Welcome to The Drift where Jalopnik East rounds up the highlights from all around the Pacific Rim. In today’s highlights, Mugen releases its accessories for the Honda N-One kei car, Hyundai has plans to export its Indian-made Creta SUV elsewhere, and have we seen the first image of the new Infiniti Q30?
Countersteer
Being a kei car, you already know that you’re not likely to get anything in the N family outside of Japan by normal means, and if you’re an American, well... You’re not going to get anything in the N family at all. Sorry.
I’m not a huge fan of the N-One/N-One Premium in its basic level (in general, I am not a fan of most of the boxy kei cars), but I like the additions of the new Mugen Trim, including the new front bumper with fog lights, the alloy wheels (do you think they would look good on my GA3?), and the rear wing spoiler. I’m pretty sure when it comes to the rear wing spoiler though, I’m still partial to the EK9 (96-00) Civic Type R spoiler style. And I’m not so sold on the dual exhaust.
Understeer
Hyundai’s Indian built and released SUV, the Creta, will be exported to other countries in Asia and elsewhere, according to Reuters. Hyundai has been far behind in the SUV trend outside of North America, where it has long produced the Santa Fe and the Tucson (because for some reason Southwestern cities are where the SUV/Crossover action is at, y’all).
Hyundai has said it is considering boosting production capacity in the United States and is building its fifth plant in China to keep up with demand for SUVs.
I hope this means that the Creta will be available in the United States, but maybe, I dunno, call it the Ruidoso (pronounced RIO DOSO, and a childhood New Mexican haunt of mine in the winter) and add some ski racks. But keep it in that delightful orange, because I (like a good share of the Jalopnik team) am partial to orange things.
Oversteer
An apparent leaked shot of the new Infiniti Q30 has shown up on the Russian website AutoWP ahead of its expected official showing at the 2015 Frankfurt Motor Show in Germany in September.
The concept for the Q30 was originally shown at the Frankfurt Motor Show in the fall of 2013, and this image seems to represent the consumer production model. Its front end seems similar to the Q50, which is also known as the new Nissan Skyline in Japan (which is absurd, since I still don’t accept a GT-R which isn’t a Skyline, nor a Skyline without a GT-R version).
What do we think? Yea or nay?
Images via Mugen, Hyundai, and Infiniti/Nissan. Modifications by Kat Callahan/Jalopnik.
Jalopnik East is your daily dose of the latest automotive news out of Asia, covering domestic developments and car culture in Japan, Korea, China, Southeast Asia, and beyond. Just because you can’t drive it, doesn’t mean we can’t share it with you. You can usually catch us every day between 5am and 7am ET.