After 6 years of everyday driving, on all road surfaces and through all weather conditions i can share with you my story of owing the family car from Hyundai.

The car was bought brand new in the summer of 2014 from local authorised dealer for 19990 euro. On local market, today, the same trim with more than 68 350 miles (110 000) km traveled, cost around 10 000 euro which means a depreciation of 50% after 6 years of owning. It is a saloon version, 1.7 diesel engine with 134 bhp and manual gearbox, that was covered with 5 years warranty or 62 000 miles (100 000) km. 

Disturbing Issues and Car Problems

The first warranty case came already in the first year during winter and was visiting us every year after Christmas holidays. The problem is that its parktronic sensors accumulate water during wet period and after first freeze they stop working. The dealer every time agreed that this problem is covered by the warranty so they changed them without any problems. The only problem that despite they knew about this repetitive problem they never had sensors in stock so i have to wait about 2 months for them to be delivered. 

Apart from that everything was running smoothly. The quality of materials were very soft and impressive. Despite a very bad roads in our country, that was always in top 10 with the worst roads in the world, the noise inside the car was at very low level until in past 100 000 km barrier. After that mark the dashboard start squeaking even on smooth road that is very very annoying. A little bit later to the dashboard noise added the noise from front seats headrests. Another disturbing fact about interior is that from storage compartment at the bottom of the dashboard blow air while driving that is especially disturbing during winter time as your hand freeze when you keept it on the gearbox stick. And one more downside of the interior is the design of the A pillar which impede the visibility. So every time when approaching a pedestrian crossing you have to make additional moves to look very weel around the pillar not to miss someone running. And the rear windows does not open all the way down. There are some quality questions as well to the external parts which starting to show some gaps despite no collisions and servicing just at official service center.

The biggest problem was the clutch that failed as soon as the car has passed 28 000 miles (45 000 km). At service center they immediately blame us saying that we drove the car incorrect or used it for rally and burnt the clutch plate itself. The real cause of the problem was the faulty pressure plate that has been fitted at the factory, a problem very well known for Hyundai at that moment that they did not care to solve for several years as this problem followed Hyundai owners from around 2010. We registered a complaint on Hyundai's official website where we mention that we were blamed even without any checks and insisted that it is a warranty case but were completely ignored. After that we decided to address to national consumer agency. They offered an expert who forced service center to take off the entire clutch mechanism and send it for an individual expertise. During the process all the mechanics noticed damages on pressure plate and agreed that this is covered by the warranty which helped us save 800 euro repair costs.

Performance and Ride

The suspension has a very short travel distance that annoy you every time when you hit a pothole as it feels like the car is cracking in half. The ride is quite comfortable when you drive on an uneven surface, the most important is to avoid abrupt margins. The engine is punchy enough to overtake slower moving vehicles if you keep the rpm above 2000 mark and for a diesel car at this speed, noise level inside is completely acceptable. The steering is uninspiring at all, it responds slow at low speed but is very ok at higher speeds.

Fuel Consumption

Compared with official data from manufacturer that showed extra urban consumption of 51.13 US mpg (61.41 UK mpg) after its milage the real consumption is nearly the same showing around 50 U.S. mpg (60.05 UK mpg). Instead urban fuel consumption neither was close when the car was new nor today when it shows around 29.40 US mpg (36.22 UK mpg).

Conclusion

I can not say that it was a cheap car at the time of aquisition based on the options it has, that are nothing special, neither was the cost of servicing. At that time it was the one with best ride in its price category but with the time the i40 has disappointed every year more and more until it was clear for me that this will be the first and only Hyundai in my driving experience.