I very common question that I'm asked is that when this vehicle is guzzling so much time, effort and money why don't I sell that off and buy a Toyota Fortuner or the newly launched Pajero Sports? *
Well the explanation is not so simple to answer in a short writeup, still I'll try. My LandCruiser's now 16 years old and running in its 17th year. That's quite a lot of time for a vehicle running on the road, I think. Additionally its done close to 200K Kms, though the Odometer shows 158K kms. I believe that the 2 owner a dealer from which Sree(the 3 owner) bought the vehicle must have tampered with the ODO. I'm the 4th owner.
No doubt both the vehicles the T Fort and the P-Sports are fanatic vehicles but I have only one basis of comparison, the Landcruiser 80 Series which I've driven now for 58000 Kms in about 2.5 Years. I've driven the Fortuner and didn't like it, this is obviously when comparing it to my vehicle. I find the drivability, road presence, ability to repair and get it serviced much better.The thought of replacing it with the Fortuner came to my mind too. I've spent close to 2.5L on the vehicle in the last 2.5 Years due to the Old Age factor. On a totality I've spent much more but I'm not counting expenses like Insurance, Accidental Repair, Normal Service & Tyres in this calculation as I would have spent a similar amount on the vehicle had it been a Fortuner or Pajero Sports.Now comes the drivability . I like driving the LandCruiser much more than I did the Fortuner, though I'll agree that I drove the Fortuner only for a short duration, but still I could gauge it, on maybe an overall level. One has to really drive it to experience what kind of a vehicle this(Landcruiser) is.
Additionally I'm a person with a slightly heavy foot, meaning though I don't drive fast but I like to let the suspension do the work while driving over potholes, bad roads and obviously no roads. And yes,I've* have driven it in mostly all kinds of terrains. For example once each to Leh, Ladakh, Lahual Spiti, 3 trips as a Rally Marshal to the Desert Storm, a trip to Goa and back, Diu & Gir, to name a few. Yes, I've had my share of hiccups with the vehicle with occasional breakdowns, Tyre bursts, fan belts breaking, power steering pump packing up, etc but most of these factors were due to the Old Age of the vehicle and owner error, which I believe and practice that if preventive maintenance is done, can be handled. Regarding the time, yes it take a bit of time and I do have drivers who can goto the workshop and stand on the heads of the mechanics to get the job done. They do infact when I get the normal services done. However whenever something critical needs to be done I prefer to be there personally due to only one reason, cauz I enjoy it and want to learn from it. Plus share it with the world.
Now comes the part on the amount of dough that I've spent on the vehicle till date. I've spent 2.5 lacs On the vehicle till date but the way I see it, the 2.50 lacs I spent isn't all loss. Like I bought the vehicle for an amount that today wouldn't even be enough to buy a brand new Mahindra Scorpio 4×4 or a Tata Safari, so I believe that I have much better vehicle comfort wise viz a viz the above two. Now on the worst case seaniro I can sell it easily for the same amount of money that I bought it for, infact,slightly more, I've got a few offers which mean that I'll earn some money of it, but for this post I'm assuming that I'll be able to sell it for what unpaid for it. So reasonably ,even if I can sell it for the same amount of money I bought it for, I'll end up losing 2.5 big ones. If that's the case, I take like this that I've haven't lost anything atall. Why you may ask? Because had it been a Fortuner and if I had paid 20L for it, I would have lost much more on the depreciation on the vehicle in 2 years than what I'm losing on the LandCruiser today. Additionally the bill has run up a bit high (some may think) is because I get all the work done from Toyota Authorized Workshop and not from road side mechanics. Further any or all the parts that go bad, I have a a habit of replacing them with brand new OEM replacements. So they are bound to cost a bit more.
The reason I blog the goings of my vehicle is that, I want to share it with the world so that tomorrow anyone wanting to walk the same path know exactly what to expect and learn from my experiences.
Now comes to the point on the reliability of the vehicle. I simply say that even if for once I thought that the vehicle is unsafe, I, for all the money in the world wouldn't risk taking my children and wife for out station family vacations in this. That's all I can say.
Cheers guys.
Quote:
Originally Posted by joshiviv Great writeup Harjeev. I have been thinking about getting a highway cruiser mainly for Gurgaon-Chandigarh and sometimes beyond, and was thinking of settling with the current crop of 7-seaters. But now you are giving me some ideas. |
Thanks buddy. I've written another post above. I hope you might like it.
Mod Note: Please do not copy-paste text from an external editor. It introduces superfluous tags which affects the reading experience.
Also do not abbreviate names of cars: instead use Fortuner for "T-Fort" Landcruiser for "TLC" etc.