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School children teach Hyundai a lesson in Quality Testing

Playtime got serious this week when pupils from Holmer Green First and Junior Schools in Buckinghamshire taught car manufacturer Hyundai a lesson in quality testing. School children became the brand’s ‘Next Generation Testers’ and put its i30 Tourer through an extreme durability test to assess its suitability as a family car.

Recognising that little people can provide big insights, Hyundai went back to school. The car brand recruited a panel of 25 children aged between 4 and 10 to carry out a series of quality tests on its New Generation i30 Tourer and see if it really is tough enough to stand up to the challenges of everyday family life.

Responding to customer feedback that their ‘little monkeys’ would be much harder on a car than 40 baboons, we decided to put the theory to the test.

Specially-designed for families and their children, the i30 has been made using extra strong materials, easy-wipe plastics, tough fittings and special high-quality steel for the bodywork.

We parked our car in the school’s playground and then let eight times as many children as in the UK’s average family subject it to some rigorous testing. Six hours later, the tough tourer cleaned up as new and was driven out of the playground fully intact and virtually unscathed.

The children simulated the typical car punishment that parents dread but sometimes have to deal with: jumping and bouncing up and down on seats (in muddy wellies on this occasion), prodding buttons and opening storage compartments, repeatedly putting windows up and down, dropping crisps, squashing bananas into fabrics and spilling orange juice on the seats.

The i30 Tourer’s gadgets were also inspected, with the children pulling faces to their friends in the reversing camera and making calls to their teacher using the car’s hands-free Bluetooth system.

Outside, the paintwork was put to test after magnets were thrown onto the car and mud smeared all over the body panels. The children investigated whether the i30 really was ‘made of steel’ by using the bonnet as a slide and thumping the doors with drumsticks. Thankfully, the hard-wearing paint protected the car from significant scratches and chips.

As well as confirming the robust quality of our New Generation i30 Tourer, we’ll use the findings to inform the research and development of our future cars.