Short Take Road Test
The designation GT has been remarkably elastic over the years, turning up on cars ranging from haughty to humble, but it still seems incongruous attached to a Korean econobox.
After all, anyone considering this car is doing so for budgetary reasons. Whether the budget is dictated by dire economic circumstances or a cheap-as-possible approach to commuting, it all adds up the same way at the dealership. And in this case, the addition looks pretty compelling. Although it's one of the cheapest cars available in America (pricing for a base three-door starts at $9994), the Accent doesn't have that old-time poorhouse feel that once set these cars apart. Hyundai has given up trying to convince us that vinyl serves just as well for upholstery and interior trim as it does for flooring. Pop another grand or so for the GL version, and it gets even more civilized, with a decent list of amenities baked into its $11,144 base price: air conditioning, AM/FM audio, tinted glass, variable intermittent wipers, rear-window wiper and defroster, and body-color exterior trim. Our test car was also equipped with the $400 Popular Equipment package (power windows, locks, and mirrors; six-speaker AM/FM audio with in-dash CD player), definitely worth the price of admission, $65 carpeted floor mats, and the package that justifies (to Hyundai, at least) the little red GT badge on the tail.
That GT package gives the Accent stiffer springs and firmer damping, bigger tire footprints on aluminum alloy wheels, white-face gauges, upgraded upholstery, a leather-wrapped steering wheel and shift knob, body-color rocker-panel moldings, fog lights, and a body-color wing stuck to the rear decklid.
At $495, the package not only is a pretty good deal, but we also view it as essential. An Accent GT is in no danger of being mistaken for a sports car-understeer, enhanced by plentiful body roll, is the defining dynamic trait-but its all-around behavior is thoroughly competent, and the chassis engineers have dialed up the firmness of the all-strut suspension without sacrificing a scintilla of ride quality. The Accent GT sopped up the bumps and ripples of our 10Best handling loop without a dram of drama, displaying a sure-footedness that shames a number of supposedly better cars.
A little more roll stiffness, perhaps via a bigger rear anti-roll bar, would probably make the Accent turn in with less reluctance-it didn't take much aggression to make the Hankook tires howl-but with more contact patch and less sidewall (185/60HR-14 versus the GL's 175/70R-13) the GT hangs on remarkably well in high-speed turns, inspiring a level of confidence rare for cars in this class.
The confidence index would be higher still if the power rack-and-pinion steering delivered clearer messages to the driver-it's distinctly numb, particularly on center. The shift quality of the five-speed manual is rubbery, something we've noted in other Hyundais.
As noted, the GT package doesn't affect what's going on under the hood, which shelters the same 1.6-liter DOHC 16-valve four that powers other Accents. With 104 horsepower and 106 pound-feet of torque its performance is adequate, hauling the Accent to 60 mph in 10 seconds flat. That's not exactly blackout acceleration, and it's actually 0.1 second slower than the last Accent we clocked (September 1995), but the little iron-block, aluminum-head four is remarkably civilized right up to its 5800-rpm power peak.
The sheetmetal of all Accents has been revised front and rear for '03, and if the design isn't quite a candidate to displace the Cisitalia coupe enshrined at New York's Museum of Modern Art, it doesn't scream, "Cheap! Cheap! Cheap!" either. The same goes for the rest of the car. It would be nice if the top-of-the-line GT included cruise control and a rake-adjustable steering column, and the absence of anti-lock brakes from the options list is inexcusable. But the Accent's fit and finish compares well with that of other cars at the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum-it no longer feels like the rolling equivalent of a hair shirt-and if Hyundai's unique notion of that new-car smell rivals damp leaf mulch in late autumn, well, it dissipates once there are a couple thousand miles on the clock.
The Accent GT is as much a GT as it is an oversize chunk of mozzarella. But it's a solid, well-equipped small car at an unbeatable price. "Cheap as possible" looks better than ever before.
