[Xaos636]

Originally Posted by Behemoth

End of the day it will boil down to personal choice - some people like the torquey, punchy nature of the diesel engine while some prefer the high revving linear and less noisy nature of the Turbo Petrol.
Take your pick!

That is a really good math that you provided here and as far as I can see, this can only apply for a car which has a turbo petrol(Yes, the Sonet here). If you take the 1.5Mpi top end variant of the Seltos, then the difference between the top end of this petrol and the diesel counterpart would be bigger. Hyundai/KIA exploited this space to give us a punchy turbo petrol, but this does not apply to other manufacturers generally, who doesn't have a turbo petrol in their lineup.

I for one hate the diesels for simply their pollution levels. Idle the diesel 2 minutes while dusting your car and the smell of the diesel literally gives me a 'kick to the head' feeling, and the calculations over a period of 7 years could mean significant damage to the atmosphere with all these toxic going in there. I am sure less than 10% of people consider this while choosing the fuel type of your car, but I would never buy a diesel in my life. I am not going extremely choosy here by not going for an electric, but since the turbo petrol's offer better/similar performance than a diesel these days, I would suggest everyone to look at this engine just for the protection of our environment. As far as I can see, it wont be long before diesel engines are out of the market, then slowly petrol as well. Just sharing my views here, no offence.

Also on the KIA Sonet, if I were to buy this over the Venue it would be a tough task, not because the Venue is a superior product, but with a few overdone design elements on the Sonet. Now since the Venue has less features(which looked to have so much at the time of launch), I would have been a confused soul and could have gone up a segment higher and chosen the Seltos or the Creta. But if someone wants an automatic with a very decent engine, there aren't much choice in this range.

One thing on the design is that I cannot live with that switches on the center console, no way. If those switches were placed lower down, it could have been livable with. I was fed up with buttons on Baleno where I have to take my eyes off the road to see what I am pressing. Knobs any day of the week.

The next thing is the digital instrument cluster and that rev needle. I have seen a few members bashing S-Presso, Kwid and the new Nexon for having a digital instrument but looks like they forgot this one because of the other features on offer. But it could be livable with though depending on people.

I also hope that they improve their spare parts sourcing as I could see lots of cars waiting for bumpers and tail gates even after a month when I went for a Seltos test drive(No, it wasn't due to Covid-19, situation was same before lock-down as well). But yeah, lets give them time for this as they slowly set up more showrooms and service centers in India. The SA did say that the introductory price would be low for the top end versions of the Sonet, which would be be gradually increased in a few months time which is a good strategy. But the Venue top end DCT Sport at over 14L on-road in Bangalore, the Sonet GTX+ DCT with all those extra features could be atleast 15L-15.5L as my books suggest, which is dangerously close to S/SX variants of Creta/Seltos.

Other than these, the features are well laid out and its bang on the C-SUV segment and I wonder what Nissan is thinking now with the Magnite. The gear lever is chunky, the ventilated seats and LED headlights looks so good. One side Honda brings out the same old Jazz as the all new Jazz with chrome ring on steering as a feature and on the other side, KIA does this. I so hope this one is tuned a bit softer than the Venue, but might affect the handling characteristic of the car, but could take the potholes better than the Venue.

[Col Mehta]

Another one spotted. Looks quite tall and seems to have strong road presence.

https://youtu.be/1dwaw3l_K-0

[Dr.Abhi]

Originally Posted by Col Mehta

Another one spotted. Looks quite tall and seems to have strong road presence.

Sonet in the video definately looks taller. Though I am sucker of ground clearance, the Sonet in the video is looking ungainly and bit too much off ground and ready to topple in case of sudden direction change.

[RoadMonkey]

Originally Posted by Dr.Abhi

Sonet in the video definately looks taller. Though I am sucker of ground clearance, the Sonet in the video is looking ungainly and bit too much off ground and ready to topple in case of sudden direction change.

Could just be a POV issue and the person shooting the video might be driving a low slung car. It definitely looks composed in its driving manners from the videos, but that's still too premature an impression.

OT: Did not expect to see another PB03 user here.

[84.monsoon]

Originally Posted by Xaos636

I for one hate the diesels for simply their pollution levels. Idle the diesel 2 minutes while dusting your car and the smell of the diesel literally gives me a 'kick to the head' feeling, and the calculations over a period of 7 years could mean significant damage to the atmosphere with all these toxic going in there. I am sure less than 10% of people consider this while choosing the fuel type of your car, but I would never buy a diesel in my life.

While what you say may be true in the past era of BS4 diesels, a lot has changed with the transition to BS6. Particulate matter (PM) levels of BS6 Diesels have reduced to less than one-fifth of the BS4 Diesel engines (from 25mg/km to 4.5mg/km) - this is the SAME level as for petrol engines. Modern diesel engines convert up to 99% of combustion engine exhaust pollutants (HC, CO, NOx and particulates). The output is carbon-di-oxide, water vapor and inert nitrogen. Hence the new BS6 Diesels are equivalent in terms of particulate emissions to their petrol counterparts and they are more fuel efficient, thereby producing lower net particulate emissions per kilometre run, than petrol engines.

The norm for NOx from diesel vehicles in BS4 was at 250mg/km, and it is now reduced to 80mg/km in BS6 diesel engines. Petrol vehicles have to reach 60 mg/km, so slightly better in this regard. However, this is off-set by the higher fuel efficiency of the diesel. In city running, where pollution is a key concern, the Sonet DCT will probably give 8-9 kpl, while the diesel will do 13-14 kpl. This 5 kpl advantage in fuel efficiency more than offsets the 20 mg/km additional NOX emissions of the Diesel.

So, while Diesel has acquired a very bad name thanks to the polluting older BS3 and BS4 engines that flooded our markets between 2008 and 2019, and the global Diesel-gate scandal. Today, it is a different story and Diesels are less polluting per KM than their turbo-petrol counterparts. But it will take time for this to sink into the consumer perceptions.

[Behemoth]

Originally Posted by 84.monsoon

So, while Diesel has acquired a very bad name thanks to the polluting older BS3 and BS4 engines that flooded our markets between 2008 and 2019, and the global Diesel-gate scandal. Today, it is a different story and Diesels are less polluting per KM than their turbo-petrol counterparts. But it will take time for this to sink into the consumer perceptions.

Very True, and current Diesel engines are very fuel efficient and also less polluting than comparable petrol engines on a per kilometre basis.
Another key difference between Diesel and Petrol is that Diesel has a higher calorific value per litre compared to Petrol and generates more energy when it burns and this results in more load carrying capacity and power (For Trucks, Ships and even Jet airplanes).
Till 10 years back, it was difficult to make smaller capacity diesel engines with less vibration and power, but now the technology is easily available and has been proven. The dieselgate scam was an unfortunate incident which maligned diesel engines, but with that behind us , companies are now being very careful and we are getting much better engines now.

Most of us tend to see huge overloaded Trucks and Buses spewing huge amounts of Soot and diesel smoke - the problem lies with Older Tech from 10 years ago and also the fact that the transporters overload the trucks by a factor of 50% , which results in pollution beyond all acceptable levels.

While I am not debating that Diesel is good or bad, I am stressing that Petrol is also not a good fuel as that is very low in mileage and also not suitable for heavy load applications.

Eventually for cars, India needs to go the Partially Hybrid or Fully electric way, but the challenge in India has always been the lack of Grid electricity and infrastructure.

Countries like Sri Lanka adopted Hybrid cars almost 12 years back and there more than 85% of the cars are Hybrids there even now. This is the path that India should have taken and even now needs to take. But the prerequisite before that for India is surplus power generation from renewable and environment friendly power sources (and not thermal , which still accounts for 70% of India's current power generation).

Anyway, we are seeing the wave of electric vehicles sweeping India now - with 3 wheelers being the first. Next should be the 2 wheelers, which have started and post that it should be 4 wheelers and Commercial Buses.
I hope that this does happen in India before it is too late, as fossil fuels in any form are neither sustainable not environment friendly.

Anyway this discussion is for another relevant thread ! But being a part of this field professionally for so many years, I am frustrated by the lack of progress in India in this area and just wanted to share my views!

I also hope that new entrants in the India Market like Kia have a long term EV strategy chalked out and can come up with some made for India EVs based on Sonet or Seltos which can lead the way!

Sorry for the OT post!

[volkman10]

Brothers in Arms - KIA Seltos and KIA Sonet






Link

[DriveOnceMore]

Originally Posted by volkman10

Brothers in Arms - KIA Seltos and KIA Sonet

Attachment 2047893

Man! this car looks big by C-SUV standards.
But when compared to Seltos, it will be definitely short on shoulder space and max suitable for 4.
KIA designers did the great job of masking the narrowness of the cabin with help of those BIG bulges on the sides.
Wonder why Hyundai team couldn't.

I see higher cross-shopping happening within KIA stable itself.
When you can get same power-train with 90% of features, 90% of space, 100% of weird styling at 70% price then of Seltos then why would one not chose Sonet over Seltos?
Ultimately if the Customer remains with KIA, it's definitely a good thing for the company.
But still I feel that Sonet is going affect Seltos more, than other C-SUVs, which surely is NOT a good thing for company.

Plus the 392 ltr boot space bluff is it yet to be exposed.
So limited rear legroom, shoulder room and small boot space comes into light, let's see how well market accepts it in long run.

Best luck Sonet.

[REN]

Video brochure of the Kia Sonet:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ywTZgQBvBE

[stormdRider]

Finally, an official confirmation of the Kia Sonet's ground clearance as 205 mm in the above video.

[Aditya]

The Kia Sonet sub-4m crossover has arrived at a dealership in Hyderabad.

















Thanks to Theja Reddy for sending these images in. Heartfelt gratitude for sharing them with other enthusiasts via this Team-BHP page!

Link to Team-BHP News Article

[kamilharis]

From the Video Brochure :

Connected Car tech features.


Virus Protection Details


"India Specific" Enhancements. Air protection inside, and Noise pollution outside with "Best Horn Perfomance"

[Shreyas_H]

"Best Horn performance" under India specific features really takes the cake

This car is a great value proposition. Hopefully drives nicely too! Kia should have no trouble doing 8-10k units a month.

[ashvek3141]

Originally Posted by Aditya

The Kia Sonet sub-4m crossover has arrived at a dealership in Hyderabad.
Attachment 2047999

One thing which I really hoped to be different from the sibling Venue was the rear space. And this pic just confirms that it’s the same.
When I had seen the Q&A episode by SVP on the Car & Bike channel, I had really high hopes on seeing the amount of rear leg space that was showcased during the video. But looking at these pictures, I am disappointed!! This was one of the major reasons that had stopped me from choosing the Venue & I’m afraid the Sonet is sailing on the same boat.
However, I really hope that I maybe wrong & this is just due to the angle of photographic image & in real the space is adequate. But if not, this is gonna be a real bummer!

[CrAzY dRiVeR]

Originally Posted by ashvek3141

One thing which I really hoped to be different from the sibling Venue was the rear space. And this pic just confirms that it’s the same.

That boot looks bigger than most competition, so it is quite unlikely the rear seat will be a revelation as well.

After all, they have to package everything within the 4m constraint.