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Hyundai admits 'error' in KDM Sonata fuel economy announcement

Stop us if you've heard this one before: Hyundai is going to have to reduce the officially announced miles-per-gallon number for its 2014 Sonata. While there's a lot of similarity between this new situation and events that transpired in 2012, there are some important differences. For one, the new mileage mistake, which Hyundai says was once again caused by an error at its test centers, is only applicable to cars in the Korean Domestic Market. Secondly, it's not so much mpg as kilometers per liter. "We are very sorry for causing confusion to reporters" - Hyundai According to Reuters, the numbers for the Korean Sonata were originally announced as 12.6 kilometers per liter (29.63 mpg), a six-percent increase over the previous model. The automaker has just announced that government verification showed an actual result of 12.1 kpl (28.46 mpg), which is only a two-percent increase. Since these numbers were done using the South Korean economy test, they are not equivalent to the US EPA numbers, the latter of which say the 2014 Sonata gets 36/40/38 miles per gallon. The correction came before the new Sonata went on sale in South Korea. In an official statement, Hyundai said, "We are very sorry for causing confusion to reporters." Hyundai Motor America's Jim Trainor, product public relations senior group manager, assured AutoblogGreen that the Korean error will have "no effect" on US ratings. In 2012, Hyundai and Kia faced a media and consumer firestorm after being caught up in exaggerated mileage claims for vehicles like its 2013 Accent, Veloster and Elantra. The sister companies agreed to compensate buyers to the tune of $395 million for what they said were "honest mistakes" and "human error" during in-house fuel economy tests. There is no word yet on whether similar customer satisfaction actions will follow this domestic market snafu.

Hyundai shocks Korea with mid-engined Veloster concept

There are many things we love here at Autoblog, but one of the quirkiest is the mid-engined hot hatch, whether it's the Renaultsport Clio V6 or the Volkswagen GTI W12-650 concept. Unfortunately, we can never seem to get our hands on one - the former never having made the transatlantic journey and the latter remained strictly a concept. And now we've got one more to salivate over.
It's called, simply enough, the Veloster Midship concept, and Hyundai is unveiling it this week at the Busan Motor Show in South Korea. As you might have guessed, it's essentially a Veloster with the engine - a 2.0-liter Theta turbo four producing 296 horsepower - mounted behind the two seats. It's also got a lightweight aluminum suspension, a reinforced chassis and extreme aero to help that mid-mounted turbo engine do its thing.
The project was undertaken by the same team that developed the initial i20 WRC rally car, but unfortunately as Hyundai itself says in the press release below (released with the solitary image above), "The Midship is a concept only to explore possibilities for the Veloster chassis and is currently not related to any future production model." Which is a bit of a shame, but hardly a surprise.

Google's new Android Autos OS unveiled, will be in cars this year [w/video]

Connected cars are coming en-masse. We know this much. How, though, remains something of an open question, especially as two of the world's largest tech companies are preparing to battle for control of your car's dashboard. On the one hand, we have Apple and its CarPlay system. And now, we know what Google has been working on with Auto Link.
Its new name is Android Auto, and yes, it's based off the Android architecture that is the primary challenger to Apple's iOS mobile operating system. Announced at Google's I/O conference today, Android Auto functions similarly to CarPlay - owners will need to plug their smartphones into their cars to access the full breadth of capability.
In Android Auto's case, that means a wealth of voice controls to limit distracted driving. Google's marquee apps will be available when the interface arrives in production models later this year, including Google Play Music, Google Maps and voice-activated texting and text playback. Meanwhile, developers will be able to begin designing custom apps for the new system via an upcoming software development kit.