Imagine you run a mid-sized car company which has sailed through the years only with average sales. It produces good vehicles, but has never stood out in the crowd. Then, at some moment you see a rival which was in the same situation release a new car which gets so well-accepted around the world that initiates an entire revolution on its line (and sales). And some years later, you notice that one of your own releases started to receive more compliments than usual. Wouldn’t you get thrilled thinking on what could this be leading to?
Sure, it’s always too presumptuous to think a given car will be a worldwide success from the moment of its very release. But what took to Hyundai was pretty much what this other Korean automaker started to do, although in a reduced scale. After all, the first one’s “revolutionary car” was an all-new generation of Sonata, while the latter has only facelifted its current vehicles so far. Sure, releasing so many futuristic concepts since 2011 (LIV, SIV and the three XIVs) reveals that SsangYong is making big plans for the next years, but until now the expectations have to stay small. What it’s been done at these initial steps is mostly correcting the company’s mistakes of the last decade, specially concerning the design. Actyon and Rodius received deep facelifts and the older Musso and Kyron have been dropped, so the company could try to make people forget the time when it was best known for selling hideous cars. The baby-brother Korando received a whole new generation in 2011 which already looked better, but arrived before the new design language started to be applied. Therefore, the new Korando ended being facelifted for the first time in only two years. SsangYong must’ve thought this would be better than making such a young project look old to the public only for not following the new identity.
Korando C is how the new crossover will be called in South Korea. Like it’s usual at these cases, sides and rear received only new wheels and bumper and redesigned lights, the latter with LEDs. The most important changes were restricted to the front fascia, which now resembles the updated big brothers. Actually, using more square lines is convenient because it makes the car look more imponent. These pictures show very attractive elements which may avoid city-car items such as chrome items, but also stay away from looking like old trucks. Entering the new Korando reveals a redesigned console, which received much more elegant shapes – although it’s hard to overlook how tacky wooden accents make a compact crossover look, specially when combined to colored seats. The company says both coating quality and noise-absortion were improved, and there are some new equipments: heated seats, hill holder, Infinity audio system, infotainment system with Internet, keyless entry, tire pressure detector and LEDs for daytime and tail lights. Opening the hood still reveals the turbocharged diesel 2.0L with 149 hp, but now there’s also a 180-hp version of the same engine. The first uses a six-speed manual gearbox and the other is restricted to a six-speed automatic.
