The Kia Koup – The Most Affordable Coupe in Malaysia

In the 33rd Issue of Live Life Drive (April 2012) Wheels Weekly (all rights reserved by dqbpublications), writer Bobby Ang did a fantastic job at presenting the case of having a 2 door car is actually more practical than a 4 door. In a nutshell, the definition of practicality is being effective, useful or suitable for a particular purpose or situation. The more a given purpose or situation appears and a product/service fulfilling its function, the more practical it is. So, buying a RM5,000 LV handbag and using it only once is a lot less practical than a RM50 Chow-Kit street carry all that’s used everyday.

 

In Mr Ang’s article, he asks why do we need 4 doors in a car? For easy entry of exit for rear passengers. Why do we need a coupe? To look good, sexy and sporty. Now, be honest and ask yourself …. how often do you really use the rear 2 doors of your 4-door saloon? Even if you have a kids, chances are, you’d only be fetching your family around on the weekends which accounts for 2 days in a week = 104 days / 365 days in a year which means the rear 2 doors serves it purpose 30% of the time in a year. How often does a coupe looks mouth watering?

 

100% of the time.

 

So, who’s serving greater practicality here?

 

So if you follow that logic and feel like going against the grain for once, the most affordable coupe in Malaysia happens to be the Kia Forte Koup …. and by affordable, I do not mean to say it’s cheap; As a matter of fact, far from it. Let’s see if it’s worth your money in detail

 

 

Design

 

 

Most people buy a coupe to look good …. and you do look good driving this car. Even though it’s been 1 1/2 years since it was launched, the Koup never fails to turn heads wherever it goes.

 

 

Measuring 4,480mm in length, 1,765mm in width and 1,400mm in height, the Koup is marginally shorter by 5cm, thinner in width by 1cm and 6cm lower than its 4-door Forte brother. With 2 doors less and a lowered roof, the sex appeal of any one seen driving this car goes up by a few notches.

 

 

Up in front, automatic halogen headlights decorate the front. A pity they aren’t HID.

 

At the rear, the Koup sports one of the sexiest butt around, with longitudinal LED combination rear lamps that creates a visual effect of a more lowered and wider back.

 

 

Welcome to the Theta II family. Pick the black one if you’re single and looking for a hottie. Pick the middle if you’ve got her hand in marriage and expecting the first one soon …. pick the one on the left if you’ve got quadruplets. Nah, I’m just kidding …. as you can see in the picture above, the Koup looks widest when though it has the least width among the 3 above.

 

 

 

So what’s your poison?

 

 

If you find frameless spectacles nice, you’ll definitely love the Koup’s frameless windows:

 

 

 

 

What’s style if you don’t let the sun (or the moon) in? The Koup comes with a sunroof which is pretty darn useful when evicting heat after parking too long under the sun. I did want to try out how fast I need to go in a rain to ensure no rain drops come into the car during moderate showers but unfortunately, the weather is set to grill nowadays and no rain clouds in sight.

 

Performance

 

 

 

Sharing the same engine as the Forte 2.0 sedan, the Koup sports a 2.0litre Theta II DOHC MPI CVVT engine that produces identical 156ps @ 6,200rpm and 194.2Nm of torque @ 4,300rpm. And similarly to the 2.0 sedan, you achieve 0-100kph in 10.5 seconds which, admittedly is not the fastest car around and won’t be overtaking any turbocharged small cc continentals.

 

However, at mid to high rev and speed, the 2.0 litre shows its stripes. While there is a slight lag when flooring the pedal, once the power kicks in above 3,000rpm, you’ll get sweet surge all the way to redline. The acceleration from 150kph northwards is done easily and the car will continue to pull until 210kph on a level road. In this zone, the Kia may very well smoke 308THPs as the difference in engine displacement is very obvious.

 

 

Paired with the engine is a conventional 6 speed automatic torque converter. Nothing to complain but nothing much to praise either. I usually slot the gear to manual when cruising so that if there is gradient and speed drops significantly, the gearbox won’t automatically jump to lower gear and consume more fuel for the sake of keeping up to the pace we set.

 

 

Ride and Handling

 

One of the other benefits of having a coupe aside from its good looks is improved chassis rigidity and this in turn alters the driving dynamics of the car compared to its 4 door sedan brethren. This is true when comparing the Koup against the Forte 2.0. Though the suspension set up remains identical, cornering ability has been improved and compared to the 2.0 sedan which doesn’t wallow as much already, the Koup is even better on curvy B roads. Even at speeds above 180kph, the car felt planted and you won’t get the as-if-my-car-wants-to-fly-ing sense as you would in some Japanese makes. Aside from the K5, the Koup is one car offering the closest sensation to a continental car you can have that’s made from Asia.

 

The secret to the quicker response and better driving stability is Kia engineers worked their magic by modifying the 2.0 sedan in the following areas:-

 

• Rigidity of bar and stabilizer bar enhanced through balanced tuning
• Enhanced rigidity of shock absorber inner valve with optimum damping
• Increased steering gear ratio
• Enhanced hydraulic steering rigidity
• Lowered minimum ground clearance
• Implemented sport tuning on shock-absorber damping
• Implemented sport tuning on hydraulic torque

 

You should be aware that the suspension set up is a little on the stiff side (but not as stiff as what you’d get in a 308THP). Running the car through yellow warning lines on the road would make your car sound like a construction zone but on properly maintained roads, the car cruises very well with minimal noise intrusion (aside from what the 215/45 R17 tires make)

 

I felt the pairing of the Theta II is just perfect for the Koup. A reasonably powerful engine to fully explore and challenge the limits of the rigid coupe chassis of the Koup. I couldn’t screech the tires as often I do on other makes and this inspires higher levels of confidence when playing corners with that supped-up Kancil we all encounter every once in a while.

 

There is also another thing you should be aware of when driving coupes: The C pillars are usually thick and the Koup is no exception.

 

 

Visibility at the back, particularly on the sides are not very good and you should be aware of this when reversing.

 

Turning radius is also not the best in the Koup but that’s ok as you get to show off your flanks more often. Just make sure you appear as if you’re deliberately doing a 3-point turn to impress the person you’re driving with.

 

 

Cabin Convenience

 

 

The dashboard design of the Koup is interesting. Instead of a monotone design (which you can still choose if you wish), you can have what you see here which sports a 2-tone red/black dash. The red part is made of quasi-hard (I say quasi because you’d have to press really hard to see the indention). When I first saw this design, I was thinking the red is too glaring, like putting too much make up on a face that’s already looking nice. After a while, you get used to it …. learn to appreciate it even as it adds to another unique appeal of the car.

 

 

As a matter of fact, the red tone matches very well with the red Supervision cluster. The leather wrapped motor driven power steering offers good enough grip for drivers and conveys excellent road feedback to the driver. Still a bit vague at high speeds and on similar levels as a the 2.0 sedan.

 

 

Forte owners should be very familiar with this center fascia. You get a 6 CD changer/radio that has Bluetooth and streams songs through it wirelessly, fully automatic air conditioning controls and the hazard light button. Now, the Forte has just been recently updated with a touchscreen Navi headunit and earlier buyers of the Forte can opt to install the new HU for a fee without voiding warranty. I don’t have an official answer from Kia yet but I believe this can be done for the Koup too.

 

 

 

You get full leather seats all round and the seats offer sufficient support especially around corners. It felt to me that both the 2.0 Sedan and Koup offers the same leather type and degree of softness.

 

 

 

Though you only have 2 doors, this coupe has space to sit 5 adults comfortably …. provided those sitting behind are no more than 5 1/2 feet since the rear sloping roof compromises 60mm of headroom. Legroom is adequate. With my 5′ 6″ frame driving position, I could still get this amount of space for my legs:

 

 

Unfortunately, my head was bent forward if my back if fully inclined on the rear backrest so the most comfortable position for a person my height would be to slide a little forward. Still reasonably comfortable but my knees would be rapping against the front seats. Good thing most Malaysians aren’t that tall so rear bench is good enough for most people.

 

 

 

Kia has changed the ball game by offering keyless entry and engine push Start/Stop in almost all their models in Malaysia. With all the shopping mall crime that primarily targets the fairer gender and elderly, having this feature is a huge welcome particularly when you don’t have to rummage through your bag for your key to unlock your doors. As long as the key is within 1 feet of the sensors on the door handles, you’ll be able to lock/unlock even if the key remains in your pocket or handbag.

 

 

 

Here’s another cool feature of the Koup: LED rings around the front speakers that can be set to pulsate according to the music beat or at a preset interval. Funky.

 

 

 

Boot size is reasonably good for the Koup. 358litres of space which is 57litres smaller compared to the 2.0 sedan. The rear seats are of the 60:40 configuration and can be dropped to get more space

 

 

Safety

 

In the area of safety, the Koup offers what most Kia model does:-

 

• Driver and front passenger SRS airbags
• Front side SRS airbags (pelvis and thorax protection)
• Curtain SRS airbags front and rear (head protection) (total 6 airbags)
• 3-point Seat belts for all seating position
• Front seat belt Pretensioners with force limiters
• Height adjustable front seat belt achors
• ABS
• EBD
• BA
• ESP
• Rear parking assist
• Speed sensing auto door lock
• Auto light control system

 

Specifications

 

Exterior

• Chrome door handles
• Frameless doors
• Powered sunroof
• Piano black grille and front highlights
• Diffuser style rear bumper
• Front fog lamps
• Rear LED combination lamps
• Chrome-tip rear muffler (dual)

 

Interior

• Keyless entry & Start/Stop button
• Motor Driven Power Steering (MDPS)
• Steering mounted paddle shifters
• Supervision cluster
• Electronic Chromic mirror
• Leather seats
• Leather wrapped steering wheel and shift knob
• Tilt and telescopic steering wheel
• 60:40 fold rear seats
• Tinted glass with sunband
• Cruise control with steering wheel mounted control
• Radio/CD/AUX/MP3 with 6 CD changer, USB + iPod connectivity
• 6 speaker system with sound mood lamp
• Fully automatic air conditioning
• Bluetooth connectivity

 

Ownership and Maintenance

 

Being the most affordable coupe in town, the Koup retails for RM115,800 OTR with insurance and each moth, you’d be looking at paying RM1,969 / RM1,469 / RM1,191 for 5 / 7 / 9 years respectively if you managed to get 2.5% loan annual interest from the bank and taking 90% loan amount.

 

As for the service maintenance cost, it follows the Forte 2.0 sedan since they both share the same engine. You can see the costing in this article:

 

http://www.kensomuse.com/kia-forte-2-0-i-am-left-sufficiently-speechless/

 

How about the fuel consumption? Well, in my recent trip down to JayBee, I got the following mileage for one tank of RON95 fuel:-

 

 

And in my next pump, I managed this amount of fuel before the pump stopped:

 

 

Which translates to about 12.4 cents per kilometer. Good or bad? You decide. The route took me from pumping at Subang Jaya – Sunway – Simpang Renggam exit – Pontian – Skudai – Taman Sentosa, JB – Perling – Ayeh Kerok (where I pumped).

 

One thing I must say about the fuel tank though. As you may drive some cars with distance to empty meters to half tank, the first half consumed may show a higher or lower reading than the remaining fuel as estimated by the on board computer. This makes me imagine some fuel tanks are designed with a larger top or a larger bottom and seldom the same size all round. In the case of the Koup, the top half appears to be larger as the distance traveled is further than the remaining fuel of the 2nd half. Also, do note that every Kia with distance-to-empty readings will show this when you drop below 50km range remaining:-

 

 

The Distance to Empty message will flash and show —km remaining. If you want to know how it feels like driving an electric car with limited range, try driving in this situation more often. You’ll get used to range anxiety in no time.

 

 

All in all, the Koup offers an excellent alternative to the regular sedans you find in the market. It’s not the fastest coupe around but certainly one of the best looking vehicles around. For its price, no complaints on my side.

 

 

 

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