Korean Sushi: Tuned Hyundai Verna

A JDM-Spec Korean car? sounds interesting. The minute I laid my eyes on Pratik’s tuned Hyundai Verna, I knew I had found the perfect car to feature in our magazine. Sweet to look at and a great diesel engine mated to a stick shift. See how low it goes? Feels like I’m in a parking lot in Tokyo, even though I haven’t been to Japan yet. This Hyundai Verna is owned by Pratik, who has built the car over a span of four years and has spent hundreds of hours in workshops, to get the parts ready in time.

The Hyundai Verna is an iconic car. Back in the day, the Verna went up against the Maruti Suzuki SX4 and Honda City. Now it has evolved to become the fastest sedan in its segment, overpowering the Volkswagen Virtus and the Skoda Slavia as well. But this one? This 2018 Verna looks classy but mean, and more so like an Elantra now, with the extended boot and front design. It houses a 1.6-litre diesel mill with a 6-speed manual gearbox. It’s the enthusiastic one, especially with the big diesel engine, a stage 1 tune and a dieseltronic tuning chip that overrides the stock throttle parameters. I don’t think I have ever seen a modified Verna and gone wow, except for this one. All you see on the road are Vernas with a blacked-out mesh grille, a spoiler, black alloy wheels and an unnecessarily loud woofer that emits more vibrations than sound.

This Hyundai Verna has been tastefully modified and the entire build feels planned and based on a single theme. Starting from the front, it gets a hand-built black grille with horizontal slats, custom retro-fitted headlights and an aluminium front splitter for durability. Fibre and plastic splitters are easy on the pocket to purchase but have to be replaced in a few months as they break easily. The side skirts are made of fibreglass, the mirror caps are made of carbonfibre and at the rear, there’s an aluminium diffuser and a foam-metal custom boot. The car doesn’t have a spoiler on the boot but gets one on the roof. The custom boot integrates a ducktail design spoiler in it, that looks much cooler than a spoiler that is externally put on. What’s the most unique feature you ask? It can go as low as a supercar and the wheels get sweetly tucked inside the frame of the car when at the lowest air suspension setting. The boot holds the air compressor tank for the suspension that has also been hand-painted with Japanese anime art. It rides on 205-section 17-inch Michelin tyres with imitation Radi8 wheels. The wheels look almost psychedelic, especially with the purple paint but definitely brings the car to life. The one thing I didn’t really like? The ride is too bouncy, especially if you’re riding in the backseat because of the low-rider stance and our legendary unlevelled Indian roads. The car has also been repainted from an icy white shade to a bright white colour now. Moving over, the engine bay houses a stage 1 tuned 1.6-litre diesel engine that made 126bhp and 260Nm as stock, but now makes 157bhp and 338Nm. The dieseltronic superchip overrides the OEM throttle parameters and gives a quick boost when required. Breathability has also improved with a K&N conical air filter. The cabin gets a fully-replaced carbonfibre Hyundai steering wheel with a custom purple interior wrap that matches the colour of the wheels. The A-pillar on the driver’s side gets three dials for the boost gauge, air-suspension pressure gauge and a voltmeter. This generation of the Hyundai Verna came with ventilated front seats as stock and those remain.

Pratik says he doesn’t drive the car often, but whenever he does, all eyes are on him. We got a taste of that as well, because while we were taking static photos of the car, I saw hundreds of eyes on the car, while a few of them even stopped to admire it. He gets a lot of traction on Instagram as well because who has seen a tuned Hyundai Verna that looks better than this one? The whole build set Pratik back by almost Rs 7 lakh, but I think every penny and the time spent has been completely worth it. Even though Hyundai’s roots are Korean, this Verna looks right in place while parked next to tuned Japanese cars and inspires owners to think out of the box!