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-   -   Renault Duster prices slashed by upto Rs. 1.5 lakh (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian-car-scene/217925-renault-duster-prices-slashed-upto-rs-1-5-lakh-2.html)

While Renault has to say "slashed", I only see it as "brought to what they should be". The Duster is a very robust, capable car no doubt. One of the best affordable AWDs available in India in fact.

However - with its ridiculous age and Renault's decision to not move to the latest platform sold elsewhere, it is nothing but overpriced. Also - Renault's weird decision of making the AWD an RxS version only and without rear wipe etc made it a bit crooked. Must have turned away some potential customers. Previously the RxS was a good preposition. After the recent (B)older facelift (as Renault called it) - the RxS was a pure rip-off. This is a last ditch attempt to clear the BSIV diesel stocks before the deadline.

Good for potential buyers of course.

Not just BS4 diesel stock, Duster stock overall.

No Renault diesels from April. And they have not announced a BS6 petrol either.

I did a test drive of the Duster on 11th Jan 2020 (at Trivandrum) and was ready to buy one too(RxS AWD). TVS did offer a quote of Rs 13.05 lakhs for the RxS AWD, but there were no vehicles available to buy. They only had a 2019 February month RxZ AWD, just one vehicle and that too at Kozhikode. The real objective of this price seems to be to attract potential buyers to the showroom and then some how convince them to go for a non AWD model. This is more like a click-bait. :Frustrati

From an adventure seekers perspective, I would look at this as a more manageable , safer and comfortable option to say, a Thar or a Scorpio/ Safari 4WD. It would do most of the off-roading except real heavy duty stuff. And then again, how many people would put a 35L Fortuner / Endeavour / Alturas in that situation on a regular basis?

The alternative is a used car, but a questionable proposition unless one knows the seller or the vehicle condition thoroughly , especially a 4WD car.

Its a pity that Renault is not upgrading the Duster as an economical AWD alternative to the Compass.

The duster injector issue is widely know as well as the clutch failure. On team-bhp itself we have a dedicated thread for it.

See the point is there is always back of the mind feeling that we might be left stranded. I have not heard about any other diesel engine in its class with this issue, TATA 1.5 diesel, Fiat 1.3 MJD, Hyundai 1.6 crdi and 1.4 crdi, Ford 1.5 TDCI all have run 60-70K km without any injector issue. And they have much higher sale than Duster (110PS guise).

Duster injector failures are very early in the ownership (<40K km on most cars) even the clutch fail around that time. Hence my concern on reliability. It may be durable but not exactly reliable.

You forgot the Volkswagen 1.6, has well documented injector issues!

Oh Yes i missed that. VW is know more for water pump issue. Duster has company from fellow European company. But I believe the injector issue was resolved with the 1.5 diesel engine.

:OT
Not to forget the First generation Ford Figo. Ford also used Continental injectors (Similar to Duster 110 PS) and lots and lots of failure related posts in social media. The consumer laws are weak in India and not worth spending time chasing these big corporations. Even a simple enquiry by Government of India on “number of injectors replaced by each manufacturers” will surely make Duster/Figo as clear winners. The 2012 Figo facelift has Bosch injectors and helped Ford to hide the mistake and make pre-facelift consumer pay for bad quality injectors (not to forget switch off syndrome of Figo which I still have in my car). In my Figo, 2 injectors are showing signs of failure with irregular firing pattern. A.S.S says each of them cost around 13K and spending 26K on 7.5 year old car due to a cheating manufacturer is absurd.

Test drove Duster couple of months back and liked it very much but horror story of Duster spares cost , unreliability and non-availability of parts over the counter made me choose mind over heart. Duster 110PS owned by colleague had an injector/fuel pump issue 2 month back and he spent around 60K for repair. As far as I remember, new clutch costed him 20K. Fed up with the costly repairs he decided to sell but in the used car market people are quoting 3.5-4L. This is the main reason I skipped Duster.

Budget car manufactured by Dacia is sold at premium price / spares costs by Renault in India. People have to realize that the only USP of “best ride over potholes” is a joint contribution by NHAI / various Roadways departments of Government.:uncontrol

They have to give a discount of 3L not 1.5L if you ask me.

I never had a single component failure of any kind in my 110ps (2wd)Duster. Nor did I hear of such issues with the SAs. The only thing I heard of was potential complexity of repairing the AWD system.

Yes I'm worried about my dad's 2015 Duster! Been 5 years now and thankfully no issues whatsoever.

Have seen the injectors fail on a couple of Dusters (7+ years old cars ) in the recent past!

Vehicle maybe VFM, but long term maintenance is where the pain lies.

Sourcing OEM spares outside ASC is tough/ next to impossible.

I did not know that Ford 1.4 diesel had issue. The 1.5 TDCI was never in news for Injector failure, it happy to note that Ford took corrective action with the newer engine and for the last 6-7 years there are no complaints. Renault just turned a blind eye to the problem which is the most worrying part.

Though I am not a big fan of Maruti or Hyundai cars, we have to accept that have worked hard for their position. Customer are for a large part happy with the service and response from company. Also their cars just don't leave the owners stranded either.

3L will be an awesome discount, will help to cushion the resale hit. I will still pick a reliable car over cheap car upfront

Interesting to see much of hatred towards an enthusiasts car, especially from an enthusiasts community. The magic carpet ride and super-solid handling is nothing less than an engineering masterpiece that others were not able to get right even after 10 years the Duster came in to the international market.

Having two in the garage, a 85ps variant and AWD (touchwood, with 2.2 lac plus combined mileage), let me tell you from my personal experience that there's nothing more satisfying than going from point A to point B in utmost comfort; the highly engaging driving experience is an icing on the cake. I also own a super reliable new Maruti Swift (a 2 star tin can with 9 lac price tag) that has left me and my wife stranded on the road due to AMT failure. I had a reliable Hyundai Accent (a fuel guzzler with silly road manners and power only on papers) that had clutch failures multiple times and needed front shock replacements twice, before I got rid of it after tolerating it for 80,000 km.

In the 85ps guise, Duster is easily as reliable as any of the Japanese. We've seen a few cases of injector failures of 110ps in the forum. But for a car that sold well over 2 lac units (not including the cousin, Terrano) , do we have a statistically significant number to call it so unreliable ?

Can someone please tell me, what would be the on-road price for the 110PS Duster in Bangalore considering the discounts these days? What would be a bargain buy?

Just to add, I had taken the TD of the AMT version recently in city, but couldn't make out much from the drive. I had asked for a longer test drive and there has been no follow up from SA.

Although the AWD at Rs. 10.99 ex showroom looks nice, the bad part is that they are offering it on RxS variant. This misses cruise control, fog lamps, rear wiper, seat height, among some other features. Would have been better if they continued offering AWD in top spec.