material choices are unlikely to have the Germans seeking therapy, but they're wholly class-appropriate. Observed ergonomics were first-rate, as was fit-and-finish (despite our car's prototype status).
Continued...
Exhibit A? The 2011 Kia Optima. You see, while exactly nobody was paying attention, the outgoing Optima actually became a reasonably competitive mid-size sedan. But with the lackluster reputation of its predecessor compounded by styling so banal that it might as well have had "John Doe" as a model designation, the Optima was seemingly forgotten by everyone but fleet managers.
That's not going to be a problem any more.
If someone had told us even five years ago that Kia would be brassy enough to provide any of its products to test at Road 'Hallowed-Be-Thy-Name' Atlanta, we'd have had a good laugh. If that same person told us we'd be looking at the segment's style leader and possibly the best model in the sector, we'd take their temperature before damning them to a year behind the wheel of a marshmallow white Amanti. And yet, after an all-too-brief first taste, there's good reason to believe the Optima may finally live up to its name.
To begin with, this is a seriously attractive automobile. Penned under the tutelage of lead designer Peter Schreyer, Kia has resisted the urge to apply the shopworn 'four-door coupe' descriptor to its latest creation, but it certainly fits. Compared to its starch-and-suspenders predecessor, the new model has leggier proportions – at 190.7 inches long, it shadows its predecessor by nearly two inches, and it's 72.1 inches wide, an increase of nearly two inches – yet it's also lower. Within its larger footprint, the hood is longer by 2.4 inches, yet the rear deck is shorter by 4.3 inches. Those changes in proportion are well-resolved by the aggressive angles used for the windshield and backlight, the latter of which gives one the false impression that rear seat room might be tight.
The Optima's face combines Kia's now-trademark 'tabbed' grille, bookended by a pair of angry-looking headlamps and aggressive lower fascia. One particularly nice detail that doesn't immediate present itself is the subtle indentation at the top of the windshield glass that echoes the grille's form. The rear is almost Jaguar XF-esque in execution, with narrow taillamps and dual exhausts for all models.
Predictably, the overall aesthetic is somewhat less assertive on LX and EX models than it is on the big daddy SX (we particularly wish that the latter's LED taillamps were standard across the range), but this is still a hard-hitting, handsome bit of design that's likely to draw fewer sideways glances than its slick but more controversially styled Hyundai Sonata counterpart.
Inside, the Optima makes no less of a leap forward. The center stack is angled ten degrees towards the driver and the vents are nicely integrated around the gauge binnacle in a way that suggests you've stumbled into a Saab. You can play a game of 'Spot the Parts Sharing,' with the Sonata, but as the two have unique approaches to nearly everything from steering wheel design to HVAC and navigation controls, common bits aren't immediately obvious. Material choices are unlikely to have the Germans seeking therapy, but they're wholly class-appropriate. Observed ergonomics were first-rate, as was fit-and-finish (despite our car's prototype status).
Continued...
#198
Senior Moderator
IWHI...
#200
quite a value