Happy New Year 2014!

Happy new year 2014 to all the readers. I am sorry for being off the radar for about six months. Its been a roller coaster ride for me since July after moving to our new apartment. This year I promise to stay hooked to my blog with more updates and news.

And yes, my TVS Apache was practically dead without a drop of oil in the engine and I gave it a new lease of life at a cost of 12k. It is now as good as new, well... somewhat, and the best part now that I realize is the wheels have punctured only twice since 2007 and my bike has clocked more than 40k (bad number?) kms. However, the sad part is, I cannot go beyond 70kmph. The bike begins to vibrate and scares the hell out of me.

Ok. Time to celebrate the last day of the year. Have fun folks! and have a good one.

Ford Ecosport - Nice!!!

Isn't this a good looking SUV? I bet you would agree with me on that one. The first time I saw it, I was impressed with how different it looked in comparison to the others in the market. In Bangalore I see only two SUVs that people prefer the most, Toyota Fortuner and Renault Duster. Yeah yeah! Mahindra XUV is a thing of the past.

Now, you might see the Ford Ecosport as well. But why? Well, it looks stunning, has a turbo charged engine, is a SUV.....

1) Has good handling and dynamics
2) Noiseless cabin
3) Responsive engine
4) Spacious
5) A good gearbox (though you will have to step down a lot in the city)
6) A reasonable price tag
7) blah blah blah!

Autocar review

 

The only feature you might probably not be happy about is the interiors. Other than that this car is definitely a success.

Datsun's first car next month

Datsun is the new entrant into the country. There is always competition and competition is stressful and tough to challenge. This is first time I am hearing of this automobile manufacturer. It will interesting to see what they have to offer to the Indian automobile industry.

Datsun, a Japanese automobile manufacturer constructed trucks in addition to passenger cars in the early 1900s. Nissan used to market cars under the Datsun brand name. Nissan is currently the parent company of Datsun.

Datsun 16, 1937

Maruthi Ertiga - A nice move and a nice car

Maruthi Suzuki Ertiga seems to be a hit in the market. I see a lot of this elegant LUV on roads in Bangalore. The Ertiga being a 7 seater is giving a tough competition to the Toyota Innova which has been around for over nine years. The fact that it is a mini suv and is way less expensive than the Innova makes it a bang for the buck. I have read really good reviews about this car in terms of looks, space and overall features. The only negative review is the engine which might struggle at low RPM, resulting in frequent shifting of the gears. Though the Ertiga sports the K-Series engine which is much more refined, less noisy and fuel efficient, the frequent gear changing could be a little annoying and tiresome when driving around in the city.

Expensive and Worthless!! What do you say?

Porsche Cayenne GTS is worth 1.3 crores and has a mileage of 5 kmpl. Audi 2.0 TDI is 44 lacs and has a mileage of about 10 kmpl. Skoda Rapid is about 9.5 lacs and gives a mileage of 10 kmpl. Audi 3.0 TDI is about 48 lacs and gives a mileage of 7.5 kmpl. Are these cars worth the bucks? Maybe, if the purpose is just to show off.

Honda Amaze

We all know that it gives 25.5 kmpl. Well, thats what the advertisements say, and the tests conducted in factory conditions. Even if it gives somewhere between 19 to 21 kmpl on road, depending on your driving conditions, it is still a good deal. 

However, what is disappointing is the tv commercial itself. It shows the driver happy about the fact that his father in law had held the map upside down and does not regreat driving around because Amaze has a good mileage. I was arguing with my wife telling her that it would probably have been better if they told the world that you save a lot of money as it gives a better mileage, instead of saying it gives a better mileage so keep driving around. Right?

Also, is it a Brio with a boot on it?? Yuck!!!!

Reva NXR to e20

A colleague of mine was mad about this car. Ever since it was officially released, he had been seriously considering buying it until people began brainwashing him with useless but realistic facts. He decided to back out.

There was a lovely post in facebook about e20's amazing features. It is now a four seater. Gives a mileage of 100 kms in full charge and takes about five hours to fully charge. So the cost in Bangalore would be about 50 rupees for 100 kms. It also have a top speed of 80 kph and lots of other bells and whistle, but at the end of the day it all boils down to how complicated your life would become with this car. Lets dig in.

Complication 1 : Travel Radius

What happens when you want to travel more than 100 kms? You should be an idiot to even consider buying a car if you want to travel between cities. What about going to WonderLa from electronic city? Ah! idiotic thought again. I hope you get the idea of how much you can use this car if you know what I am talking about.

Complication 2 : Battery 

1.5 lacs to change the batteries after 60,000 kms or 3 years?? Thats about 1974 litres of petrol in bangalore and a mileage of 33,552 kms (17 kmpl). This means I can travel from Bangalore to Mangalore (370 kms) about 90 times, yelahanka to koramangala about 671 times i.e a year's worth of petrol.

Complication 3 : Weight

The more the load, the greater the battery usage. You have to be picky before deciding to go out with your friends and make sure you don't gain weight too. Start burning your excess calories. I think this car would actually motivate you to lose weight by giving you better mileage every time you shed a kilo.

Complication 4 : Charging

I think this is another good thing about this car. It teaches you discipline and patience. You got to plan well in advance to charge your car for full five hours. Its not as easy as dropping in to a petrol station and filling up in 5 minutes. All it takes is 10 units of electricity and you are done. Its about 220 rupees assumming per unit cost is 22 rupees.

Complication 5 : Solar Panel

The solar panel is not on the roof of the car??? Why did they decide to scrap what they showcased in the expo in Germany? The panel is now an external setup and has to installed separately. I am not sure if you need to pay extra for it. It would have been brilliant to have the panel on top of the car.

Now the fun part. Lets do some stats. I am going to compare my i10 with Reva e20 in terms of cost.

i10: 

Year	Petrol Cost	Distance per day	Travel Cost	Monthly Cost	Yearly Cost	Annual Maintenance	Total cost
2010	55	50	500 for 3 days	5166	62000	5000	67000
2011	66	50	500 for 2.5 days	6200	74400	6000	80400
2012	77	50	500 for 2 days	7500	90000	7000	97000

Cost after three years is about 2,44,400 rupees

Reva e20 (assumming it was launched in 2010 and 10 units for 5 hours of full charge) 

Year	Charging cost	Distance per day	Travel Cost	Monthly Cost	Yearly Cost	Annual Maintenance	Total cost
2010	5 per unit	50	50 every 2 days	775	9300	0	9300
2011	6 per unit	50	60 every 2 days	930	11160	0	11160
2012	7 per unit	50	70 every 2 days	1085	13020	0	13020

Cost after three years is 33,480 + 1.5 lacs for battery change after three years = 1,83,480 rupees. 

There you go, the overall cost of using reva is lesser than that of a petrol car. A saving of 60,000 rupees. However add the cost of the car and you can see a huge difference. The reva comes at a price tag of 6.8 lacs and the i10 is 4.8 lacs. This brings the overall cost of reva to 8,63,480 and the i10 to 7,24,400, a difference of 1,39,080 rupees. 

The battery prices keep coming down 8% every year and their capacities keep increasing. So in the long run this could reduce the cost of replacing the batteries every 3 years or 60,000 kms. Damn! I wish they installed the solar panel on the car. We simply could save even more. Imagine if you parked it outside under the sun and it would just charge your battery fully for free!!!! What happened Mahindra? Why did you drop this plan? Burgers!!!

Alto 800 First impression

I got to see the new Alto 800 today. The first thing I got to see is this...

What the hell is that gap there????? I understand Maruthi attempted something funky and cool with the rear lamps, but look at that cut?