If you ask anyone to name a budget car brand the name Hyundai will often come up in the conversation. Many will have either

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owned or know someone who owned one of the automaker’s earliest entries into our market, such as the Pony or Excel, or possibly even the brand’s first “luxury” car, the Giorgetto Giugiaro designed Stellar. Over the decades the South Korean brand has become a serious player in the mainstream auto sector, filling almost every key segment with a competitive offering and also offering some very creative niche vehicles, but no other vehicle Hyundai has ever made measures up to the Equus, in size, substance or wow factor.

Just the premise of Hyundai building a full-size, rear-drive, V8-powered, leather-lined, premium-level luxury four-door sedan capable of going head-to-head with Japanese and German flagship models such as the Lexus LS and Mercedes-Benz S-Class

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throws the mind into a numbing loop of self-doubt and second-guessing. Is the earth really round? Does the sun rise in the east? Is my belief system based on anything grounded in reality or have I just built one latticework of fantasies upon the other in order to justify my existence?

Truth be told, the sun does rise in the east, and is shining particularly brightly on Hyundai these days. Not only does it remain one of the world’s leading builders of budget-minded vehicles such as the Accent, Elantra and Tucson CUV, plus larger family haulers like Sonata and Santa Fe, but it has become downright sporty with Veloster

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and Genesis Coupe, and capable of taking on all premium brands with the Genesis sedan and this impressive Equus. Hyundai has become one of the most complete auto brands in the industry, and one of the bravest.

While its mainstream competitors have created luxury-oriented sub-brands such as the aforementioned Lexus built by Toyota, as well as Nissan’s Infiniti and Honda’s Acura, much the same as Cadillac sits atop General Motors’ range of brands and Lincoln is a premium-level Ford (although these two have a much older and richer history than the Japanese trio), Hyundai took a totally different tact.

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A discreet winged logo might adorn the front of its Equus (which doesn’t make a lot of sense being that Equus is Latin for horse or steed, but I digress), but the upwardly mobile automaker shows pride in its brand by leaving its stylized “H” fused to the middle of its rear deck lid and makes no qualms about calling it a Hyundai Equus on its web site. After all, the big Lexus was also known as the Toyota Celsior in Japan until 2006 when Lexus was introduced there, so let’s give Hyundai praise for being totally up front and honest about what it’s selling. Whether under the Hyundai name or one day a spin-off brand like Lexus (many market analysts have recommended Hyundai follow this lead and I happen to also believe it would be a good idea), it doesn’t change how intrinsically good the Equus is.

The

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Equus hit the Canadian market in 2010 as a 2011 model and still looked good last year, although Hyundai gave it a mild refresh for 2014 with changes that improve every angle. The car has a stately and majestic stance, not unlike how its previous-generation Genesis sedan was penned, a mid-size luxury four-door that shares hardware with this larger variant. Its bold bisected chrome grille has traditional luxury written all over it, although the large headlamp clusters with integrated LEDs look modern and its beautifully sculpted turbine-like 19-inch multi-spoke alloys are gifts from Haneullim. From profile, the front fender bulges as it skims overtop 245/45R19 rubber, following a rearward beltline that melds into nothingness halfway through the rear door, but just as attention begins to fade a much more muscularly curved rear fender grabs all eyeballs and moves them

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upward and rearward again, overtop another gorgeous buffed silver disc to join up with somewhat generic albeit pleasantly shaped taillights. These get a row of de rigueur LEDs, as do the mirror housings, while nice brightwork trim highlights all key design points such as fog lamps, door handles, greenhouse edging, rear deck lid garnish, the tailpipes, which incidentally are neatly integrated into the rear valance, and of course the car’s “EQUUS” nameplate. While not as bold and daring as the new Genesis or the HCD-7 concept that many thought would find its way to production under the Equus moniker (looking back it’s probably better they took a more conservative approach), it’s nevertheless a premium-level sedan done the way traditional luxury car buyers like.

This statement couldn’t be any truer inside, either. A big improvement over the 2013 Equus, the updated model is a more elegantly design and better quality combination

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of supple leathers and gloss burl walnut inlays, the latter real, genuine, authentic wood. Of course loads of bright chrome, brushed aluminum and premium-level soft-touch plastics accompany the natural surfaces for a truly luxurious ambiance, a highlight being the elegant square wrist watch-style clock at dash central that looks as if it could have be sourced from Cartier (although it doesn’t include Cartier’s usual roman numerals so I’ll have to give the horological inspiration nod to Movado and its Fiero Square or possibly Braun and its less elegantly named Men’s Analog Square Wrist Watch). Either way, I’d be proud to wear it on my wrist and it certainly looks fittingly fabulous in the Equus, set amid a row of HVAC switchgear, above the state-of-the-art 17-speaker Lexicon 7.1 Discrete Logic 7 surround sound audio system interface and below a large eight-inch full-colour infotainment display with integrated nav, back-up camera system with guidelines and more, which is not a touchscreen as I found out after multiple attempts to get a response out of it with my

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index finger. An iDrive-style rotating knob sits atop the lower centre console surrounded by the usual infotainment buttons, all nicely damped and perfectly aligned like others in the premium class, and just next to that another set of buttons for controlling the seat heaters and ventilators (yes, they’re cooled too) as well as one for the powered rear sunshade and another for raising or lowering the air suspension system.

No, the Equus hasn’t been designed to compete in jumping and jacked up lowrider competitions popularized in SoCal, but rather to optimize ride and handling in the best possible ways. Other brands will charge you more for their air suspensions, but such comes standard with the base Equus Signature model I tested and makes

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a big difference in handling over similar cars without it. Case in point, Hyundai’s sister brand is Kia, and the new full-size K900 shares much of the Equus’ underpinnings except for this air suspension system. Where the Kia feels more like a ’70s era Lincoln Continental through the slalom the Equus’ continuous damping control enhanced set-up worked wonders when the driver-selectable Sport mode was engaged, delivering much more accomplished performance. While not quite measuring up to a 7 Series or S-Class it’s a good match for an LS. Its ride is plush too, the air suspension providing a best of both worlds scenario that suits big luxury ideally.

It’s a good thing too, because the Equus’ standard Tau V8 can get a person into constabulary trouble very quickly, the car’s very stable running gear critical for keeping

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it pointed in the right direction at speed. No less than 429 horsepower and 376 lb-ft of torque whirs into action ahead of the well insulated firewall, the dual overhead cam, 32-valve, direct-injection 5.0-litre eight every bit as refined and easily as sonorous as its premium-badged competitors, only the lack of green-initiative tech such as idle start-stop and regenerative brakes making this powertrain any less impressive than the Germans. Its eight-speed automatic is pulled from the same ZF factory that builds BMW and Lexus flagship gearboxes mind you, this one incorporating manual mode sans paddle-shifters, because it would be oh-so-gauche to have to do more work than necessary in a car so resplendently endowed.

Splendid

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indeed. Everything about this car is quiet and smooth. The carpeting might be the deepest and plushest this side of a Bentley, going yet further to silence the outside world, while the suede-like micro-fibre roofliner that wraps down each pillar is softer still, no doubt adding its own insulating effect to that of the surrounding acoustic laminated glass as part of Hyundai’s multifaceted approach to reducing NVH levels. Stitched leather covers the topmost portion of the dash, as well as the sections of steering wheel not circled in solid wood, the door panel inserts and each armrest, plus of course the seats, which get the perforated treatment for the aforementioned forced aeration.

Those in back get legroom galore as well as the ability to really stretch out on reclining

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seats, the one behind the front passenger’s perch capable of putting the shotgun position out of commission. Push a button on the wood embellished foldable rear centre armrest and your legroom increases as the front passenger seat slides away into the distance and seatback folds forward, while dual powered window switches allow VIPs to drop the opposite rear window with the flick of a finger. My tester didn’t include a shiatsu massage function or powered ottoman as per a similar seating system in the Lexus LS (which is optional by the way), but I’m willing to guess your passengers won’t be complaining if they have to take the back seat. Instead they’ll get their own audio and climate controls, including rear seat heat, as well as a button for the powered rear window sunscreen and two for the powered rear side window sunshades, and of course a pair of cupholders slide out from the front portion of the armrest.

When

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I first got the keys to the Equus I popped the trunk and was miffed to find out there was no fully powered actuation. It was soon after that I learned my Equus was the base Signature model and Ultimate trim was available. Opt for this latter model and you’ll get that powered trunk lid and right-side rear passenger massage system as well as the powered ottoman, plus a thermoelectric refrigerator in the rear console, a rear entertainment system with an eight-inch monitor, illuminated rear vanity mirrors, and a front-view cornering camera to make sure your hired driver finds his way.

These join a standard equipment list that made my Equus Signature model as comfortable a car as can be had at almost any price, those items not already mentioned including a soothing massage system for the 12-way powered and memory-enhanced driver’s seat, a heated and powered tilt-and-telescopic steering wheel,

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proximity sensing access along with pushbutton ignition, tri-zone automatic climate control, a large and clear 9.2-inch infotainment screen, bright and easy to read electroluminescent primary gauges with an integrated 3.5-inch TFT LCD information display at centre, front and rear parking sonar, an auto-defogging windshield with a humidity sensor, water repelling hydrophobic front door glass, adaptive cruise control, automatic, adaptive, auto-leveling HID headlamps, plus so much more.

Active safety gear includes the usual stability and traction control along with ABS-enhanced four-wheel discs featuring electronic brake force distribution and emergency brake assist, while lane departure warning and pre-collision warning are also standard, as are front pre-collision seatbelt pretensioners, electronic active front head restraints, and all the usual airbags plus one for the driver’s knees.

I

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wouldn’t go so far to call the Equus a fuel miser, but its 13.7 L/100km city, 8.6 highway and 11.4 combined rating is pretty good considering its size and weight. This said Hyundai was thoughtful to use metric-converted U.S. EPA numbers on its website in a bid to be more transparent to its customers, being that Transport Canada’s old two-cycle rating system was a bad joke on Canadian consumers. Fortunately our governmental ratings division has changed the way it does business for 2015 with a new more realistic five-cycle testing procedure, and the updated ratings of the latest Equus are already out, showing a very similar result to what Hyundai advertised last year at 14.1 city, 8.6 highway and 11.6 combined.

All

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said, at my 2014 Equus Signature model’s $64,799 price tag, not including $1,995 for freight and pre-delivery prep, there would be a lot of cash left over to purchase gas. If the Equus Ultimate is more to your liking it’ll set you back $72,299, and even at this higher price it still comes in at $10k less than the base Lexus LS and priced almost $30k lower than the cheapest V6-powered Mercedes-Benz S-Class (add another $8k onto the M-B’s sticker if you want similar power to the Equus). That’s just how Hyundai rolls. Even in the full-size premium segment it offers a lot more car for a lot less money, a value proposition some luxury buyers will find hard to pass up.
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