[amalji]

Originally Posted by sups

I am having a strange problem with Liva. Since you have experienced the car very minutely, I have a question for you.

My wife travels about 60 km everyday in the back seat while my driver drives. Earlier it was Getz and now it is Liva. She feels that in congested roads, the same driver accelerates faster and also brakes harder in Liva than in the Getz. As a result, she always undergoes back and forth motion in Liva leading to lot of discomfort. So, even if Liva is more settled (less bumpy) in the back seat than that of Getz, it feels less comfortable in congested roads due to back and forth motion. She attributed the reason to lighter weight of Liva, but I do not think so. When I talked to the driver, he told me that Liva has more pickup and sharper breaks and the effect is due to that. Did you have any such experience coming from the back seat passengers?

Yes. :-D
I get addicted to the peppiness of the Etios cousins and sometimes do those fast acceleration and as a result of that, sharp braking as well. While, it's fun for the driver and the passenger on front seat it won't be the same for passengers on back seat.

So, what I do is to enforce seat belts even for passengers on back seat and then ask them not to worry about the quick acceleration/deceleration. In your case, in addition to seat belts, you can ask your driver to shift early.

2nd gear at 10 kmph
3rd at 25 kmph
4th at 40 kmph
5th at 70 kmph ( since the top gear is very tall on the Etios )
Ask him to be gentle on the accelerator as well.
But, the lack of turbo lag do tempts you to get into a peppy driving style. And those best in class brakes gives you even more confidence to accelerate.

[saadat1992]

@amalji - is it only the Etios that has a tall 5th gear? I thought both the liva and etios had the same specs.

[amalji]

Originally Posted by saadat1992

@amalji - is it only the Etios that has a tall 5th gear? I thought both the liva and etios had the same specs.

Meant to say-'Etios cousins'. So yes, the same is applicable for the liva as well. :-)

[amalji]

Originally Posted by Rufus_M

I have a few clarifications to make.

1) Though Fiat A** isn't as good as Toyota, it is not as bad as it is made out to be.

I gauge a company's customer focus from the attitude they show towards after sales. In the case of FIAT they started off by giving the service to another company - TVS ( which is not known to provide good service ). Even 2 lakh bookings for the Uno did not change their mind. That was a huge opportunity for them to take control of the Indian market. They still sat back and relaxed thinking that Indians do not deserve FIAT's own after sales. Now, they are in a position where inspite of their engine being used on most diesel hatches in the country, their own cars fitted with the same engine ( and the superior 90 HP engine ) sell in 3 digit figures! And the only reason is their attitude towards after sales. Only God will knows who is going to handle their after sales 3 or 4 years from now. That's the kind of impression that they have set in the Indian market ( inspite of coming up with those fantastic engines and cars ).

Originally Posted by Rufus_M

2) Spares maybe a concern for Palio users, but Punto/Linea users don't face that problem. I have an Punto & I stand by my point. The spares have never been a problem till now.

When I buy a car, I buy it for 10 years ( not the EMI period of 5 years ). So, if a recently stopped product like the Palio is facing spare availability concerns, I'm very much concerned about the situation of Linea/Punto 5 years from now especially since FIAT is not selling it in good numbers.

My friend's Palio ( 1.6 L Petrol ) is in the workshop for 2 months due to the lack of availability of spares. And that's a huge concern for me. My friend's Esteem ( my own X-vehicle ) doesn't face any kind of issues with spare availability even 5 years after Maruti has stopped production of the vehicle. That's what happens, when companies really take the ownership of after sales.

Originally Posted by Rufus_M

3) The service costs & spare costs aren't high at all. The 15,000kms/1 year service costed me about 5000 bucks which I think is reasonable. Major contribution to this bill is the synthetic oil used for MJD.

Except in the case of VW and Skoda, service costs are manageable for most companies during the warranty period. It's post warranty period, that the real difference comes in. Again, not much of an issue, if we plan to sell the car in 5 years.

Regardless, you will find that the regular replacements are done after a longer time interval ( by a long margin ) in the likes of Toyota. for eg:- , air filter, fuel filter, timing belt replacement intervals.

And when an issue do come up, the time required to replace a spare will be lesser for a Toyota because their cars are designed to be serviced easily. And that's the reason why they are able to complete their regular service in 2 hours flat including washing ( even though they promise 1 hour )

Originally Posted by Rufus_M

4) Yes, the clutch slave cylinder was an issue in some cars. Fiat has replaced them FOC. Punto/Linea comes with a 4 year warranty & they don't make a fuss in honoring warranty.

Regards,
Rufus

More than the cost, what I'm concerned about is the hassle associated with it.

[DRIV3R]

Though OT, thought would clear the air a bit.

1) Everything is already in place by FIAT, FIAT has started opening exclusive sales and service centres over India.

2) I believe spares availability would also be much better due to Point #1, also current gen Fiat owners do not face any spare issues as with the Palio. Do you mean to say all MASS still stock all spares for the Esteem? Try getting a spare for the Esteem D.

3) Warranty or not, Fiats never give any mechanical problems, go figure, they are as reliable as a say a Swift DDiS.

4) The GP was launched with the plastic clutch slave cylinder which did not fare well in Indian conditions, maybe due to poor QC of the component or anything else, FIAT replaced the same in all the models twice, and the metal CSC in place now has not reported any failures. It is wrong to make a sweeping statement that Fiats and clutch failures go hand in hand.

Cheers!

[amalji]

Originally Posted by DRIV3R

Though OT, thought would clear the air a bit.

1) Everything is already in place by FIAT, FIAT has started opening exclusive sales and service centres over India.

2) I believe spares availability would also be much better due to Point #1, also current gen Fiat owners do not face any spare issues as with the Palio.

The important point is "has started opening" and "would also be much better". We don't know yet how this is going to transpire into. So, as a consumer, I do not want to take risk at this point of time. If FIAT starts taking after sales seriously, well and good for them. I might consider them later, but not in the current scenario for sure.

Originally Posted by DRIV3R

Do you mean to say all MASS still stock all spares for the Esteem? Try getting a spare for the Esteem D.

No, but invariably, I'm sure that I'll not have to wait 2 months for a spare. And Maruti parts can be easily procured, even if the spare is immediately not available at a particular service center.

Originally Posted by DRIV3R

3) Warranty or not, Fiats never give any mechanical problems, go figure, they are as reliable as a say a Swift DDiS.

Might be. But, my experience is a bit different. I'm seeing 80,000 odd kms run Palio break its timing belt, and cause engine damage.
And the clutch slave cylinder issue which causes break down in the middle of a trip for a new vehicle.

I've used Maruti and seen people use Maruti, Toyota. I simply don't see these sort of issues around me inspite of the fact that Maruti sells almost 100 times the car FIAT sells in a month. So, there has to be something good that these Japanese people are doing.

It could be the lightness of the design,
it could be in the excellent proactive after sales care. I'm not sure.

My friend asked for quote for his 10 year old 1.6L Palio Petrol, and what he got ranged from 20,000 to 40,000 ! Everyone who wants to buy the car has only one issue. They are afraid of spare availability and after sales of FIAT.

Originally Posted by DRIV3R

4) The GP was launched with the plastic clutch slave cylinder which did not fare well in Indian conditions, maybe due to poor QC of the component or anything else, FIAT replaced the same in all the models twice, and the metal CSC in place now has not reported any failures. It is wrong to make a sweeping statement that Fiats and clutch failures go hand in hand.

Cheers!

There are 2 points to be noted here. Inspite of the their vast experience and designing the national diesel engine, they still made such a silly error which could cause break downs for a new car.
Even when the first correction was made, it was not good enough, and they had to make another correction. That too on a very critical component of the vehicle. That can only be caused due to flawed management or flawed quality control.

I know that FIAT cars are excellent in terms of built, ride stability and the comfort they offer. But, somehow they haven't got the basics right. I hope and pray that their current strategies like "OWN after sales" prove to be genuine and help them win the hearts of Indian customers.

[DRIV3R]

^^ Agree with most of what you said, Palio timing belt example notwithstanding! Fair enough. Yes, FIAT needs to pull up their socks and get their act together, be it before sales or after sales. The mistake done was outsourcing Sales and Service to TATA, they shot their own feet by doing that. I am a victim of both poor sales and poor after sales experiences and I took lots of pains to handle those. I still stand by what I said though. Times are changing.

[amalji]

Originally Posted by amalji

But, I told him that I'll keep a check on it when I go for a long drive next time.

I had a chance to take my car for 2 long drives. ( Cochin to Trivandrum and back ). On both occasions, the problem did not come back. So, the Air filter cleaning + ECU firmware update seems to have fixed the problem.

[amalji]

Etios is at 27,500 kms now and it met with a small accident. I was overtaking a car when a bike which was travelling on the line meant for bikes suddenly took a 45 degree turn to the right. It was coming head on. I was at 70 kmph and he was probably at 30 to 40 kmph. I honked and steered the vehicle to the left. The biker didn't seem to have any effect ! I missed the head on collision by a whisker. But, he hit me hard on my right ORVM and it broke. I thanked God that nothing happened to him, and continued my journey.


View from front side of the broken right ORVM


View from back of the broken right ORVM


The side view mirror after replacement


The cover of side view mirror was not replaced. They just rubbed it to hide the scratches as much as possible. Looks decent.

Experience at Toyota Service center, Kalamassery, Cochin

Took the car to service center by 11am and got it back by 1pm.
Total cost - Rs. 1175/-
There are 3 parts involved in the side view mirror of an Etios - The Assemply, the mirror & the cover ( with body coloured paint ). I had to replace only the mirror and assembly.

I also bought an ELM327 OBD2 Bluetooth Diagnostic interface. More details posted on the liva official team-bhp review thread


A sample snapshot from the torque pro android app which is fetching data from the OBD2 interface over Bluetooth

[saadat1992]

Thank god no one was injured. Happy to see that the car is alright!
That's the case with most bikers. They think can swerve away to safety but end up hitting other vehicles. This happens a lot in Chennai. Most of the scratches on my old Santro were because of those over confident bikers who think that they can squeeze through!
Take care and drive safe Amalji!

[amalji]

Originally Posted by amalji

Then I asked whether the newly manufactured Etios is fitted with the old kind of suspension setup or the new one and he replied that it's the old kind.
So, I decided to live with the old suspensions especially since I do slow down on bad roads in which case the sound will never be heard.
And it also acts as a warning alarm to make sure that I slow down adequately on bad roads instead of banging it hard.

1) The information given by Toyota SA seems to be wrong. I have a friend in Kochi who drove a new liva ( around 1 month old ) and he mentioned that the thud sound was not there even after trying it on terrains which used to create that sound on his car ( liva - 1 year old ). So, Toyota indeed seems to be using the new suspension setup on newly manufactured cars.

2) I tried out a Liva Diesel with the new suspension setup, and it did not feel bad at all as far as comfort is considered. It felt more composed than even the old suspensions at high speeds as well. So, I've decided to go with the new suspensions. Called Nippon Toyota, Cochin. They mentioned that I'll be getting the new suspension design by February last week. Eagerly waiting for that.

[saadat1992]

Originally Posted by amalji

1) The information given by Toyota SA seems to be wrong. I have a friend in Kochi who drove a new liva ( around 1 month old ) and he mentioned that the thud sound was not there even after trying it on terrains which used to create that sound on his car ( liva - 1 year old ). So, Toyota indeed seems to be using the new suspension setup on newly manufactured cars.

2) I tried out a Liva Diesel with the new suspension setup, and it did not feel bad at all as far as comfort is considered. It felt more composed than even the old suspensions at high speeds as well. So, I've decided to go with the new suspensions. Called Nippon Toyota, Cochin. They mentioned that I'll be getting the new suspension design by February last week. Eagerly waiting for that.

WOAH! New Suspension setup? Toyota are updating the Etios twins in bits and pieces. Why so?

The new ones are more composed on the highway? I feel the ones in my 7 month old Liva are good enough!

How much did they quote for the new suspension setup? If they're affordable, i'll get them for mine too!

[amalji]

Originally Posted by saadat1992

WOAH! New Suspension setup? Toyota are updating the Etios twins in bits and pieces. Why so?

They are giving customized solutions for people who need it. I'm in love with Toyota for the effort they are taking in fixing each minor glitch of the Etios.

Originally Posted by saadat1992

The new ones are more composed on the highway? I feel the ones in my 7 month old Liva are good enough!

The new ones are a bit more on the stiffer side. So, they provide even better composure and lesser body roll on high speeds. On low speeds, it's not as soft as the old suspensions but, I never felt it hard even on low speeds.
But, if you get a chance, do try out an etios/liva with the new suspensions fitted before taking the dive.

Originally Posted by saadat1992

How much did they quote for the new suspension setup? If they're affordable, i'll get them for mine too!

It's FREE and will be replaced under warranty ( if you make a complaint about the suspension thud sound while taking a hump fast ). Also, let them know that some of your friends in team-bhp got the new suspension setup.

[saadat1992]

Originally Posted by amalji

It's FREE and will be replaced under warranty ( if you make a complaint about the suspension thud sound while taking a hump fast ). Also, let them know that some of your friends in team-bhp got the new suspension setup.

That's good news.
A friend of mine was telling that Toyota are planning to make a recall for the suspension glitch.
So, I'm looking forward to take my Liva and get the suspension replaced this weekend! Thanks for the info amalji!!

[automachine]

Any idea on what all parts gets replaced in the suspension setup?