[shancz]

Brilliant thread, what an effort

Going by the posts it seems everyone was doing their bit in their own way but you've brought all of them together in one place and some more.

Will serve as our handbook for TDs.

Originally Posted by Bibendum90949

- I've set a familiar circuit of 16-18 kms for all test drives.

- "Sir, this is my first time in an year with Thar test drives someone has taken the car to off road and tested it" .He said, 90% of Thar buyers test drives them on city roads.

- That's perfect, not too long for someone to deny outright not too short to be unable to judge with a good mix of surfaces.

- Sad reality of our times when looking the part is more important than doing anything close hence our SUV wave.
Glad that your Thar won't feel bored.

Originally Posted by Poitive

Try to take someone along while on a test drive.

Very important, a second/different perspective matters a lot, especially occupants. IIRC a relative was TDing 10-12 years ago and his mom liked the SX4's rear seat the best. She told that she liked the view since the rear seat was higher than the front.

Originally Posted by Poitive

- Another channel called Man And Motor has a guy well over 6' - I use him as a reference where possible (quite like his rustic manner, which has a non typical-Youtuber feel)

Agree with the rustic.
Looking for space after your SUV thread I am using him and the guy from DDS as a reference. They have collabed too so those videos are quite good with two 6+ feet guys sitting one behind the other and as rear passengers which is quite rare to find.

On the TDs part the feature I hate the most on our roads is when a new section/pothole is re-laid the junction with the older road acts as a speed breaker which is difficult to see and when you see it on a highway its too late to brake. Even if you think about braking have to check if some larger vehicle isn't tailgating because they don't really slow for these things. Its the hatchback and sedan owners who get tossed around while going over these.
Sadly these are difficult to find on a normal TD route but this would be my benchmark for an excellent suspension

[Poitive]

Originally Posted by One

Extremely comprehensive list @Poitive. For me, the following things from your list take precedence while doing TDs :
----
- I never ever read car reviews before the TD, I just read those parts in them which mention the car features so that I can try those features out. Have seen that too many people pre-judge a car even without driving them or experiencing it and it becomes an echo chamber. How a car drives, its ergonomics and space is for me to determine and Lewis Hamilton can't tell me otherwise. A person who drives an Alto only will find the Amaze big and wonderful, a person with a City with find it small and a compromise.
Happy TDing , make it personal

Thank you, One mate. If I had to pick one, it would be this one, One:

- How mental biases and placebo effects work are such a big influence on things which are rather subjective. I love your point about echo chambers, mate. I too have tried to keep aside all I had read and heard while on a TD, and make my own opinion about things, which may or may not agree with popular opinion. Am reminded of this decade old post on how opinions might be formed:

Originally Posted by NoRules

Welcome back, Poitive

Forget opinions formed without proper test drive - I have had my close friend telling me 'Optra? Waste car' without even driving it once. And when I cornered him with pointed questions, he lamely tells me his opinion is based on 'popular perception'. Sad but that is how it is about Optra.

- Also totally agree with you that much depends on where a person is coming form, and it is not just about how premium or spacious a vehicle might be; it is also about things like how a certain steering might feel (covered in the guide) or handling of cars. It takes time with a vehicle to get to know it.

-----

Originally Posted by dust-n-bones

Thanks for a great thread - what I find striking is how many things are we overlooking in a typical TD setting.

- We have a salesman whose interests have very little in common with ours, we have an unfamiliar vehicle and a relatively short time to complete the whole checklist in.

- On top of this, unless you are looking for the top spec vehicle (which is typically what a TD vehicle would be), getting a feel of the variant you want even after a comprehensive TD is just guesswork.

- It continues. How are you going to figure out the niggles. That your back hurts after a 3 hour drive, or your knee doesn't like getting bruised against the plastic every work day or that there's a battery draining away while the salesman explains the next cool feature in the car. Or that twice a year service schedule is going to be painful.

- Jumping from a TD into a downpayment cheque is not for the faint-hearted. If you touchy/feely kind of a consumer, maybe you should consider renting the vehicle for a month over a TD. Or a lease-to-buy plan?

Thank you, d-n-b mate.

- For the initial drives, I suppose one does not at all need to get into the whole list. Mainly focus on what connects with you, and if there are any deal-breakers there. Once one has narrowed down, then one can focus on the parts of the guide that you really care for.

Eg: Even though music is very important part for me (of my life too), I have hardly focused on it in my TDs as it is only going to be a significant deciding factor if the critical stuff (typically: space, driving experience, basic safety) is evenly matched between contenders in the final shortlist.

- As I typically tend to avoid the top spec for our purchases, I too have faced this issue. If one is really keen, one can request the staff and visit the service centre to see the required variant when one is available (only allows a look, but one gets an idea). Tedious, I know.

- Team-Bhp is invaluable in terms of owners sharing their experiences to get a hang of niggles one might face. Your idea about renting a car for a while is something I have considered for ages, but never really ended up doing. It is an excellent idea, I think. Reduces chances of ending up with the wrong vehicle. To properly extrapolate from the rented vehicle also needs to be done sensible (maintenance levels between individual pieces vary a lot)

Originally Posted by Jangra

MY work place is 30 min drive from my house in a good day (90% of the time), worst has been 1.5hours. My test drives has always been the same route, and ...

Jangra mate, this is the first kind of TD mentioned in the opening of the guide. Recommended for all; at least a part like this.

Originally Posted by McLaren Rulez

Great thread. One thing I'll add is that you can and should spend a lot of time with the display vehicles.

Thank you, McLaren_Rules, mate. This is a very good approach. Allows one to focus on other things while driving.

[Poitive]

Originally Posted by GrandTourer

Brilliant comprehensive list there Poitive. Even enthusiasts might miss on some of these points due to various reasons like huge crowd waiting for TDs or other prior commitments to be reached on time to, etc.

Might I add another small point to this list. Take multiple TDs from different showrooms, because not all TD cars are well maintained in every dealership & all of them have different KMs on the odo. The second part tells you how the vehicle ages with time/KMs (rattles, NVH, service centre competence, etc.).

Thank you, GrandTourer mate.

- I too often miss many but typically as I am focused on the few that really matter to me, and to check on what might be a deal-breaker to cut down on the shortlist.

- A lot of value in what you said. Proper interpretation of the experience is important. While some dealerships really keep their TD vehicles in good condition others don't, and this could lead to an improper perception of the vehicle. Have seen people almost give up on the car owing to the TD vehicle being in bad shape.

I find value in checking ownership reports on T-Bhp to figure out how it might turn up over time.

Originally Posted by shancz

Brilliant thread, what an effort

- Going by the posts it seems everyone was doing their bit in their own way but you've brought all of them together in one place and some more.

- Will serve as our handbook for TDs.

- Very important, a second/different perspective matters a lot, especially occupants. IIRC a relative was TDing 10-12 years ago and his mom liked the SX4's rear seat the best. She told that she liked the view since the rear seat was higher than the front.

- Agree with the rustic.
Looking for space after your SUV thread I am using him and the guy from DDS as a reference. They have collabed too so those videos are quite good with two 6+ feet guys sitting one behind the other and as rear passengers which is quite rare to find.

- On the TDs part the feature I hate the most on our roads is when a new section/pothole is re-laid the junction with the older road acts as a speed breaker which is difficult to see and when you see it on a highway its too late to brake.

Thank you, shancz mate.

- I actually had started writing on the driving aspects only, but realized that much of it can be put to poor use by young boy-racers and could result in irresponsible driving. On avoiding much of it, realized there wasn't enough to start a thread, and quite casually started enumerating other points and they just flowed out. 90%+ of the points were written in one flow. The rest being added as they occurred to me over the next few days. The first (driving part) was edited. The latter is almost like the first draft with minor refinements.

- You found the term I was looking for: Handbook for Test Drives. Thanks.

- Here when I was talking about taking someone else, it was more like a friend or a co-observer. The family drive is a must anyway, and mentioned at the second drive in the opening para. Also saves one from future complaints from the family

- Your involvement in my car selection is amazing. Thanks. For those who don't know, Shancz is about as involved as me in the selection in the Choosing an SUV thread. Kudos to the mods for making an environment which allows and encourages such camaraderie.

- Some can be horrendous. OT: The key is to keep slow enough that your car can handle such, and to try and anticipate them based on cars ahead and also road laying equipment around if any.

[shancz]

Originally Posted by Poitive

- I actually had started writing on the driving aspects only, but realized that much of it can be put to poor use by young boy-racers and could result in irresponsible driving.

- quite casually started enumerating other points and they just flowed out. 90%+ of the points were written in one flow.
The latter is almost like the first draft with minor refinements.

- Here when I was talking about taking someone else, it was more like a friend or a co-observer.

- Your involvement in my car selection is amazing.

- Kudos to the mods for making an environment which allows and encourages such camaraderie.

- Some can be horrendous. OT: The key is to keep slow enough that your car can handle such, and to try and anticipate them based on cars ahead and also road laying equipment around if any.

- good call, kudos to your sense of responsibilty

- That comes from your experience, which by the looks of it is quite comprehensive to out benefit

- Got it, makes sense, something as simple as how the seating position is like in your case with the 700 and gives a chance to try out the other seats when the other guy drives as per directions.

- That's because your requirements are quite unique and something that I never paid attention to(short height benefits) and as we research further some startling revelations have been highlighted like the knee-console issue in the Harrier and the Compass but most surprising is the passenger seat height issue on the 700. I would've never thought about it. Fascinating and amusing at the same time. Let's see where this leads to.

- Kudos forever, an oasis of calm in the sandstorm of social media platforms. Takes relentless effort, resilience and I have nothing but respect for them. This won't be possible without them like other platforms show us.

- Quite horrendous, I ran over one at 50kmph and the rear seemed to jump but the problem is that I can't start slowing down in the middle of the highway for every change in road colour since the bigger vehicles don't care about them and come dangerously close especially on dual carriageways where I don't have the luxury of multiple lanes.
Good point on the construction equipment, will keep that in mind, Thanks.

This is one of the reasons for my bias towards a well sorted suspension in a car with workable GC and larger wheels but not a SUV since its an outcome of ground realities not choice which would've always been a responsive, well handling sedan or hatchback.

Thanks again for the handbook.

[SchumiFan]

Might not be related to test drive itself but it might be wise to invest in a temporary prepaid number, if one is going to enquire vehicles.

I recently brought a Hyundai Venue and visited about 6 different dealers before finalising on this. I gave my number to each one of them. It's been a month and I have been getting a very high number of telemarketing calls ever since. DND in Airtel doesn't help one bit. It might be a coincidence but I strongly believe this could be the case. Also need to be wary to whom and where I share my in primary mobile number.

Will not make this mistake the next time I am in the market for replacing my current ride.

[Poitive]

Originally Posted by shancz

- That comes from your experience, which by the looks of it is quite comprehensive to out benefit

On this, I'll restrict myself to the relevant part from a post from 2012 - a decade ago, when km-crunching was not as easy as now:

Originally Posted by Poitive

Some background about my driving experience
I really really didn't want to get into this. Still will not go into details. Briefly -
Cars run in - If I really count, it should be into double digits. Typically almost totally run-in by me. Most were used in the family for a lakh odd kms. There were some used (pre-worshipped) ones too.
How much have I driven? - Didn't bother to really count after a while. My guess is that it should be about half a million kms. Most of it in urban India (which IMO counts for more than the huge distances one may cover a lot more simply than western highways).

Why I even mention the above is that the mood in the thread appeared to be that I collected (complied) information from various sources, which really wasn't the case. Of course, besides experiencing things, there has been much benefit of reading and taking in other's views, surely including our lovely forum.

Originally Posted by shancz

- Quite horrendous, I ran over one at 50kmph and the rear seemed to jump but the problem is that I can't start slowing down in the middle of the highway for every change in road colour since the bigger vehicles don't care about them and come dangerously close especially on dual carriageways where I don't have the luxury of multiple lanes.

- This is one of the reasons for my bias towards a well sorted suspension in a car with workable GC and larger wheels but not a SUV since its an outcome of ground realities not choice which would've always been a responsive, well handling sedan or hatchback.

Thanks again for the handbook.

- If the car can't handle it well and safely, slowing down is a good idea, IMO; just that it needs to be done appropriately and with due anticipation. To remain on a lower speed in general if one's car can't handle the road conditions is the sensible thing to do though. Let the 'bullying' of bigger vehicles not push you into a dangerous situation, mate.

- A sorted suspension too would mean different things depending on the use case. Very often, what is called a sorted suspension would be a bit hard. In the case you describe, a medium/soft with more travel might serve better. Proper damping, which would come into play after you hit the unevenness, would be of much value too but not easy to assess as characteristics could well change based on the kind of undulations (eg XUV700 in the Choosing an SUV thread; also Hector).

- The pleasure is mine.

OT:

Originally Posted by SchumiFan

I recently brought a Hyundai Venue and visited about 6 different dealers before finalising on this. I gave my number to each one of them. It's been a month and I have been getting a very high number of telemarketing calls ever since.

This is an issue with most high value potential purchases. A lot worse if one has property transactions. I believe there are caller lists/databases shared and sold in the industry. One really needs a system of disposable numbers like disposable emails, but that is a topic for another thread - perhaps this one.

[shancz]

Originally Posted by Poitive

- Why I even mention the above is that the mood in the thread appeared to be that I collected (complied) information from various sources, which really wasn't the case.

- Let the 'bullying' of bigger vehicles not push you into a dangerous situation, mate.

- A sorted suspension too would mean different things depending on the use case.

- Those lines can come only out of first hand experience, anyone thinking otherwise should try it out themselves.

- Not dangerous but very uncomfortable and I have an out of the box solution for it, get a Gurkha and then let's see who dares to come close
Credit goes to Asterix, Django and their respective owners since I read their posts in the past few days, smitten by their trucks.

- Agree by sorted I meant both ride and handling but that's nowhere on the radar but if it was it would be more like the 700 rather than the Hector but I won't buy either. Anything outside the sedans/hatchback (S-Cross is a large hatchback in my books) would mean off road specific needs and hence 4x4 and if its 4x4 it will be the Gurkha