Kia’s latest SUV is set to be game changer

THERE was a time in the King’s Road, Chelsea, when the air was thick with diesel fumes from what were disparagingly called “Chelsea tractors”.

These were the largest SUVs and 4x4s around, such as the Range Rover and the Land Rover Discovery — usually in a uniform colour of black — that were popular with trendy Londoners.

Then, as even those people became more aware of a need to protect the environment, the King’s Road witnessed a profusion of one of Toyota’s most successful vehicles, the Prius.

This is a mid-size car, which has a hybrid drivetrain, that is, combining an internal combustion engine with an electric motor. Again, black was the colour of choice.

Now, carmakers are able to provide, for those people who need a giant car to match their ego, large SUVs easily comparable in size to those Chelsea tractors of old.

The problem might arise, to my mind, when you get behind the wheel of one of these new, larger electric SUVs.

As I pointed out in a previous column, in my experience so far the big all-electric cars come with the added burden of being a heavy vehicle due to heavier batteries and body structure. However, Kia says because of something called its “game-changing” Electric Global Modular Platform (E-GMP), the all-new Kia EV9 has “athletic performance”.

We’ll have to wait and see because the car is not yet here but it will be showcased at the New York International Auto Show running until this Sunday.

There is welcome news on the range of the EV9: it has an all-electric target range of more than 336 miles on a single charge and a 148.5 miles range with 15 minutes ultra-fast 800-volt charging time.

It’s big and only a test drive will reveal how the EV9 performs — which I hope to bring you in due course.

And be aware if you like your SUVs large but are a little bit sceptical about autonomous driving — that’s where you sit back and read the paper and the car does the driving for you.

For the EV9 “will take a significant step” towards full autonomy with its Highway Driving Pilot (HDP) system, available in the Kia EV9 GT-line in the future, that will enable “conditional Level 3 autonomous driving” in selected markets.

For those that do not know what that is, “conditional Level 3 autonomous driving” consists of approximately 75 per cent automation.

A level 3 car performs safety-critical functions such as acceleration, deceleration and steering and can also monitor the road and surroundings. Level 5 driverless cars are fully autonomous — that is, driver optional.

Although that may seem a way off to most motorists, the BBC recently featured driverless taxis in San Francisco that are at present fully operational.

In the EV9, Kia also introduces the Kia Connect Store, which enables customers to buy digital features and services on demand, so they can choose the features they want and continuously upgrade the capability of the EV9 with Over the Air (OTA) updates.

No wonder then that Ho Sung Song, Kia president and CEO says: “The Kia EV9 transcends all aspects of traditional SUV thinking and represents the pinnacle of Kia’s design and engineering capabilities.” As I have said this is in every sense a big car. The vehicle features a 3,100mm wheelbase, supported by a choice of 21in, 20in or 19in wheels. Its overall length is 5,010mm.

The Kia EV9 offers a range of seating options: seven-seater and six-seater configurations and a variety of second-row seat options, suitable for different situations such as moving, charging and resting.

The first row features relaxation seats that ensure a comfortable resting posture. The second row, for the first time among global EV models, offers four seating options, including three-seater bench seats, basic-type, relaxation-type, and swivel-type two-seater independent seats, providing customers with a variety of usage methods to choose from.

When equipped with the second-row relaxation seats, the EV9 allows first and second-row occupants to recline together while the SUV is charging.

With the swivel seat option, the second-row seats swivel 180 degrees to enable conversations with those seated in the third row. Occupants in the third row are provided with charging points and cup holders.

Kia will begin offering pre-order of the EV9 for the Korean market in the second quarter of 2023. The Kia EV9 will go on sale in selected global markets from the second half of the year.