Sonalika Rhino - Prospects. EDIT : First drive on pg.3!

[CorsaLove]

Saw this once in Bangalore. Looks exactly like qualis but dont know how refined it is. waiting for a TD..

[lganimys]

I own a Tata Spacio Gold with 3.0 L 407 SP engine.

I am considering the various options to change my vehicle.

I did the TD of Rhino Rx.

In Karnataka, the various variants cost between 7.6 and 8.6 lakhs.

The vehicle was OK for me and following were my observations.

1. Look and feel was medium.
2. Finish quality was medium.
3. Initial pickup was ordinary and the vehicle does really good after 60kms mark. 60 - 100, it does in 4-5 seconds. When I enquired about the issue, I was told that the turbo kicks off only after 60 kms mark. I am wondering about it. In the era of VTT, turbo kicking off at 60 is real crazy stuff. So I can easily say that the engine is best suited for highway use compared to city use.
4. In city conditions, I was unable to shift the gear above 3. In third gear it lugs when the speed is 50kms. So, the gear ratio is bit unsuitable for city conditions.
(Tata's G-76 gear box easily shifts to overdrive at 45 kms speed)
5. Power steering was responsive and breaking was good.
6. Body seems to be strong and the sales advisor claimed that recently during an accident involving rhino rx at 150kms, there was minimum injuries to people inside. But it is difficlut to imagine as I have seen deaths in muvs crashing at 70kms.

8. AC was not impressive.

9. The sound of the engine from outside is high compared to other di vehicles like tavera, scorpio m2di, the new victa di etc. But, inside it is heavily shielded.
10. I observed black smoke from 3 to 4 rhino vehicle recently. I dont know whether it is a problem or an usual thing. I have not observed the same with similar vehicle from other manufacturers which are euro2 and above.

11. The pricing is too high for a newly released non-crdi vehicle with minimum service points. Atleast it should have been 1.5 lakhs less.

My Final Verdict:

The vehicle is more suited for highway use and so suited for taxi segment which run largely on highways. The overall product quality seems to be decent.

Due to its heavy pricing compared to other similar vehicles like tata sumo, mahindra bolero, chevrolet tavera, scorpio m2di, safari tcic, tempo trax, and the new tata sumo grande, the vehicles are not selling at all and probably would not replace the defunct qualis segment.
Another 1.5 lakhs reduction to the current prices can only make some magic. Otherwise, except for a few experimenters, others may not go for the vehicle.

So my sincere request/advice to the commercial dept of the company is reduce the price drastically atleast during the next 2 years even if they sell it cost to cost. Else it would be difficult to survive in the Indian auto market.

Ganesh Laxmanmurthy

[pgsagar]

I don't know anything about the Rhino nor the company that makes it. I'm sure it should be a value for money MUV. But what really beats me is why did they zero in on the Qualis shape to design their MUV. As though Qualis was a beautiful-looking car and with its denise, someone just had to step in and make a clone.

[karanraheja]

I dont think there is much offtake of this vehicle. It will take time till
it improves it's after sales.