MT CONFIDENTIAL

Designed by William Heynes in the 1940s, the XK was an inline-six with twin overhead camshafts. It made its debut in 1949 and stayed in production until 1992. Built in displacements ranging from 2.4 to 4.2 liters, it was for decades a paragon The powers that be in Hiroshima weren’t in the room when we discussed the 3’s lack of performance, but it appears they’ve come to the same conclusion: It needs more grunt. As a result, an upgrade program means both the Mazda3 and the CX-30 crossover are getting the 2.5-liter turbo-four as an option, delivering an estimated 250 hp and 320 lb-ft of torque. Sadly, the engine won’t be available with a manual transmission. The decision puts into question the viability of the Skyactiv-X engine in North America, especially as the engine is already having a hard time getting through emissions because of NOx output. There wasn’t supposed to be a full-fledged N version of the DN8 Sonata, but it appears Biermann has found a way to make it happen. The N-spec Sonata will use Hyundai’s new 2.5-liter turbo-four with 304 hp and 311 lb-ft of torque, paired to an eight-speed wet dual-clutch transmission that can handle up to 347 lb-ft. Sources in Seoul say an N version of the Kona is also on the way. It’ll use the same 2.0-liter turbo-four as the Veloster N and i30 N, but with the output dialed back slightly to about 255 hp. It will only come with the eight-speed DCT. The original plan was way more bonkers: almost 300 hp and 300 lb-ft of torque. It appears those numbers have been dialed down so the torque vectoring limited-slip diff from Veloster/i30 N stays in one piece.