[Dr.AD]

Originally Posted by SkyWalker

Anytime you get into the 4 line highways towards Dharmapuri. 150 comes before you realize!

For those who like to do 150+, this rating system does not apply anyway. The reason is that this rating is based on the assumption of "equal weights or priority" to all categories. However, if someone drives at 150+ (even for a short duration of time), then I feel they should only care for airbags and ABS+EBD, and use a rating system that gives highest weights to this and pretty much ignores anything else . Remember, you are over-depending on your Airbags and ABS when you are doing such speeds in India. Make sure you have those models with 6 or even 8 airbags, and all four disc brakes.

On a serious note, to a large extent none of these 26 cars, and certainly none of the highways in India are safe enough at 150+ kmph. It should never be done in India.

[pranav_mankad]

Hi SmartCat,

Good Work! Quite an eyeopening information.
Here is a suggestion:
How about adding "Adjustable Lumber Support in front seats" ( Driver and/or co-passenger front seats) as one of the feature under "Convenience"?

[SkyWalker]

Originally Posted by Dr.AD

On a serious note, to a large extent none of these 26 cars, and certainly none of the highways in India are safe enough at 150+ kmph. It should never be done in India.

We are mixing two things.

One - can they do it - most of the cars in the comparison can easily do it - ANHC,Cedia, Octavia & Verna for example.

The next is whether its safe in India. Thats a qualitative discussion and this thread is not the best place for that. And of course, we want everyone to buckle up, stick to legal limits and drive responsibly

[RaguHolla]

Hi Smartcat,

How about adding rear passenger reading lamps also part of features.

Edit: Also height adjustable seat belts, seat belt warning.

[SmartCat]

Originally Posted by NutsNBolts

Following luxury/safety features are worth a look (All available in Linea).

Originally Posted by pranav_mankad

How about adding "Adjustable Lumber Support in front seats" ( Driver and/or co-passenger front seats) as one of the feature under "Convenience"?

Originally Posted by RaguHolla

Hi Smartcat, How about adding rear passenger reading lamps also part of features.

The features list is getting bigger and bigger .

Meanwhile, I have been busy lately, scouring the used car market on the weekend - so couldn't get the features list compiled.

Originally Posted by UKR

The Linea MJD's 30-80 and 40-100 in gear acceleration timings was dejavu for me, I mean I drive a Linea MJD E+ and have always felt that the car picks up speed really fast from the 3rd gear onwards.

A small correction (somebody pointed this out) - the timings are for 20 - 80 kmph in 3rd gear and not 30 - 80 kmph. Anyway, yes - from my brief test drive, I found that Linea MJD really flies in the 4th gear, especially when compared to my Optra 1.8 petrol (takes 18 secs in 4th gear to go from 40 - 100 kmph apparently)

[ACM]

We keep pairing up cars in comparision tests, but are our pairings correct?

We take the Linea and pitch it against the City, calling the linea more VFM, but the city does not have a diesel option and yet sells 4X times the Linea

We take the Dzire and compare with the Manza - One does 8K units and the other 7K and both have petrol and diesel options and are similarly priced, but are hugely different cars, infact the Manza is more similar to the Sx4/fiest/verna/linea in size and features than the Dzire (a smaller car), so here a VFM car with similar numbers is seen as competing with the another one at the same price point.

Seems that Pricing is the main parameter that people consider while slotting cars into categories, irrespective of the size, power and features.

Just shooting of a thought. Somehow the Linea and Manza are both from segments higher but pricing drags them to lower segement competetion.

[SmartCat]

According to me, most car buyers first fix a price range. Then they choose between petrol or diesel. And then look at different brands, take a test drive and then decide.
So, if a buyer is not very particular about a petrol or a diesel model, he will compare a City with a Linea MJD.

Now, if price is not a major issue, a City buyer might even look at the Civic!

According to me, size (length) of a car does not matter much to most buyers - unless there are garage parking issues. Basically, since price is the first filter, a DZire buyer will look at the Manza too, and vice versa (unless they have issues with the company/brand).

[Car&me]

Price does play an important and more oftenly the first filter in a car buyer's mind.

I also feel that most of the buyers end up buying the car that they have seen the most. The sightings could be on the road, or neighbours, or relatives, friends, office so on. Based on this sightings they prepare a mental list of few (usually 2 or 3 variety) and go after them and do a TD. The TD they do is also most of the time 1 or 2 kms just to have a feel of it. Rarely they try to look into any other source to compare what other cars could be available in market on the same price range.

And I am glad that we are not part of the above group.
If we are we would not have had smartcat doing a smart compilation and we would not have been glued to this thread.

Bravo smartcat.

[akaush]

Hi Smartcat,

We (me and my wife) are still waiting for your final list and have decided to test ride the top 5 cars from your list (+scorpio) and then finally book what we feel is the best.

Great job till now. I wanna see the Final winner now.

-Ajay

[shankaranand]

Originally Posted by smartcat

The features list is getting bigger and bigger .

Meanwhile, I have been busy lately, scouring the used car market on the weekend - so couldn't get the features list compiled.



A small correction (somebody pointed this out) - the timings are for 20 - 80 kmph in 3rd gear and not 30 - 80 kmph. Anyway, yes - from my brief test drive, I found that Linea MJD really flies in the 4th gear, especially when compared to my Optra 1.8 petrol (takes 18 secs in 4th gear to go from 40 - 100 kmph apparently)

Smartcat, How about rating the cars based on the resale value of the car as well?

I was the proud owner of Indigo SX which cost close to 7lakhs in 2006 only to sell it at 3 lakhs recently. In comparison, a swift which was bought for 4.8 lakhs was sold for 3.45 lakhs to Maruti true value. (I am sure, it would have fetched higher price if sold to individual user).

It hurts when your car value depreciates at much higher rate as compared to others. So, I think resale values/brand image of the car companies also should be included into the mix..

[mkh]

Originally Posted by shankaranand

Smartcat, How about rating the cars based on the resale value of the car as well?

I was the proud owner of Indigo SX which cost close to 7lakhs in 2006 only to sell it at 3 lakhs recently. In comparison, a swift which was bought for 4.8 lakhs was sold for 3.45 lakhs to Maruti true value. (I am sure, it would have fetched higher price if sold to individual user).

It hurts when your car value depreciates at much higher rate as compared to others. So, I think resale values/brand image of the car companies also should be included into the mix..

A 4 year old swift for 3.45 lacs??? Resale does matter a lot- but that factor is very tough to incorporate. A lot of people do not look at it if they are going to keep the car for 4-5 years, and also the value is driven by market factors that change many times.
However any maruti,hyundai,honda cars have decent resale and fiat,ford have bad resale( as per bangalore markets)

[SkyWalker]

Originally Posted by shankaranand

Smartcat, How about rating the cars based on the resale value of the car as well?

Smartcat - i really like this suggestion. And actually you got a very good way to measure that - for most cars at least. Assume a 2009 launch, and calculate the depreciation of the car now, and year later from Carwale (i would have said five years - but quite a lot of these cars aren't five years old).

[echo77]

This is an excellent thread. Muchos kudos to smartcat!

I have created a TCO spreadsheet based on initial costs, fuel costs etc. I will create a new thread for it.

[SmartCat]

Originally Posted by akaush

Hi Smartcat, We (me and my wife) are still waiting for your final list and have decided to test ride the top 5 cars from your list (+scorpio) and then finally book what we feel is the best.

The results will be out in 2 days flat

Originally Posted by shankaranand

Smartcat, How about rating the cars based on the resale value of the car as well?

Originally Posted by SkyWalker

And actually you got a very good way to measure that - for most cars at least. Assume a 2009 launch, and calculate the depreciation of the car now, and year later from Carwale

Yeah, I originally thought about incorporating depreciation into the quantitative rankings. But there are couple of things to consider -

- The expected price in Carwale is just that - the expected price. The final price at which the deal is struck is not known. Heck, we don't even know if the sale is successful.

- Different sellers have cars with different expected price, different year of manufacture & different kms run.

- For new cars, we don't have any data.

Originally Posted by echo77

I have created a TCO spreadsheet based on initial costs, fuel costs etc. I will create a new thread for it.

hey I'm not sure if I got that. What's TCO?

Round No. 7 - FEATURES & EQUIPMENT

OK, here I need help from the owners of the respective cars. Websites don't mention if a particular car has got dead pedal or bootlamp or front arm rest. So some of the inputs I have entered is from whatever knowledge I have about these cars.

I'm not allocating points yet - waiting for the features list to be reasonably accurate after I get all your inputs.

Note: If a particular feature has not been listed inspite of you mentioning it in this thread, its probably because we don't have data on it in either the website or e-brochure.

[echo77]

Originally Posted by smartcat

hey I'm not sure if I got that. What's TCO?

Total Cost of Ownership

Here's the thread:
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian...et-sedans.html