Team-BHP - Swift Sedan

SX4 was designed to be a hatch and look what happened to it, it is going to be voted by the team bhp as the car of the year. I dont see any reason why they shouldnt have a swift sedan. I guess we have to hold our horses before dismissing a car without even seeing it. It is only another 10 days and we can pass our judgement after that.

A few cars which were hatches and have been converted into sedans.

1. Tata Indica to Tata Indigo
2. Honda Jazz to Honda City(notice the cross bar in the boot)
3. Fiat Palio to Petra/Siena
4. Corsa Sail to Opel Corsa
5. Optra to SRV(this goes the other way round)
6. VW Golf to VW Jetta

So if almost all manufaturers including Honda/GM/VW can do it, then why not MSIL?

India is still a growing economy and there is lot of disparity in the earnings of people. The reason that old models from car manufacturers get successful here is that neither most people have not seen the latest models and nor can they afford them.
Maruti is not known for making good car designs but there cars are VFM.
We have started talking about ABS and other safety features but we fail to realise that a person graduating from a two wheeler to Maruti 800 will consider it damn safe as compared to the two wheeler.

eflanker, why the sudden khujli?
It is easy to blame the manufacturers for dumping dated cars, making India special editions, this and that, but try doing business in India, see how the government tries to make you jump through endless hoops, bribes and endless delays, pig headed regulations, huge duties etc on importing certain *raw materials*, wonderful "IT-Superpower;" infrastructure and then there is the attitude of your typical incompetent IAS babu in XYZ ministry.

If people here were decision makers in the automobile companies, they would not even think of doing business in India. Or, they'll take the approach being taken by various manufacturers, presently. They are business, they have to be profitable and sustainable unlike government which can over regulate the entire country at the expense of tax payers.

Given how poor our manufacturing base is plus the entire attitude in how we treat manufacturing industries compared to Thailand or China, auto makers (and their suppliers/vendors) really do the best that they can.

When you are a garbage can, people will throw their garbage at you, not freshly picked roses.

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Originally Posted by BUSA (Post 672240)

Add the Ford Ikon to the list as well. Personally, i feel the sedan in this case looked more complete than the hatch.

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Originally Posted by BUSA (Post 672240)

A few cars which were hatches and have been converted into sedans.

So if almost all manufaturers including Honda/GM/VW can do it, then why not MSIL?

True, most of these cars are designed to have sedan and hatchback variants from the very beginning, and often an estate variant. The trend is there in high end luxury cars like Mercedes and BMW too.

I think eflanker is really upset that the car is essentially a hack job, being made primarily for Indian market (?) by crudely bolting a boot to a platform that was never designed or intended to have one (unlike vehicles you have listed).

We'll see how it all turns out. Frankly if Suzuki can get sales success from this job, the shame should be on other manufacturers not them!

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We'll see how it all turns out. Frankly if Suzuki can get sales success from this job, the shame should be on other manufacturers not them!

No, the shame should be on us the buyers, for acceptng it.

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Add the Ford Ikon to the list as well. Personally, i feel the sedan in this case looked more complete than the hatch.

Yes, even the Optra SRV, Corsa Sail, its not easy to make out that they are Hatch-Sedans of the same version.

At a time when India is becoming the automotive design hub of the world -- when full-fledged automotive design engineering is done (so cost-effectively) in India -- when we harbor aspirations of buying the one-time prestigeous Jaguar and Land-Rover brands, lock, stock, barrel and factories; when Indian literati intellect-out a car design as a work of art, when they talk of personality and character in web-based fora ...
...Why must we suffer one more cost-cutting exercise of growing sedan sheetmetal on a hatch econobox, albeit Maruti-Suzuki's?

Quality (like salary, timeliness and cleanliness) is now a hygiene factor.
Having it is no big deal. But not having it is a very big deal-breaker.

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Originally Posted by SuperSyn (Post 672311)

I think eflanker is really upset that the car is essentially a hack job, being made primarily for Indian market (?) by crudely bolting a boot to a platform that was never designed or intended to have one (unlike vehicles you have listed).

How can you say its crudely bolted?

And, the other cars can't be excluded as such. Indigo does appear like Indica with boot, and how many bought it. many people wanted an affordable sedan.

Even with all the cry about safety, people are still opting for the M800, because they can afford that only. Similarly, if people want the swift with a boot, why not?

The sales will decide whether this was needed or not!

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Originally Posted by benbsb29 (Post 672297)

Add the Ford Ikon to the list as well. Personally, i feel the sedan in this case looked more complete than the hatch.

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Originally Posted by BUSA (Post 672313)

Yes, even the Optra SRV, Corsa Sail, its not easy to make out that they are Hatch-Sedans of the same version.

In both ikon and corsa, we saw the sedan first. In case of ikon we never got to see the hatch here. I feel this played a lot in the mind. We never felt them like a hatch.

In case of indica, the sedan never went down well in my eyes. the boot was always like protruding out of the car. Visually Petra was better even after seeing the palio first.

Also, when they convert a hatch to sedan, not sure how many mechanical things are modified suitably. In my friends flair, when the car is fully loaded(4 people and boot full), the rear of the car will go down and will scrap a lot more. In my opinion that gave away its hatch design and it was never meant to have a boot.

I personally think that manufacturers have to resort to such cost-cutting measures, given our economy and the tax structures. Lets say international manufacturers get all their cars here. How many people would be able to buy it? Think of a situation where there are no 800, alto,zen, indica, wagonr, santro, etc. If we have only Beemers, Mercs, Audis, VWs, Skodas less than 10pc of our Indian population would be having 4-wheelers today.

So, the Swift sedan might not be visually so appealing, but many people would like to have a cheaper entry level sedan rather than a obscenely costly hatch. This car caters to such requirements. I genuinely feel that this is a brilliant move by Maruti. Afterall, they have read the Indian mindset for more than two decades now :)

It is the same statergy used by FIAT and GM as welll... I dont see a major issue with that......

Palio + Boot == Petra
Punto + Boot == Linea
Aveo - Boot == UVA
Optra - Boot == CRV

I guess Suzuki wants to cash in on the mindset of Indian Public who prefer a Sedan to a Hatch.

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Originally Posted by raajks (Post 672545)

Agreed. But in my honest opinion these transforms are quite reasonable, and not even half as ugly as this one. I am sure even MS could and should have done a better job than this.:eek: