One of my complaints about car reviews is that they’re often not grounded in reality.
Like, you want to know a bit about a new Kia. But instead have to sit through a video of some dude in his 40s who looks like he’d corner you in a bar and talk about the stock market smash a family sedan on a race track. He’ll then regurgitate a bunch of technical specifications straight from the brochure and finish with some luke-warm commentary which will neither steer you towards or away from making a purchase.
So when I got my hands on Kia’s rear-wheel drive EV6 GT-line I wanted to judge it on a task we have all done at some point or another. A job which is as day-to-day as doing the dishes, or deciding what to wear.
In this review I ask the question: how does the Kia EV6 fare when picking up six stray cats from a vet clinic across the city?
Now, Kia is quite prescriptive when they sign over their review car, more so than other manufacturers I’ve dealt with this year.
Amongst their requests was that I paid any speeding fines (unlikely to be accrued), return the vehicle when requested (rude but fair), and not to travel with pets unless absolutely necessary.
I decided there’s a lot of room for interpretation in the words ‘absolutely necessary’.
Is it not absolutely necessary for my readers to know how the EV6 handles the basic job of moving six cats? Could I reasonably recommend this car to anyone if I hadn’t tested this most basic – and cute – of tasks?
So with this justification in mind, the boot of the car well protected, and six cats waiting, I set off.
Now, cats are a clean and image-conscious animal. Thankfully, the EV6 is stylish to a level I believe any feline would approve. Say what you will about Kia, but I think they’re punching above their weight when it comes to design. Their new generation of cars look good and the EV6 is amongst Kia’s best. It’s wide and sporty with nice shaping on the panels.
For a lot of reasons, Kia’s EV6 cars are compared heavily to Hyundai’s IONIQ series. Both are at the same price point. Both have the same user interface and operating system. But while Hyundai has chosen to make a car which feels very futuristic – a stylistic choice I applauded for its bravery – the Kia looks a bit closer a more typical sporty SUV.
A lot of manufacturers have taken advantage of the space available in EVs. From concept cars to what’s on Australian roads now, we’re seeing a lot of minimalism which makes the cars feel empty and cavernous.
Curiously, Kia seems to have gone in the other direction.
The EV6 feels wide on the road, but isn’t so spacious inside. Of course, there’s no handbrake dividing the space between the passenger and the driver. But instead of letting that area empty, they’ve put a little plastic tub for your possessions.
They’ve also put the car’s start button and the knob used to select drive, reverse and neutral in the large, fixed centre console. Whether or not you prefer this setup will entirely down to personal preference and how many trinkets you like to carry with you.
I did appreciate that Kia hasn’t done away with physical buttons for functions like seat warming (something which bothered me in the IONIQ). If I want my seats to be warm, I want them warm now. I don’t want to risk my life, trying to work out what submenu it’s hidden under while I drive. This is dangerous and, most importantly, wastes precious seat-warming seconds.
On the matter of buttons, the cats had no opinion. They were in the boot after all.
Now, I’ve been saying six cats. You’ve probably been picturing me walking into a vet clinic, scooping up three desperately squirming strays under each arm, putting them in the back of the car and quickly closing the boot.
While this is not outside the realms of possibility with me, it’s not exactly how it went.
In fact, I was picking up one cat and her five kittens. They were all in a carrier and quite okay with the entire mission (though they might have protested more had they known how much staring at them I would do in the coming days).
While the cats may not have cared much for the EV6’s interior design choices, they might have noticed the smoothness of the ride. Personally, from the front seat I felt it was a bit hard – a driving experience closer to what you’d expect from a sports car. I was acutely aware of any potholes or bumps, more so than the IONIQ. Whether this is the suspension or the tire profile, it’s difficult to say.
The other interesting quirk of this car is the sound. I found the EV6 to be noisy for an electric car. The wind and tyre noise seemed to penetrate the cabin quite a lot and the car itself also made an interesting humming noise. It took me a while to work out what it reminded me of, but eventually it twigged. The car sounds like a whirly tube. You know, those plastic, corrugated tubes you spin over your head? Perhaps this is a sophisticated ploy by Kia to trigger a nostalgic response in adults who had shit toys as kids.
But all this can be ignored when it comes to acceleration. Even in the single engine rear-wheel drive, this car moves. Again, the effortlessness of electric cars is so fun. The moment I had the thought of overtaking, the EV6 was there to meet me. I suspect the two-engine GT-version of this car would be devastating to drive. I love petrol and diesel cars, but honestly. It’s hard to see how they survive against the speed and ease of an EV.
In all regards, the EV6 excelled in its cat-transportation duties. Should you be moving anywhere up to six, perhaps even ten, mid-full sized cats you’ll have no troubles. But the EV6 is not precisely a cheap car. You’re looking at around $85,000 on road for the model I drove. You’ll pay another $10k on top of that if you want the much beefier dual-motor AWD.
You may well ask: “could you get the same cat transportation capabilities for less money?”. Sure. But if you’re in the market for a new EV, this is a reasonable cost benchmark. Whether that’s an acceptable payoff is up to you. And the six cats you may or may not be fostering.
