As you can see, the Photoshop exercise created a car boasting the same front end we presented in the leaked teaser. And, to be honest, the car looks much better in this rendering than in the blury teaser presented by Kia’s chief designer, Peter Schreyer.
The car is expected to hit South Korean streets sometimes in late 2011, as a model offered above the Kia K7/Cadenza luxury sedan. Little is known about the car's performance and features, but the rumor mill spilled out talk of a new 8-speed automatic transmission, to be featured on the Equus as well, paired with existing Hyundai engines, likely from the Genesis range, and a new a high-performance 4.0l V8 engine, developing some 385 hp.
The downside is that, according to the unofficial story, the K9 is not actually the K9, but the future... K7. According to Autocar, the sketches revealed by Schreyer really show an early sketch of the car which will be known outside Korea as the Cadenza and which will be launched next year.
The Cadenza will be powered by a 3.5l Lambda II Quad-OHC V6 engine, developing 290 hp at 6,600 rpm and 338 Nm of torque at 5,000 rpm.
The unit is paired with a 6 speed fully auto and sequential manual transmission. Together, they help the Cadenza reach a top speed of 230 km/h (143 mph) and accelerate from naught to sixty in 7.2 seconds.
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