Spacious and luxurious interior with good ingress/egress, magnificent paintwork, good performance
Steering far too light and lacking road feel, centre lap belt in centre of third row seat unacceptable in 2011
Yes, the Carnival is over. If you want Kia’s people-mover you’ll have to settle for a Grand Carnival. When the original Carnival made its Australian debut in September 1999, it was obvious that the Kia product planners had been inspired by the Chrysler Voyager. Now that all Voyagers are Grand Voyagers, some marketing dudes at Kia decided that Carnivals could all be Grand, too. People movers have never been sexy, but does the latest from Kia deserve the bold adjective?
Design
The Grand Carnival inevitably shares its basic line (how many ways can you shape a box?) with previous models but it now has Kia (ex-Audi) designer Peter Schreyer’s ‘tiger nose’ grille which is nicely integrated into the bodywork and does add some flair. The interior combines good quality plastics in various shades of grey, a grey leatherbound wheel and quite hard, but plush looking leather seats. Despite all the plastic, the overall sense is of a well integrated design with an astonishing sense of spaciousness and light. All-round vision is superb.
Accommodation
The Grand Carnival will actually seat eight adults although there are only seven lap/sash belts, so the middle occupant of the third row of seats only gets a lap belt of the same type that was common in the mid-1960s. Ingress and egress is easy with the second row seats tipping forward and out of the way. If the third row is not needed, it can be folded down flat. Even with the third row upright, there is a deep luggage bin. Too often in the past, you could carry up to eight people in your MPV but had little room for their luggage. Those in the front rows of seats travel in luxury. The driver gets Mercedes-like power adjustment of the seat via a very similar switch in the door trim (which is a scale model of a seat in profile and you press the backrest to adjust the backrest, and so on. The driver’s seat and the steering wheel have a generous range of adjustability but it is unfortunate that the wheel is adjustable only for rake, not reach. There are decent drink holders and plenty of stowage compartment but the Kia designers would do well to study the Ford Territory for some more ingenious arrangements. All-round vision is brilliant through deep glass and a reversing camera is incorporated into the mirror. There is a sunroof.
Performance & Economy
The Grand Carnival Platinum comes with a choice of a 2.2-litre turbodiesel four-cylinder engine or a powerful 3.5-litre petrol unit as in our test vehicle. Maximum power is a hefty 202 kW and there are 336 Nm of torque. Here, Kia seems to have taken its lead from Toyota whose Tarago V6 is of the same capacity and develops 202 kW and 340 Nm! A seamless six-speed automatic transmission with the now de rigeur manual mode is perfectly matched to this smooth, lusty engine. Fuel economy, though far from brilliant, is better than you might expect of such a heavy vehicle. It is officially rated at 10.9 litres per 100 kilometres.
Ride & Handling
The steering is direct but far too light and lacking in road feel. Handling is about as good as you can expect from a people-mover, which is to say safe and predictable and controlled by all the usual electrical acronyms if you overdo things. The ride is excellent.
Conclusion
People-movers have a specific job to do and the new Grand Carnival does it impressively. Especially in flagship Platinum guise, the latest model does not feel like a poor relation to the Tarago and that other (Chrysler) Grand Voyager.
Kia
