MotoMan heads back to Arizona to drive the Hybrid version of the 2022 Hyundai Tucson in this combo TECH REVIEW, FIRST DRIVE REVIEW and round of our famous #OptionsGame and learns it is SIGNIFICANTLY better than the 2022 Hyundai Tucson with the internal combustion engine!
This may not come as a shock to you but kumo and i we spend a ridiculous amount of time pondering key inside car trends things like why don’t people drive cars like this anymore or why don’t people buy more hybrid crossovers think about it one opts for a crossover to be practical so if you’re going to be practical why not go whole hog and get them a better fuel
Economy which brings us to an unusual question what moves the needles on hybrid crossovers is it practicality is it saving a couple of shackles on gas or is it the way it drives let’s get something out of the way right at the top the vehicle we are driving today is a hybrid electric vehicle also known as an hev put another way it’s a hybrid that does not
Have a plug and a very small battery it has a 1.49 kilowatt hour battery so this will not drive on its own with full ev however there is a full plug-in hybrid version that is coming we will drive that in subsequent episodes this one is kind of a mash-up of some of the stuff we’ve already experienced from the hyundai kia group like for example it starts with
The basis of that 1.6 turbo engine we’ve driven in this car matter of fact that engine is the 1.6 turbo and here it’s 180 horsepower and 195 pound-feet of torque then there is an additional 59 horsepower that comes from the electric motor however you can’t just like add those numbers we’ve discussed this in many episodes the total system horsepower is 226.
Now a huge hind vice here in the hybrid it’s unlike the ice version of the vehicle it is only on offer as all-wheel drive that does translate to some interesting things specifically the fuel economy here not only is it really easy to remember it’s pretty unusually good considering the size of the vehicle 37 36 37 combined back again in the lovely sonoran desert
With another baby buggy this one’s slightly heavier three thousand seven hundred fifty two pounds or depending on how you express your weights and measures one thousand seven hundred and two kilograms that is a hundred pounds more than the gasoline version of this same car we just drove and 400 pounds more than the gasoline two-wheel drive with that oh yeah
Much better off the line than the gas car i would go so far as to saying this is by far the better one in terms of acceleration and thrust the acceleration is better more so good and it overpowers the suspension a bit and you can feel the weight disadvantage in the front but it definitely is the more usable vehicle around town and the thing is the handoff it
Works incredibly well it’s more smooth now i would go so far as to saying that maybe it’s the transmission because here it is not the eight-speed torque convert automatic it is a six-speed torque converter automatic and it behaves like a transmission should it’s not very mechanical like a dual clutch but it doesn’t have that rubbery feel like a cvt and as you
May remember the internal combustion engine flavor of this vehicle we drove just a week or two ago that one felt like a cvt even though it wasn’t a cvt and here one of the more noticeable differences is usable power in the mid-range translated usable power for passing which is something you wouldn’t expect out of a hybrid but here it’s significantly better in
That area than the internal combustion engine flavor of this vehicle and cattle guard coming up yes it is indeed that time again to play your favorite game on the office game with today’s contestant something even more practical than last hyundai you and i drove not this one rather a 2022 hyundai tucson all-wheel drive limited hybrid for base price of thirty
Seven thousand three hundred and fifty dollars once again i do feel it prudent to point out the price of the most basic hybrid this one also kind of a bargain like that gasoline version twenty nine thousand fifty dollars they call it the blue and like the gasoline version one can add a convenience package as well as the premium package which together it’s a little
Over four grand adds things like a regular sun roof chi wireless charger leather seats vented seats makes it a bit more fancy without going all the way up to thirty seven thousand dollars anyway we press on to the only options that are fitted to this car which would be color as well as one factory option the color here i had to pick a couple of different colors
There was grays and silvers and then the burgundy we saw on the gasoline version and this beautiful midnight blue metallic it works much better than the burgundy especially with that same light gray leather interior for life for me i could not find a like saddle or a tan tier which i would argue would have worked better with this blue uh then the only factory
Option fitted to this car carpeted floor mats optional on a 37 000 car can we fix that then the only other thing we add is the destination handling from the exotic port of call of montgomery alabama for 1 185 i would like to point out that that is more than the destination and handling than the last porsche that came from stuttgart we had in this hangar which
Brings us to the full retail price of seven hundred and four dollars do you remember back in the day when the difference in the weight between an internal combustion engine car and its hybrid equivalent was five to seven hundred pounds in some cases more this is the other end of that spectrum to be exact it’s 101 pounds difference and that has a huge impact on
The driving dynamics now for the avoidance of doubt the internal combustion engine flavor of this vehicle which we drove a couple of weeks ago it’s not a porsche macan it does not set the world of fire in terms of driving dynamics there really is not very good control over pitch particularly dive was a problem squat was okay now that brings about a very obvious
Question aside from the second propulsion system and the battery that sits underneath the rear seat are there any other differences underneath this vehicle from the internal combustion engine flavor and the answer is no a bit of a recap 12.8 inch diameter rotors in the front 11.8 inch diameter rotors in the rear mcpherson struts up front and multi-link in the
Rear something interesting even in the hybrid they do have stabilizer bars front and rear although they are not very effective i have to say that and that is how we arrive at the difference in drive dynamics between the hybrid flavor and the gasoline flavor of the tucson where does that difference in weight live it’s not a lot but it lives all at the nose of the
Car like coming around this turn here i’ve really got to scrub some speed off the little trail breaking granted i’m saying a track car then a porsche macan translated to extreme drive dynamics scenarios it can get sloppy and uncontrollable in parts would anyone notice that driving it around town which is the remit of this vehicle probably not but here whoa you can
Absolutely notice the difference that a it’s a hybrid and b there’s more weight in the nose yet it still marks a monumental shift in the hybrid world i would argue the hybrid crossover world and it’s this the drive dynamics no longer a problem between hybrid and gas let’s not mince words because what i’m about to say i do not say very often the hybrid is better than
The gas let me put that in another way in the world of the hyundai tucson the hybrid is significantly better than the gas and no it’s not just because i’m a cheapskate and prefer better fuel economy and it’s not just a better acceleration that comes from grafting on a secondary propulsion system which does not weigh a lot rather this is a more cohesive package it
Fixes a lot of the ills that we learned in the full first drive review of the internal combustion engine flavor of this same vehicle then you bring in the fact that it doesn’t cost a lot yeah it’s a hyundai but this is a particular value which brings us to the wish list and here it’s nothing about this vehicle rather it’s about the coming plug-in hybrid version
Of this vehicle and here my wish is very simple don’t make it forty five thousand dollars that is too much money the reason why this hybrid works is because one can have this vehicle which is this big cheaper than one could have a mazda cx-30 which is not a hybrid and is this big get where i’m going with this keep the value equation moving forward otherwise it
Will not sell and the way this thing works now i think they’re gonna pretty much mop the floor with everybody’s ass in this segment with the hybrid not the gas and this is the point of the episode where it turns around to you guys to opine in the comments below or via our social media moto man tvl one word moto man tv more facebook twitter and instagram and
With that i do want to share something it was lovely to be back in arizona as a sun devil but the things i do for you guys to go behind enemy lines and be amongst wildcats know i love you until i see you in the next episode
Transcribed from video
2022 Hyundai Tucson Hybrid: MUCH better as Hybrid! By MotoManTV
