[Vid6639]

Originally Posted by CrAzY dRiVeR

Speaking of which, is there no parcel tray at all? None of the media cars have it, nor is it mentioned in the variant list.

Originally Posted by arindambasu13

There is one review (if I remember correctly, it is the Motoroids review) where the reviewer points out that there are grooves/ mounting points on the upper part of the boot, which indicates that the production and road ready version sold to customers will indeed have a parcel tray. Looks like the media cars were not provided with any, to ensure that the already smallish boot did not look positively claustrophobic! I certainly hope that they do provide a parcel tray, because otherwise, it looks like something is missing. Parcel trays do bring in some degree of aesthetic finesse in the cabin, apart from their obvious functionality.

Parcel tray will not be standard. Will be sold as a dealer accessory. If its standard then boot space capacity in specs will be even lesser hence dealer accessory. With the parcel tray it would have been really small.

[rajshenoy]

Saw multiple media reviews on Youtube but none had the elusive petrol engine. I wonder if this will be even offered at launch !!
We know they have this marazzo engine which has been reworked for XUV300. however petrol engine is all new and i strongly feel that they might rather launch it along with BS-VI.
Obviously petrol engine would cannibalise diesel sales, especially if it offers 200nm of torque(That is as much as what my Ertiga has on offer ) and with a typically high revving petrol engine, the car will be a hoot !!

Honestly, I was almost sold on this car. It was practical, loaded with features and looked perfect and I shelved all my plans after looking at that boot space. Even some hatchbacks like new WagonR or KWID can put it to shame !!

[tarik.arora]

Originally Posted by adimicra

1> Boot space. This can be a deal breaker for many including me
2> Interior space. From the reviews, it looks like the legroom in the backseat isn't all that great which is surprising considering the largest wheelbase of 2600m in the segment. I wonder where all the space has gone considering the boot is also smallest in the segment. Mahindra can learn a thing or two about packaging from the Japs.
3> Dashoboard (minor) - Some parts of the dahsboard do feel tacky and a decade old. I guess one can live with this considering the +ves.

You echo most of my thoughts. May take on these points:
a) Boot space: This is a deal breaker for a few people but i also buy the logic presented by other members regarding the nuclear family concept. My guess is, this will be a showstopper for not more than 15-20% of the people (for me, it is).
b) Rear legroom: I noticed this in most of the videos. This is more true for people over 5'10. The rear seat will not be comfy at all for tall people. Where has the space gone? My Nexon offers better space. With the front seat set to my height (6 feet), i can sit behind the driver seat with about 2" space between my knee and the front seat back. This is not supremely comfy, but much better than the 3OO.
c) To me, the dashboard design looks a decade old. Especially the lower half of the dash. The white color and orange back light only makes it worse. It reminds me of a low cost people mover (Xylo?) than an upmarket SUV. This surely is a deal breaker for me.

I also suspect the pricing now. In a bid to give so many segment firsts, Mahindra may have overshot the pricing for the top end variant. The problem with a high price is, buyers tend to explore the next segment. I don't think the eco-sport 'S' variant sells much for the same reason.

[hemanth.anand]

Originally Posted by Vid6639

Parcel tray will not be standard. Will be sold as a dealer accessory. If its standard then boot space capacity in specs will be even lesser hence dealer accessory. With the parcel tray it would have been really small.

That's not nice...I hope they provide it in the higher variants at least. Even our Alto K10 AMT came with a standard parcel tray (albeit it is available only in the top variant MT and AGS)

[WorkingGuru]

Almost everything is carried over from the Tivoli parts-bin (which is probably because it helps M&M procure better quality parts at competitive prices).

I fail to see how this car will satisfy anyones needs. Bear with me, but the short-falls need to be considered too.

Within the city, people rarely travel full-load. So, the 5 seat-belts are not going to be useful. 300NM is a large number & the reviews mention that the boost is very strong after a certain point ie the acceleration is not linear post 1800RPM, and one needs to be very gentle with the accelerator while the clutch isn't light. Again not very useful within the city - infact it'll take quite abit of getting used-to for constantly modulating the accelerator & clutch, cautiously.

At the highway, the tiny boot-space will mostly need the smaller seat to be folded down. Its effectively a 3-seater given the compromise for crudely chopping 20-22cms off the tail, even at the cost of making the XUV3OO look dis-proportionate from the side profile.

• India is a developing economy & dust is an issue, M&M could have atleast changed the bright seat-fabric colour.
• Whats with the strings on the seat-backs? Its the one place rear-passengers could stove their stuff away from prying eyes.
• Indians travel heavy, boot-space cannot be so small for a car that'll probably cost ~12 Lakh OTR.
• Acceleration needs to be linear to deal with heavy city-traffic. Torque-curve tapering off at 250NM would suffice if the engine needs to be tuned for linear acceleration.
• BS-VI norms are going to kick-in by next April, the diesel may be short lived, so WHY isn't M&M ready with the petrol variant during media drives ?
• Automatics are vital for a car nowadays. A large chunk of the crowd just strikes it off the moment they find theres no automatic variant.

IMO This car misses more boxes than it ticks. It is the perfect example of why originality as seen in Tata Nexon, is very important.

[FrodoOfTheShire]

Originally Posted by tarik.arora

b) Rear legroom: I noticed this in most of the videos. This is more true for people over 5'10. The rear seat will not be comfy at all for tall people.
c) To me, the dashboard design looks a decade old. Especially the lower half of the dash. The white color and orange back light only makes it worse.

Even the rear seat angle looks too upright and not much thigh support. This might lead to much fatigue in long journeys.

The white/silvery dashboard with red/orange buttons are an eyesore for me. Reminds me of those low cost third party remotes for TVs and music systems! Brings the whole look and feel a notch down

Other than that the whole package is great! Pricing awaited.

[Nav-i-gator]

Originally Posted by rajshenoy

Saw multiple media reviews on Youtube but none had the elusive petrol engine. I wonder if this will be even offered at launch !!

I enquired about the availability of petrol engine variants through Mahindra official website for XUV300 (I got a call back after about half an hour of filling my contact details on their website). The responder told me that petrol variant will be launched simultaneously on 14th Feb. It's strange that they did not provide petrol variant for media reviews. Either it's not so good as the diesel one (and Mahindra wanted to avoid negative reviews before official launch which could affect pre-bookings) or Mahindra deliberately want to prioritize diesel variants.

[pavi]

Regarding nuclear family stuff that most mentioned, hope you guys really are married and having kids. I am having Honda City with I think around 510 litres of bootspace, MASSIVE right??. No, not when I have to pack my daughters stuffs when I go home on some weekends. Her luggage includes the usual napkins and dresses, lot of toys including a favourite teddy bear, a doll, a kitchen set, a doctor set and what not. I used to take drinking water in a 35 litre jar as my parent’s home is blessed to be in a village, hence blessed with drinking water from well that is heavenly. Mine and my wife’s complete stuffs can be taken in a bag, but when you got kids it is a whole different story.
Or may be I let my kid take whatever she wants when she goes to her grandparents.

[shashanka]

Originally Posted by CrAzY dRiVeR

Saw the XUV 3OO at Phoenix Market City Mall in Bangalore yesterday and checked it out. Will let the pics do the talking - (The engine is the elusive 1.2 turbo petrol).....but I still have a big lump in my throat when it comes to even thinking about parting with the Punto.
Will take a final decision after price is announced, and post test drives.

I can understand your sentiment on the prospective parting with your Punto. My feelings were similar - or perhaps more so! - when I parted with our Scorpio last month after over 14 years. And tho' our first choice for a replacement had been the TUV300+, circumstances dictated otherwise and we opted for the Eeco. The choice was dictated in our case by the need to stay within a budget, sufficient interior space to take our two boxers and last (but definitely not the least!) that it had to be RWD.

The XUV300 ticks all the boxes that one can think of, but one - M&M are not offering an AWD version, not even in the pipe-line. This would not only have established the continuity of M&M's much vaunted DNA, it would also have established their bonafides in setting the XUV300 well-apart from the also-rans in the segment.

[Nav-i-gator]

Originally Posted by pavi

Regarding nuclear family stuff that most mentioned, hope you guys really are married and having kids. I am having Honda City with I think around 510 litres of bootspace, MASSIVE right??. No, not when I have to pack my daughters stuffs when I go home on some weekends. Her luggage includes the usual napkins and dresses, lot of toys including a favourite teddy bear, a doll, a kitchen set, a doctor set and what not. I used to take drinking water in a 35 litre jar as my parent’s home is blessed to be in a village, hence blessed with drinking water from well that is heavenly. Mine and my wife’s complete stuffs can be taken in a bag, but when you got kids it is a whole different story.
Or may be I let my kid take whatever she wants when she goes to her grandparents.

You need to travel light man!

On another note, guess we pack basis how much boot space our cars have (and no matter how big, it always feel short on long family trips). Our spouse and children will always be like - let's pack this too, and that too - we have ample boot space!

I have a chevy Beat with 175 L of "boot" space. Any which way you look at it, it's terribly small. And that shows only when we take it out for long road trips. What do we do? We pack mostly in soft bags, stuff the bags and squeeze out every molecule of air from the bags. And I have a son who want to take his entire collection of toys, books and what not to every trip (even to nearest mall).

[PYSO]

XUV 300 scores very high on safety, and performance (diesel only), and looks.

But scores much lower on utility, practicality.

Small boot
No rear AC vents
Ivory white interiors
Only 180 mm ground clearance
Limited rear leg space
Upright rear seats backrest without recline function
Limited under thigh support in rear seats?
Usual mahindra niggles

The naging question in my mind is. Why pay 14 lakhs for the top variant diesel of xuv300, when I could buy the top variant diesel of ford freestyle for 9.3 lakhs on road.

The ford freestyle diesel is equally good on performance, safety and looks (looks is subjective). And scores slightly better than xuv300 on practicality, utility.

Equal sized boot
Black interiors
190 mm ground clearance
Equally good rear legspace
Etc

How could I justify paying 50% more for the xuv 300? Of course there are some extra features like dual zone climate control, heated orvms, etc. But the freestyle also comes with really cool tech like anti rollover protection, Instantaneous fuel efficiency, etc.

[CrAzY dRiVeR]

Originally Posted by PYSO

How could I justify paying 50% more for the xuv 300?

Same reason why Ecosport is priced 50% higher than the Freestyle for the top models too - market positioning of raised hatchbacks as against the more crossover'ish hatchbacks - though the capabilities of both may fundamentally be the same.

Freestyle fights a tough battle, in a segment where the market won't pay a premium over a Figo, just because the way it looks (as a segment in general) kills the desirability. Creta over i20 Active is another example with an even more premium positioning.

[Lakwontsing]

Originally Posted by pavi

Regarding nuclear family stuff that most mentioned, hope you guys really are married and having kids. I am having Honda City with I think around 510 litres of bootspace, MASSIVE right??. No, not when I have to pack my daughters stuffs when I go home on some weekends. Her luggage includes the usual napkins and dresses, lot of toys including a favourite teddy bear, a doll, a kitchen set, a doctor set and what not. I used to take drinking water in a 35 litre jar as my parent’s home is blessed to be in a village, hence blessed with drinking water from well that is heavenly. Mine and my wife’s complete stuffs can be taken in a bag, but when you got kids it is a whole different story.
Or may be I let my kid take whatever she wants when she goes to her grandparents.

Ah! Looks like my story. Apart from my Santro getting old, its the space in it that is making me look for a new car. And its a hell if you ask anyone in family to drop some luggage due to space constraints in my current vehicle. XUV300 is a heart break on this count for sure. A big problem now to start the search all over again.

Looks like either I look at Kicks again or else now stop the idea of so called SUV and settle for a sedan like Honda City.

But true, nuclear family doesn't mean settling for less space. A car having tonnes of features (some of which eventually may not be of great use) but not having something that makes it more like a utility vehicle doesn't make sense. And XUV 300 falls in that category for me as it doesn't have decent boot space and rear AC vents. Add to it the white leatherette seats.

[swiftnfurious]

Originally Posted by Vid6639

... With the parcel tray it would have been really small.

As i expected. Any idea why did they de-tune the engine by 8-9 bhp?

[free_will]

I think that's why it is important to have good friends who own MPVs.

I have recently moved my house and definitely know the utility of having car with a spacious boot. If you are planning a road trip, the small boot of the XUV300 may be a crucial factor in deciding the location/duration of the trip. So I was really disappointed when I saw the tiny boot of the XUV300. So what are the options to overcome this problem?

1. Buy a carrier
2. Buy a roof box
3. Hire/Rent a car for long trips with family (Zoomcar, etc.)
4. Buy a car with bigger boot

Considering all the pros and cons, I think XUV300 is a good package. It doesn't have many problems which users cannot overcome (barring the omission of rear AC vents). Is it a good value proposition? We will know it on the 14th Feb.