A Review of the Chevrolet Malibu, Hyundai Sonata, and Chrysler 200
During the last month, I’ve had the experience of driving three of the major entries in the American market’s fiercely competitive mid-size market. These vehicles, all of which I drove courtesy of rental companies, give an interesting window into the state of the automobile industry today.
We drove the first car, a Chevrolet Malibu, in Ohio. This is a very nice looking vehicle inside and out. It also drove very well, earning a solid overall “A.”
I should note that I’m rating the Chevy against the standards of today, not the weaker ones of even five years ago. Frankly, this is a car I’d be pleased to have as a daily driver; I’d probably like it just as well for commuting and errands around town as a Mercedes or Lexus. Those big vehicles would be nicer for long distance, and a BMW would be better for canyon carving, but if I didn’t do such things, why spend the extra money?
The next car was a Hyundai Sonata, rented at a very big Alamo location at LAX. Aesthetically, I’d rate it a notch below the Malibu, but I still liked the interior a lot—crisper than the Chevy. This inexpensive car was as well equipped as a luxury car of not that long ago--even in rental-car-stripped guise. I’ll bet the industry is pleased that Hyundai/Kia finally now has luxury vehicles of its own. For years before, they were eating into the luxury market by offering high end features like sensor-based door locks on even low-end models.
Even though the Sonata had the fewest LEDs, I liked it the best, mainly because it felt tighter, especially on the freeway and in turns. This is very much a matter of personal preference, though. I’m sure many would like the Malibu better.
The third vehicle came courtesy of Dollar at the Charlotte airport. I was told I was getting a Mitsubishi Galant, but it turned out to be a Chrysler 200. The Chrysler ID was very, very low key—about eight point type on the key and not much bigger on the steering wheel.
Chrysler seems not to want to identify with this car. After a short time, I knew why.
The 200 was easily the best looking of the three, with lovely swooping lines. A beautiful pearl red paint job helped.
The first bad news came when I put it in R and pushed gently on the gas. The thing jumped like a startled cat, something I was to learn it always did when cold. And, actually, it was fairly twitchy all the time—the car had less than 3,000 miles, so should have been well broken in.
The offset for those pleasantly swoopy exterior lines? A big blind spot; almost scary when changing lanes to the right. A tiny, “sporty” exterior mirror didn’t help.
At first glance, the dash seemed cluttered. But, to be fair, I’d have to admit it grows on you. Much like fungus on a toenail.
The Chrysler designers went absolutely crazy with the LEDs. The big speedometer and tachometer are ringed with small blue LEDs. Chrysler is headquartered in Detroit and owned by Fiat in Italy, but the design studios are in California and, I have to assume, influenced by the availability of “medical” marijuana:
“Wow man! Look at those cool LEDs!”
“Yeah! Like a flower, man!”
After a little bit of driving I realized that I was hearing voices. Hmmm. Yes, the radio. I looked for the off switch. I’m good at finding these since I never listen to the radio in the car—at least not in the last fifteen years or so. Later, when parked, I searched through all the knobs and the many options on the screen and concluded there is no off switch. You can mute the radio, but it comes back on when you restart the car.
This reminds me of a little remarked feature of Stalin’s time. Every room in a public place, even college dorm rooms, had a loudspeaker on the wall. This made it possible for the masses to hear Comrade Blavov’s thoughts on Lenin, uttered randomly through the day, not to mention the views of other officials and of course the speeches of Stalin himself.
Overall, the 200’s screens had lots of information but I found little practical information. For example, the very useful “miles to empty” number seemed not to exist. It might be in there somewhere, but I didn’t have time to take the five credit hour online course on understanding the car’s dashboard Chrysler thoughtfully makes available.
The various screens can be programmed to show information in Spanish and French as well as English. Curiously, there’s no option for Elbonian.
So how did it drive? Not like the Hyundai.
There must be a spot on the Chrysler assembly line where they inject Novocain into the various active parts. The steering and suspension were numb, numb, numb. I wouldn’t have wanted the 200 on our long trek in the car pool lane on I-405, where the concrete wall is about six inches away as you zoom along at 70+ MPH. The 200 just doesn’t feel sharp and responsive.
My summary here is the GM and Hyundai/Kia are in very good shape. I’ve recently driven a rental Ford and liked that a lot too. The Fiesta was quick and precise. And we know that Toyota and Honda are very strong.
As for Chrysler, it’s puzzling. Back when the company was owned by Mercedes (Kreisler?) quality actually went down. So did the engineering. Fiat is supposed to have done much better on quality, and this car may be highly reliable, but from the driving point of view it’s a dog with a lot of fleas. The Italians are going to have to do better.
Maybe put a loudspeaker in the engineers’ cubicles, endlessly repeating customer’ delighted reactions to cars from Kia.
Just for fun, I turned the car in to Dollar with the dash controls set to French: “Appuyez sur le bouton…”
