[TejasKinger]

Interesting trivia courtesy Parked In Bangalore on Instagram and DriveTribe about the Daewoo Matiz.

The original design for the Daewoo Matiz was meant for the Fiat 500 back in 1992 and almost never made it to production.

In the early 90s, Fiat was looking to redesign the Fiat 500 and contacted several Italian design houses. Giorgetto Giugiaro's ItalDesign was one of them. He came up with the ID Cinquecento concept and showcased it at the 1992 Turin Motor Show which was rejected.

In 1993, at the Bologna Motor Show, he showcased a reworked version known as the 1993 ItalDesign Lucciola concept. What made it unique, according to Italdesign was, "The Lucciola [was] equipped with a 5.5 kW twin-cylinder catalyzed diesel engine and two electric motors positioned on the rear wheels, each with a power of 7kw. The hybrid system [guaranteed] a speed of 100 km/h and a range amounting to 8 continuous hours with the hybrid system or 50 km using only the electric drive."

Unfortunately, this concept did not find any takers either.

In 1998, however, Daewoo came across the design for the Lucciola concept and decided to push it into production. The Lucciola concept became the Daewoo D'Arts, which finally launched as the Daewoo Matiz.

Images from cardesign.ru

[ph03n!x]

A few snips from A Medium-sized Book of Boring Car Trivia - I'm midway through, and am surprised a bunch of petrolheads (us!) didn't discover this (or at least post about it!).

Gordon Murray had such confidence in the strength of the McLaren F1 that he asked to sit in the car during its mandatory 30mph crash test only to be thwarted when the authorities said no. The car performed so well in the test that, had the front lights not smashed, it would have been in a fit state to be driven home.

Nissan wanted every GT-R to look good for years to come so it created a ‘cushion coat’ layer over the paint that was designed to absorb the impact of flying stones, lessening the chances of the paintwork getting chipped. The effectiveness of this technology was developed using a prototype bonnet, an air rifle and a very large bag of peanuts.

The XUV3OO possibly borrowed a leaf from this-

The 1986 Audi 80 was criticised for having a small boot. Audi bosses had signed off such a thing because they assumed there would be an estate version, only for this to be deleted from the original product plan (finally arriving with the major facelift in 1991). In an attempt to hide the problem, Audi dealers were given a set of fitted luggage to put in their showroom display models which was designed to make the boot look bigger.

[GTO]

Trivia = Tata can actually launch a new "Rover" car as it owns rights to the Rover brand name. Jaguar-Land Rover bought the "Rover" marque in the mid-2000s to stop the Chinese from using it.

[GTO]

German cars might be high maintenance, but you ought to thank them for "lesser maintenance" on your car, even if its Japanese. To shed their high maintenance image, it is the Germans who popularised 1-year service intervals & 10000 - 15000 km oil changes in India. Believe it or not, at one time, Linkway Honda wanted to service my Honda City every 3 months!

It's also an irony that one of the most reliable cars in India - the Toyota Innova - requires the most frequent service visits (every 5000 km).

[mallumowgli]

Originally Posted by GTO

Trivia = Tata can actually launch a new "Rover" car as it owns rights to the Rover brand name. Jaguar-Land Rover bought the "Rover" marque in the mid-2000s to stop the Chinese from using it.

Wasn't the Tata Indica launched under the Rover name in the UK? But that was prior to the purchase of the brand by Tata

[ajmat]

Originally Posted by GTO

Trivia = Tata can actually launch a new "Rover" car as it owns rights to the Rover brand name. Jaguar-Land Rover bought the "Rover" marque in the mid-2000s to stop the Chinese from using it.

Attachment 2010515

Originally Posted by mallumowgli

Wasn't the Tata Indica launched under the Rover name in the UK? But that was prior to the purchase of the brand by Tata

The Indica was sold as a Rover before the Tata takeover
Sadly there is no room for Rover to be relaunched unless some radical segment is discovered. The mass market is shrinking. Renault is shrinking, Jaguar is on an oxygen cylinder

Originally Posted by GTO

German cars might be high maintenance, but you ought to thank them for "lesser maintenance" on your car, even if its Japanese. To shed their high maintenance image, it is the Germans who popularised 1-year service intervals & 10000 - 15000 km oil changes in India.

That was to pander to fleet buyers who wanted low maintenance costs. The more you change the oil, the better it runs.

My Jetta ran barely 4000km this year but it will get an annual oil change at least.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by mallumowgli

But that was prior to the purchase of the brand by Tata

Originally Posted by ajmat

Sadly there is no room for Rover to be relaunched unless some radical segment is discovered.

IMHO, Rover was already a terminally sick patient by the time BMW stupidly bought it. It moved to ventilator support when the Phoenix Consortium bought it.

[ajmat]

Originally Posted by GTO

IMHO, Rover was already a terminally sick patient by the time BMW stupidly bought it. It moved to ventilator support when the Phoenix Consortium bought it.

Thats because no one had the guts to actually cut out the septic parts. BMW did nothing to radically change the operations. Ironically, BMW retained Mini, an engine plant and a pressing unit and invested in them and these have provided huge returns.

[theAutomaniac]

I guess this must be here as well-

Tata Nexon currently has 36 variants, which is the most for budget cars atleast!

1. Nexon XE
2. Nexon XM
3. Nexon XM S
4. Nexon XMA AMT
5. Nexon XE Diesel
6. Nexon XZ
7. Nexon XMA AMT S
8. Nexon XM Diesel
9. Nexon XZ Plus
10. Nexon XM Diesel S
11. Nexon XMA AMT Diesel
12. Nexon XZ Plus DualTone Roof
13. Nexon XZ Diesel
14. Nexon XZ Plus S
15. Nexon XZA Plus AMT
16. Nexon XMA AMT Diesel S
17. Nexon XZ Plus DualTone Roof S
18. Nexon XZA Plus DualTone Roof AMT
19. Nexon XZ Plus (O)
20. Nexon XZ Plus DualTone Roof (O)
21. Nexon XZA Plus AMT S
22. Nexon XZ Plus Diesel
23. Nexon XZA Plus DualTone Roof AMT S
24. Nexon XZA Plus (O) AMT
25. Nexon XZ Plus DualTone Roof Diesel
26. Nexon XZA Plus DT Roof (O) AMT
27. Nexon XZ Plus Diesel S
28. Nexon XZA Plus AMT Diesel
29. Nexon XZA Plus DT Roof AMT Diesel
30. Nexon XZ Plus DualTone Roof Diesel S
31. Nexon XZ Plus (O) Diesel
32. Nexon XZ Plus DualTone Roof (O) Diesel
33. Nexon XZA Plus AMT Diesel S
34. Nexon XZA Plus DT Roof AMT Diesel S
35. Nexon XZA Plus (O) AMT Diesel
36. Nexon XZA Plus DT Roof (O) Diesel AMT

The next car to have most number variants should be amongst the Hyundai-Kia crossover trio, i.e. the Creta/Seltos/Venue/Sonet! at around 20 variants each.

[ph03n!x]

Originally Posted by theAutomaniac

Tata Nexon currently has 36 variants, which is the most for budget cars atleast!

And these don't even include the 3 EV Nexon variants!

[theAutomaniac]

Originally Posted by ph03n!x

And these don't even include the 3 EV Nexon variants!

Let's not forget that the Nexon might soon get new "Dark' and 'Camo' editions. Each of them adds 4 variants straight!! (petrol and diesel with both manual and automatic)

[dicor]

Originally Posted by theAutomaniac

I guess this must be here as well-

Tata Nexon currently has 36 variants, which is the most for budget cars atleast!




The next car to have most number variants should be amongst the Hyundai-Kia crossover trio, i.e. the Creta/Seltos/Venue/Sonet! at around 20 variants each.

So 36 variants of Nexon, 50+ variants of Altroz / Tigor/Tiago/Harrier/Zest

Feeling pity on TATA sales persons, how much they will have to learn. A Jaguar salesman must be learning less and earning more.

[avsrihari]

Pity the product planning, people at the Assembly Line and also the Sales Technicians. Becomes a nightmare predicting volume forecast and planning the production schedules. It's common in Europe where some models have a 2 door/ 4 door / estate / coupe. The variants are justified given it caters to the wide audience looking for the type of car to buy. Tata has gone overboard and flooded one car with too many variants. Would be interesting to pull up a price list of all variants and see how closely they're placed. Not too long before TaMo silently kills every alternate variant.

[Annibaddh]

Originally Posted by theAutomaniac

I guess this must be here as well-

Tata Nexon currently has 36 variants, which is the most for budget cars atleast!

I wonder at what level does customizing cars becomes more feasible? It can become a distinct advantage for Tata to keep their highest selling variants in stock but also offer near term customization on cars. Given the competition and as cars become more expensive, OEM value becomes important.

[kamilharis]

Things like DT, Camo, Dark etc should not be treated as variants IMO.

Those are just body colors or simply another paint scheme, so it can just remain as a color selection based on a specific variant, and not entirely a new variant.

What TATA can do is introduce packs like RHYTHM etc to all their cars so that buyer can add it to the car as per his choice.

Keep the variants standard at XE, XM, XT & XZ along with add on options for features and color choices, simple!