Team-BHP - Sales of Automatics taking off

I'm not a fan of automatic. There should be some activity when driving cars & it becomes simply boring. Yes in city, it would be a boon really, but I prefer driving a manual shift on highway. The credit goes to WagonR to have introduced the first AT in India, but for some reason I'm hardly able to see any WagonR AT on road.

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Originally Posted by aargee (Post 1976919)

Maruti 800 used to have automatics available even 20 years back. It used to be made on special order & was called the Maruti 800 for handicapped people.

@ Nithi : i10 AT is very much fuel efficient. Depends on driving style. Initially it will give poor FE, why don't you look up the thread. Owners have been consistently reporting good FE numbers recently, isn't it?

And yes, this is very much a welcome move. Hyundai has been making good money on the Santro and i10 AT's till now, being the only player sensible enough to grab an obvious opportunity. And contrary to popular belief, it's not just housewives and girlfriends who drive i10 AT's. Infact I've seen more guys driving them than women.

I have had an AT since 1999 Zen AT) and now both my cars are AT. I hope someday we see advanced ATs with Torque converter lock etc. on a lower and mid end cars. Just compare the 4AT on the Santro / i10 and the 5AT on Civic/City and you will know. Looks like my Civic will run the Santro in FE close in town and beat it hollow on the highway.

I think A-Star AT is definitely a challenge for the i10 AT. Because, the typical buyer of automatics (not all, but typical) go for it because they are not interested in the hassle involved in shifting gears, pressing the clutch pedal and paying much attention to driving. Many of them dont know driving yet, are intimidated by the concept of clutch, gear etc (to them it is "technical"), many of them are women/people who want to get from one place to another in AC comfort. They couldn't care less about bhp, torque etc and if you tell them the engine is a 3-cylinder, they will say "no, its a petrol engine so there is no need to use a cylinder".

The only thing that is keeping many such potential buyers away, is the fuel efficiency factor of i10 AT. If A-Star beats i10 here and offers the car at a good price, buyers will go for it :thumbs up .

What I'd really like to see is a couple of compact diesel ATs. The Indica Vista with an AT would be nice. Similarly a Ritz Diesel AT would be a great city vehicle for high-mileage use.

Edit: Have a Santro AT since 2007 and mileage depends greatly on driving style. It gives 10-11 kmpl when I drive it, but drops to around 9kmpl when the wife drives it. On highways it consistently gives about 15kmpl.

Cheers.

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Originally Posted by rajushank84 (Post 1977008)

Another reason people go for Automatics is that they want to pay attention to the driving rather than shifting gears.

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Originally Posted by carboy (Post 1976805)

All the cars mentioned are subcompact - not compact.
Corolla, Civic etc fall under Compact, I think.

Carboy, Welcome to Indian term :) Corolla and Civic are more of Luxury Mid size.

Prem.

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Originally Posted by flyingspur (Post 1976989)

@flyingspur: Kindly have a look at this thread -> Team-BHP - View Poll Results. 46% of the people are getting around 8 - 10, which to me is very very low. But then again, if one wants to get AT with ABS, then he has to go for the highest variant of i10 which would cost a bomb. If maruti could launch AT in Ritz Vxi, then we could have a much cheaper alternative.

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Originally Posted by ampere (Post 1976764)

I guess they only thinking of Moms dropping their kids to school!
They need to think beyond!

What do you mean by that?

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Originally Posted by nithi (Post 1977178)

What do you mean by that?

What I meant is that they need to have AT options in bigger hatches cars as well. Not just an A-Star, where back seat is almost not there. As other mentioned, even I am of an opinion that it would be good to have an AT on 1.2L models as well (Swift/Ritz etc).

AT's will definately grow in popularity, the only thing holding them back over the years was 1) The fuel Effeciency and 2) The loss of fun in driving.

With more grear steps in AT, DSG, Torque Converter & CVT all maturing as technology, today one even sees AT's where are more effecient than the equvalent MT's. (Like in the case of Laura).

Yes we can look at a significantly higher number of cars with AT in the future, but it will still take at least 5 years for them to be the main stay in India.

Any idea guys how is SX4 Automatic selling? This is the 1st 4 gear AT box Maruti is using, Earlier once had 3 gear AT box, which is used in wangonR flopped in front of Santro AT.