[ASP007]

A lemon delivered by a very shady dealer. I strongly believe that the dealer is aware of this. Should have cancelled the booking at this dealership after the initial interaction itself and reported them to Mahindra.

Even after extensive trials, still the initial lots are plagued with issues. Reminds me of the Harrier launch. I've tweeted this to Anand Mahindra, and suggest others to do so.

[mahalingam_a]

Very Sorry to hear this story mate. I know how it feels and can relate it. Please document everything and contact Mahindra's head office. Let us know what is their response. Also, one more fire power that you can try is to tag Mr. Anand Mahindra in social media, just in case if your initial escalations are not encouraging. Whatever it is, I wish the issue gets resolved. Safe Miles!

[raunaqv471]

Extremely saddened to read this. Clear case of a lemon being delivered fresh out of the store. We need stronger anti-lemon laws, it's high time. The dealer should take neccesary cognisance of the issue and fix it asap. If it's any major component failing, a new car should be provided since such episodes are unacceptable when one has paid the full price. If it's a sensor issue, then the dealer should fix it and reassure the customer with a free extended warranty along with an undertaking that it won't reoccur in future. We buy new cars for reliability and a hassle free ownership, definately not for this. This seems to be happening too often for comfort and we only know about the ones reported on our forums. Imagine the plight of a newbie first time Car buyer with no knowledge or links to car enthusiasts or the car community, he'd be at the mercy of the dealer. If all else fails, try tweeting to Anand Mahindra, that might actually help considering he is pretty active and can give it a firmer push. Hope this is sorted out at the earliest.

[lurker]

My intuition is because all Mahindra Thar's being shipped out come without infotainment units (ICE) installed, due to chip shortage, and the same being shipped seperately later and installed at the dealers, this may result in dealers on ocassion unable to exercise strict quality control (QC) on installation processes due to which such fire hazards can occur due to poor relays, fuse and wiring kits installed at dealer end by technicians operating without oversight.

[Dry Ice]

This is beyond shocking!

Has there been any further updates? Would be curious to know what is happening now?

Thar is a perfect storm of a car in high demand + Mahindra v1 product (Thar v1 was completely different, I consider this to be the first gen of its kind).

I remember when EcoSport was launched and caused a similar frenzy. People were quoting such senseless figures back then too, 1 to 1.5 lakhs in "black" to get an early delivery.

Going by the experiences we keep hearing, I feel it's best to let the dust settle and then take a call about buying a Thar in a year or 2. Sure it pulls your heart strings, but a bad experience like this one will put you off the car a lot faster.

[ashnd]

This is the typical Mahindra sarkari experience. I test drove the petrol automatic Thar yesterday. The salesman was least bothered and insisted that I could only drive one car, either the diesel or petrol. He said to me that the diesel automatic was not available for a test drive at their dealership. Upon asking if the diesel manual was available he said that it had gone for a test drive. The petrol auto felt good to drive, nothing special, especially the gearbox felt a bit dimwitted. Upon asking him if I could drive the diesel manual to compare the two he again started giving explanations. This finally got me angry and I gave him an earful. This completely turned around his response with him trying to appease me and get a good feedback for his test drive. He even offered to bring the diesel car home for a test drive. The point I’m trying to make is that their service was already quite abysmal, now with a product that has a long waiting list and no shortage of customers they’re even less bothered. Should take this as a precursor to what will come if you do decide to take the plunge!

[13thpsycho]

Apologies for the late update

I got the car on 25th evening, the very next day. I was on call with Mahindra guys till around 10 pm 24th night. They weren't able to sort out the issue then but they finally did the next day when the parent company sent in their tech.


The problem as they mentioned was with moisture getting into the connector of the wiring harness. They cleaned the connector and attached it and everything seems to be working absolutely fine as of now. They have also ordered a replacement part for the car which should arrive in a few days.

One important lesson learnt guys, the first thing to do in a scenario like this is to register a complaint through the parent company's customer care, either mail or through a call. Don't forget to take the complaint number. This makes the dealer work faster and also exposes their weakness to the company. This will not only make dealerships maintain trained staff who can handle things on their own but also improve our overall experience.

Originally Posted by Cyborg

Please put your terrible experience on all modes of social media like Twitter, Facebook etc, shame them publicly for what you had to go thru
Cheers

Originally Posted by manishk123

This is just not acceptable behaviour by the Dealer and the company must take action against him. I think you should send a message to Anand Mahindra on Twitter - he is very active on it.

It did cross my mind but I got such a speedy response from the company that I thought it wasn't required. At least these guys made up for it here.

Originally Posted by gkveda

What is the manufacturing date of the car you received? When did the dealer receive the car? And lastly, how many days did the car was lying in open yard?

Luckily there is no rodent play here. The car was at the yard for about 15 days. I will look into the manufacturing date and get back to you.

Originally Posted by stallmaster

Hello OP, did you make any audiovisual documentation of the issues? It significantly increases the reach of your post.

I do have a couple of pictures. I have attached one with the cluster meter celebrating Diwali and a few others

Originally Posted by Bibendum90949

I suspect there's a high pressure wash done(against the guideline) in the engine bay which may have resulted in water entry to key electronic components.

Bang on brother!

Originally Posted by swunkjyn

@13thpsycho, you have great patience or wanted to buy the car still even though there were so many small and big bad experiences.

I am probably the most short tempered one around but when it comes to cars and bikes I seem to forget everything

Originally Posted by benbsb29

Sad to see you had to go through this experience with a brand new car, right from the sales experience. What was Mr Gopal's answer to the car being brought back to the workshop right after taking delivery?

Mr. Gopal has been busy with some puja away from Patna since a day before delivery. He refuses to take my calls.

Originally Posted by extreme_torque

And its the Petrol Thar with a brand new Mahindra petrol engine but even given that its pretty poor in my opinion, the white smoke and all the dash lights. I would stay away from a Mahindra petrol engine anyway.

I beg to differ brother. The engine is simply superb, extremely smooth and silent. As a matter of fact I feel the engine and gearbox combo is more than sufficient for a car like this. I dont expect it to be a corner carver or setting best lap times with it, what I mean to say is, for the 400 kms on the car today, the combo works, dont know what the future holds for me. Only thing like GTO suggested wait till all these issues get ironed out and then get one.

Originally Posted by Sebring

His family wont go in the back seat, as its not comfy.

Elderly won't like it one bit due to ingress and egress. The seat at a reclined angle is pretty comfortable in the city. It might not be the case on long journeys as one would miss thigh support since you are seated in a knee up position. I am 5'11 and my friend 6'2, both of us sat pretty comfortably at the back for a good 45 minutes. Leg room is good enough.

Originally Posted by himanshugoswami

Im surprised no one has commented on one very suspicious activity. The dealer said your brand new car has gone to the workshop for paint protection and anti rust, when, as per your post you did not order it.

I am glad you mentioned this, please stay away from these dealer scams. If I wanted I would have fought again for this but I was so frustrated with the entire experience, I just wanted the car and get away from these goons. I am currently sitting at 3M and getting paint detailing done and the prices here for the anti rust and paint protection is a lot lower than Mahindra.

Originally Posted by Pulse500

In fact, I see the check lamp glowing almost 20% times when I start engine early morning after heavy overnight rains or when humidity is extremely high (Mumbai). I just let the engine warm up a bit, for 2 mins if this happens, shut down, lock, unlock and then restart vehicle, and everything gets normal. This has been my observation for atlast 7 rainy seasons.

About the smoke, I guess it to be vapors of solvents used for underbody treatment or engine bay cleaning or dressing compounds if any, they take atleast 2 hours to sufficiently evaporate in warm temperature conditions.

I do not believe such underbody treatment is necessary at the time of purchase, and dealers MUST refrain from unnecessary treatments or asking customer to pay such extra charges.

Thanks a ton for your valuable advice will keep this mind.

I am a noob at uploading pics with details right after. Apologize for that, I will improvise in the coming posts. I will make some youtube videos and share links in a couple of days

Thanks for all your prompt inputs!

[Sankar]

Apologies for the late update

I got the car on 25th evening, the very next day. I was on call with Mahindra guys till around 10 pm 24th night. They weren't able to sort out the issue then but they finally did the next day when the parent company sent in their tech.


The problem as they mentioned was with moisture getting into the connector of the wiring harness. They cleaned the connector and attached it and everything seems to be working absolutely fine as of now. They have also ordered a replacement part for the car which should arrive in a few days.

I am glad to know that you have received your car back. But at the same time saddened at the kind of connectors Mahindra use in their wiring harnesses. I guess they are right when they said not to wash Thar's engine bay. Hope the new replacement part is an improved type and fixes this problem for you for ever.

[Slipstream11]

Originally Posted by 13thpsycho

The problem as they mentioned was with moisture getting into the connector of the wiring harness. They cleaned the connector and attached it and everything seems to be working absolutely fine as of now. They have also ordered a replacement part for the car which should arrive in a few days.

Happy to hear the car is back with you.
Any particular reason cited by the experts behind the white smoke?

[gkveda]

The problem as they mentioned was with moisture getting into the connector of the wiring harness. They cleaned the connector and attached it and everything seems to be working absolutely fine as of now. They have also ordered a replacement part for the car which should arrive in a few days.

Read my message in the beginning of the thread. Since there were multiple issues cropping up which were not related to each other, one can easily guess it was a cable or related harness issue.

Anyways, I suggest to forget about the bad experience so far and enjoy the drive.

All the very best for your mile munching future

[Pulse500]

Originally Posted by 13thpsycho

The problem as they mentioned was with moisture getting into the connector of the wiring harness. They cleaned the connector and attached it and everything seems to be working absolutely fine as of now. They have also ordered a replacement part for the car which should arrive in a few days.

Happy to know you got your car back and that there was no serious damage.

I really hope Mahindra uses better quality parts. Connectors need to be designed resist fluid ingress. In telecom world, we use special water repellent gel plus special flexible boots on any cable joints, and are designed to last decades in the harshest environment they are subjected to. We also use redundant critical electronic components with automatic failover in our core equipment and internet routers to protect against any rare failures, so that critical telecom and internet services never go down. Can Automotive industry use some of our techniques? Can save so much time and costs in diagnosis, part replacements, pain to customer and damage to company's reputation. If there is standardization, can get economies of scale to bring costs further down.

Hope the Indian automakers listen.

[AutoNoob]

Originally Posted by Pulse500

I really hope Mahindra uses better quality parts. Connectors need to be designed resist fluid ingress. In telecom world, we use special water repellent gel plus special flexible boots on any cable joints, and are designed to last decades in the harshest environment they are subjected to...
Can Automotive industry use some of our techniques?

Water-proof connectors are almost standard piece of hardware in Automotive sector as well. Particularly for use in engine bay and underbody.

I fail to understand how Mahindra messed up this simple design step. That too on a product which is expected to encounter harsh environments more than average vehicle.

Yes, Mahindra has mentioned that engine bay must not be pressure washed. However, they must be not forget ground realities. That the customer and average car washing shop/ guy is not going to read the owner's manual fully.

And if such a relatively small design change could prevent the big problems for customer, it must be adopted ASAP.

[shady_lawyer]

Good to hear you've got the beast back. Now enjoy!

Originally Posted by Bibendum90949

I I suspect there's a high pressure wash done(against the guideline)

Originally Posted by 13thpsycho

Bang on brother!

Mahindra pehlich bola tha! phir bhi nehlaya. Don't angry SHER
image from https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/attac...brochure-1.jpg

[Born 2 Be Wild]

Honestly what a joke after owning multiple cars and bikes to see such a lame exmaple of , issue being attributed to moisture in the engine bay of a vehicle termed as a offroader i get my cars / bikes washed every month for the past 10 plus years without any issue. To see this as a reason is beyond belief

I salute mahindra!

[kiku007]

Originally Posted by Born 2 Be Wild

Honestly what a joke after owning multiple cars and bikes to see such a lame exmaple of , issue being attributed to moisture in the engine bay of a vehicle termed as a offroader i get my cars / bikes washed every month for the past 10 plus years without any issue. To see this as a reason is beyond belief

I salute mahindra!

The same dealers who can't even read the SOP on how to wash the Thar are going to install infotainment screens. Incredible. What can go wrong right?

BTW I still don't understand the moisture in the connector theory anyway. Like it's been said many times, the underlying problem is lack of engineering. For a start, why would you not have waterproof connectors in the engine bay of an offroader if that's the root cause?