How to N Grin Shift With Hoonigan

Vin Antara:
Ron and Vin here from Hogan, and today we’re driving the new Hyundai Elantra N.

Ron Zaras:
We’re here on location at the airport where we film our show THIS vs THAT. It’s a drag race show where we race anything from super fast hypercars down to really fun stock cars. Today we’re going to see what this thing can do in all of its different modes.

Vin Antara:
Generally, our races are from a start to a thousand feet and we want to do some testing because this car has a really interesting feature. It’s called N grin shift, and it’s essentially like a push to pass button.

Ron Zaras:
Right, it’s like a 20 second over boost that you hit a button on the steering wheel, gives you 20 seconds of more pressure, more power, faster shifts.

Vin Antara:
So we’re going to see exactly what that does in our a thousand foot course. Before we get into that, let’s talk about the Elantra N. It’s powered by a two liter four cylinder turbo engine, and this one is paired to a eight speed dual clutch transmission or DCT. It’s also still available in a six speed manual with three pedals and the gear shift. It makes 276 horsepower and weighs only 3,100 pounds in a six speed manual non-sunroof configuration. This one with the dual clutch and the sunroof is right around 3,200 pounds, which is incredibly light by today’s standards. Hyundai’s done a great job making this thing luxurious and sporty, but also keeping the weight off of it. Car comes standard on 19 inch wheels with 245 section with Michelin PS4Ss, which are phenomenal tires, but honestly some of the best stuff is on the inside.

Ron Zaras:
So the interior of this car is a really nice place to be. The upper spec of the N car gets you stuff like these door cards which are suede, really nice perforation in the side. Some race stripes going on there, the steering wheel also N mode button right here. You push this, got some really cool stuff that happens on the dash, brings you into the sport mode of this car. That means full engine response, steering, suspension, all the things to get you away tighter, more aggressive driving experience. Then right below that, this whole anodized red button right here, NGS. That’s the N grin shift. That’s what we’re going to test out today. That gets you the faster shift, a little more boost, all the right things, and then you got N mode. You press it on there. Another cool animation. Then you get stuff like lap timers, all your engine temps, oil temps instead of just the standard gauge on the dash.

You get real, real numbers here. It’s very important when you want to keep things cool on the track. You got the suede inner, the stripes once again, the perforations with a little blue hint in between. You got the N logo that lights up here on the center. You got harness holes, just a really good sporty shape, great bolsters that aren’t too wide. They actually hold you in the seat when you’re cornering. Blue stitching again to kind of tie in everything that’s going on in here. This is genuinely one of the better new seats that I’ve experienced.

So on those modes that we talked about inside you have the standard exhaust note and then when you go into N mode, there’s a completely different exhaust note that you get. It’s a little bit louder. You get a couple pops and crackles on the overrun. So we’re going to take a listen to them right now. This is standard. This is what it sounds like on the daily driver mode. Okay. Okay. Okay. Tasteful. Tasteful, not too bad, not droney at all when you drive. So now what we’re going to do is we’re going to put it into N mode, which gives you the more aggressive exhaust. More beans. That’s nice, it’s nice. It makes turbo car noises, pops, burbles, all the right things, but that’s enough of that. We’re actually going to test this thing on the track now. We’re going to try out different modes and see what the time difference is between each one.

Vin Antara:
All right, first run is in eco-mode. It’s the standard mode on the car. No launch control procedure, just going to step on the gas and go. Still pretty quick in eco even though its primary focus is to get better fuel economy, it still scoots. Not bad, not bad. We did 12.7 seconds, thousand foot in eco-mode. All right, so now we’re in N mode. We activated launch control on the screen, which is super cool. You step on the brake with your left foot, you floor it with your right foot. It’ll set an RPM to help build boost off the line. And the really cool thing is you could actually adjust the RPM that you’re going to launch at on the steering wheel. So here’s how it goes.

And you can actually raise it or lower it down, but we’re going to raise it up and we’re going to set it to about 3000 RPM and then we’ll let it go. Little wheel spin. Much quicker. Much quicker. Super impressed with how quick this car is. It’s really fun. The DCT is a phenomenal transmission. It shifts so fast and it’s really smooth. All right, so now what we’re going to do is same procedure, same exact launch procedure, but once we get the initial first gear wheel spin, I’m going to hit the NGS button and we’re going to see what it does. So we’re going to activate launch control. All right, so here we go.

We’re going to lower it down a pinch, and here we go. And now we’re in NGS mode. Much faster shifts, a little bit more boost. You can feel how quick it shifts. It’s so cool that Hyundai’s making cars that have these types of features that are so oriented around the driver’s enjoyment. So many cars are going electric now and there’ll always be a want to have such a fun, connected experience. It’s awesome to see Hyundai making these cars in 2023. It’s something that we all got to get behind and support.

Ron Zaras:
So there you have it, the Hyundai Elantra N by the numbers, different modes, different speeds, and it’s as we expected, but it’s just cool to see.

Vin Antara:
Factory scramble boost mode.

Ron Zaras:
That’s really cool for a car that’s like bone stock. It comes like that from the factory.

Vin Antara:
So here’s how it’s stacked up. Big shout out to Hyundai for making performance cars like this. This thing’s a blast.

Ron Zaras:
You could tell it’s made by enthusiasts and engineered by guys that just enjoy doing car stuff because you got the track modes, you got launch control and seeing the boost that gets built, all the different settings.

Vin Antara:
So if you want comment below on what cars you think we should race this on on Hoonigan’s THIS vs THAT because we think this thing could hurt some feelings.

Ron Zaras:
Oh, I think it could make some people real sad with how fast it is.

For more on this, and all the Hyundai Automotive products see: https://www.youtube.com/@hyundai