Indulging in Carnival-ism

Just in case you’ve just slipped out of a five year coma, or you’ve finally crawled out from underneath that rock you’ve been living in, it won’t surprise you to know that Hyundai/Kia are the fastest growing car companies in the world. What a difference a few years can make. One day, they are the butt of all the automotive jokes, next thing, they seem to be sprouting up dealerships like a pot of popcorn kernels with the heat turned up.

In a way, it is sort of like that classmate you had in grade school who, despite sitting next to you for a few years, never took your interest. Until she returned from the summer break after hitting puberty, that is. All of a sudden, you find yourself raiding your father’s vanity closet for all those unwanted Old Spice or Brut 33 aftershaves that you seemed to buy for him every Christmas, birthday and father’s day and marinate in it each morning before going to school.

It’s funny how that happens. One day you’re a gawky, lanky, neither-here-nor-there little kid, next thing… you’re a young woman. And people start taking notice. Well, that’s exactly how I feel about the new generation Kia Carnival; it is the mechanical expression of an awkward little van that has just cleared puberty.

And I am not the only one who thinks so. According to the well-respected global marketing information services firm, JD powers, Kia models improved 22% in their Initial Quality Study (IQS), and-improved twice as much as any competitor in the last three years, showing how the Korean car maker continues to offer world-class quality and award-winning customer satisfaction.

And it’s not just overseas, either. Locally, not just has the entire Kia model line up undergone a total make-over, but over the last year especially, their dealerships, marketing, after sales and service centers have really started to fire on all cylinders and are operating on maximum RPM. It’s the kind of enthusiasm and renewed confidence they now have in their own brand that has catapulted them to the top of the shopping lists of car buyers and helped the brand scoop up 4 Car of the Year awards for their Picanto, Rio, Carens and Carnival as well as making it into the highly coveted STAR picks of 2007.

I had a chance to take my entire family out in the Carnival on an out of town weekend escape to Subic just before Christmas last year and came back thoroughly impressed. Normally, a trip like this would require a PhD in packing, as any one with three young kids would know; even a two-day trip usually involves enough luggage to put any balikbayan to shame.

But the Carnival swallowed it all up with ease thanks to the very clever seating configurations. It offers eight seats with increased luggage capacity, but the fully-removable 2nd row is complemented by a 3rd row that folds into a well in the luggage compartment to again create a fully-flat floor throughout. This is something that many people movers could learn from and should be ashamed of if they’re still using those bulky, antiquated fold up seats that seem to only give you an extra 1.3 inches of luggage room once you figure out how to get them out of the way. “Okay, kids, we’ve finally figured out how to fold up the last row, now we can all bring along that extra tooth brush that we thought we’d have to leave behind. Yay!”

But luggage room is one thing – my house fits a lot of luggage, it’s just not all that aerodynamic and would probably not have a very good take off at the traffic lights, (which reminds me of a few vans I’ve driven in the past) What we needed was a heart that could pull this Seoul train all the way up the steep hills of Subic and dispatch those pesky trucks and busses along the single lane highways with just a stab of the throttle.

And the Carnival delivers. Unlike the previous generations, especially those with the woeful, Rover-sourced V6 engines, the all-new Hyundai-developed, 2.9 liter CRDi engine pulled strongly from every gear and cruised happily at any highway speed. Overtaking was as simple as dropping a gear and coaxing the throttle. It is not a high revving engine, so you don’t need to wring out each gear and say the Our Father each time you try and pass a crazed provincial bus.

I was given the 5-speed manual version that, as a trade off for switching cogs myself, returned a very generous combined cycle of 12km a liter with five passengers and luggage. The clutch is light enough for daily driving and with all the torque lurking under the hood, you can pretty much start in second and keep it in the higher gears without too much of a worry, which saves some fuel and minimizes shifts in traffic.

What impressed me most is that despite the luggage and seating capacity, the Carnival does not feel like a full size van to drive. It has an excellent turning circle, which makes it easy enough to navigate through tight streets and won’t have any problem fitting into basement car parks. It also has great visibility and feels as responsive as any average sedan.

Towards the end, I spent more time trying to find something wrong with the Carnival than I did just simply enjoying it. It’s the kind of vehicle that you drive thinking, “where’s the catch?” Well, asides from the absence of rotating electric captain’s chairs with an ottoman, I still am not convinced I found one. Then I thought it must be hidden in the sheet metal or in the safety cell – you know, the stuff you can’t see.

You would think that something this versatile would take a dive in safety, but amazingly, the new Carnival received a full 5 star rating – the highest honor the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration bestows for all seating positions in frontal and side-impact crashes. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety also rates the Carnival “Good” – its highest rating – in front, side and rear impacts. The IIHS, in fact, has christened the Carnival a “Gold Top Safety Pick,” making it the safest minivan ever tested.

As far as ownership is concerned, well, only time will tell. Two owners I interviewed for this piece had nothing but praise about their vans, so they were absolutely no help at all. The Royal Automobile Club of Victoria in Australia rated the Carnival as the most affordable people mover to run, based on a five-year/75,000km ownership period and took into account standing costs that include depreciation, loan interest costs, registration, licensing, insurance and RACV membership. It also considered operating costs such as fuel, tires and servicing.

Locally, prices start at 1.2M up to 1.5M for the LWB EX Carnival. Aftershave is optional.