[BLACK1]

Dear Autoindian, congrats for maintaining the car in such a good condition and for maintaining such detailed service history. We also own a tata indica v2 dls 2002 model done close to 115k kms. My car is now showing signs of engine overhaul as it is showing signs of backcompression (spitting out engine oil from dip stick area). Though I must admit that I have taken utmost care of the engine as I changed the engine oil within 5-7 k kms , used to idle the car for 3-5 mins everyday , cleaned airfilter every week and drove very sedately so I am a bit disappointed with this engine behaviour. I also want to know that whether any changes were made in the engines (475 idi engines) of later models to resolve the issue of high oil consumption due to premature wearing of piston rings. Are the Vista / INDIGO CS tdi engine also plagued with the same problems after one lac Kms? Thanks in advance.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by BLACK1

Dear Autoindian, congrats for maintaining the car in such a good condition and for maintaining such detailed service history.

Thank you BLACK1 for your compliments (sorry as I don't know your real name). , I love my car & really care for her, that is why it has been maintained in good condition. My wife calls me mad, possessed & what not, but I am ready to hear anything for my car.

We also own a tata indica v2 dls 2002 model done close to 115k kms. My car is now showing signs of engine overhaul as it is showing signs of backcompression (spitting out engine oil from dip stick area). Though I must admit that I have taken utmost care of the engine as I changed the engine oil within 5-7 k kms , used to idle the car for 3-5 mins everyday , cleaned airfilter every week and drove very sedately so I am a bit disappointed with this engine behaviour.

I can understand, when you take so much care & even then you get such issues, you tend to get disappointed. As oil is getting sprayed form the oil dip stick, it is an indication that the engine is loosing compression. If you want to keep the car for couple of more years then you can get the piston rings replaced.

More than 4 years ago when I had been to Maruti showroom to check out on the Dezire (I wanted to trade in my Indica, which had run 47K kms then) I asked them to do my car's valuation. The evaluator asked me to start the car & he opened the bonnet, removed the oil dip stick. He pulled the accelerator cable, raced the engine above 3500 rpm. Did this for quite some time. He then took a ride, accelerating harshly till 3500rpm, before changing the gears (with AC on). Drove for a km. Again opened the bonnet, removed the dip stick. To his dismay he could not see any oil slpashes through the oil well, which he was very sure of. He said the car is in good condition as of now & warned that it will start giving trouble after another 15K kms. How wrong he was. Car has run 82K kms after that day & still there are no oil splashes from the oil well. In the 10K running after every oil change I had rarely ever done the engine oil top-up. The oil level is maintained without much loss.

I also want to know that whether any changes were made in the engines (475 idi engines) of later models to resolve the issue of high oil consumption due to premature wearing of piston rings. Are the Vista / INDIGO CS tdi engine also plagued with the same problems after one lac Kms? Thanks in advance.

I don't know the exact technical details, but mine is the 2004 Indica V2 refresh model. I have never faced this issue of high oil consumption due to premature wearing of piston rings (touchwood). One contributing factor for this could be my daily high running @ 65 kms. Short runs of few kms do take a toll on engine & its life.

[drsingh]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

I am in a bit of dilemma, whether to replace my Indica with a 7 seater compact MUV like Ertiga or go for 2 cars, a very compact hatch, like Nano for city & office runabouts complimented by a used people mover like Innova. The issue with the latter option is that I have only one parking space & the lesser utilized car will have to be parked out in the open on the road. Hopefully in a years time I am expecting to have a perfect replacement in my garage.

My thought process is along similar lines.I think you will be best served by the emerging monocoque segment. i.e. ertiga/enjoy/ . by 2015 Honda,toyota,renault,Tata might have their vehicles in the fray.I think this is going to be the hottest category for the next decade.As road infrastructure improves and people look for long distance tourers that are efficient but not too unwieldy.

I like the enjoy as my next car mainly because of the roof height and second row captain seats that recline. also because my dad and the ladies in the family can drive it as driving dynamics are hatch like.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by drsingh

My thought process is along similar lines.I think you will be best served by the emerging monocoque segment. i.e. ertiga/enjoy/ . by 2015 Honda,toyota,renault,Tata might have their vehicles in the fray.I think this is going to be the hottest category for the next decade.As road infrastructure improves and people look for long distance tourers that are efficient but not too unwieldy.

Ertiga is on top of my list, if only it had a 1.6L MJD engine my decision would have been much easier. I didn't give much thought to Enjoy earlier, but it seems a no-nonsense, VFM package. only worry factor is its Chinese origin & many parts are sourced from China. If I get good feedback from the initial owners then I can surely consider it.

I like the enjoy as my next car mainly because of the roof height and second row captain seats that recline. also because my dad and the ladies in the family can drive it as driving dynamics are hatch like.

It would be very cumbersome to drive a people mover for the daily office run or city errands. In my case the people mover would be brought into service only during weekends or family vacations. Hence I am still tossing with the 2 car philosophy, a used people mover (Innova being top of the list) & a small/fuel efficient hatch (perhaps a Nano diesel), fingers crossed. I may even take a bizarre decision of going for just one car, a Linea (1.6 MJD) if ever it gets launched & it strikes my heart strings

[AutoIndian]

Today was a very boring day, reason being it was a mandatory working day & I had to go to office despite being a Saturday. The only silver lining about the day was this, the picture below taken while returning from office. The odo crossed the 1.3 Lakh kms mark (sorry for the poor picture quality as it was taken on my mobile cam). I have already done the oil change service. However two jobs are yet to be done, replacing the front RHS bearing & the RHS ball joint. Now even if I am driving at a speed above 50 kmph, the humming noise from front RHS becomes very prominent. Need to address it before it worsens.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

I have already done the oil change service. However two jobs are yet to be done, replacing the front RHS bearing & the RHS ball joint. Now even if I am driving at a speed above 50 kmph, the humming noise from front RHS becomes very prominent. Need to address it before it worsens.

Hi Friends,

Went to my friendly garage (Venus Auto) @ 09:30 in the morning (even before it was opened). After waiting for 30 mins, my car was taken on the ram. Right side wheel had play in ball joint & bearing was making noise when wheel was rotated. Rest of the wheels were fine & rotating freely without making any noise. Decided to replace both. The suspension & its bushes were checked & were found to be OK.

Car was brought down from the ram & taken into a bay. The RHS front wheel was removed, brake calipers & rotor disc was also removed. When the mechanic tried removing the hub (& the bearing with it) from the axle, with slight hammering it would not come out. He tried hard with hammering but was not successful. Finally they took the decision to remove the axle/drive shaft & did that. The axle was then taken over to the hydraulic press where the bearing was removed. New bearing was fitted. Hammering the axle at centre with a centre punch had made it bulge slightly and the nut was not fitting over the threads. The threads were then brought back in shape by grinding. Meanwhile the new lower ball joint was also fitted in place. Now the axle, hub, rotor, brake calipers all were assembled. Removal of axle had resulted in some gear box oil spillage, which was collected in a tub & was later topped up. I also got the air filter cleaned. The car was ready by 12pm.

When I took it for a spin, I observed that the steering wheel was tilted towards the left by more than 45 degrees. When I showed it to the Mr Harish (garage owner), he said that this will get corrected during wheel alignment. I then paid the bill (part & labor charges below) & went straight to Darshan Tyres. He was amazed to see the steering wheel tilted so much. I told him that the ball joint & bearing have been replaced. Within 20 mins he brought back the steering wheel in the centre position & perfectly aligned the wheels. Now the car runs absolutely straight when both the hands are lifted off the steering wheel & most importantly the humming & creaking sound have vanished for good

Front RHS Bearing 840.00
RH Lower ball joint 390.00
Total - Part Charges 1,230.00
RH Lower ball joint change labor 100.00
Front RHS Bearing change labor 250.00
Gear box oil top up
Air Filter cleaning
Discount -30.00
Total - Labour Charges 320.00
Grand Total 1550.00

Wheel Alignment @ Darshan Tyres, Chinchwad 200.00

Uploading some pictures that I had taken while servicing.

The wheel, rotor disc & calipers removed & the hub is visible



The RHS axle/drive shaft removed



New RHS lower ball joint fitted in place



Bearing being removed from the hub on press



Old bearing



New bearing



New bearing being fitted in the hub



Bearing circlip put in place



The hub being fitted on drive shaft



The hub being assembled on press

[Ashok Kumar.T.]

My Indica V2 has done 120,000 km 2004 model. Now i am facing a problem where there is insufficient power assist from the Power steering. My local mech changed the power steering oil. It has improved but is not perfect. Did any of you face similar problems? If so what could be the solution???


Note from Mod : Please use proper punctuation and avoid the use of SMS language (u, gr8, etc). Do see THIS THREAD before continuing. Thanks.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by Ashok Kumar.T.

Mt Indica V 2 has done 120,000 km 2004 model.Now i am facing a problem where there is insufficient power assist from the Power steering. My local mech changed the power steering oil.It has improved but is not perfect.Did any of u face similar problems? If so what could be the solution???

I have not faced such a problem until now (touchwood).

(Courtesy one of the experts in other forum) Probable causes, in order of importance :
1) Main valve in PS system faulty --- will make steering hard, fluid will not leak out, will make sucking sound.
2) Air in system ---- needs to be vented.
3) PS pump not developing enough pressure.
Remove the PS fluid container cap & try the steering.

[AutoIndian]

Yesterday had been to Pandit Auto, Pimpri to check out the Vista D90 VX model for my brother in law. While we were finalizing the quotation I asked for my car to be evaluated. The valuator checked the RC book. He then got into the car checked electricals, odo etc. Rotated the steering wheel to complete right, then rotated to complete left. He asked me if I feel the steering to be hard, I said I don't feel so. He then opened the bonnet, removed the oil dip stick & raced the engine to around 3K rpm. I guess he was looking for some oil splashes from the oil well. Repeated it 2-3 times, but for his bad luck he didn't find any. He then checked all the door crimps, by removing the rubber door beadings.

After doing all the above checks for 20 odd minutes, the value quoted was a dismal, INR 70K . I was expecting at least in the range of one lakh, if not more. They purposefully quote a low price & then make the exchange lucartive by offering INR 30K exchange bonus.

p.s: Yesterday the gear shifting had become very hard. The clutch pedal had gone down considerably compared to the brake pedal. Obviously even when the clutch pedal was fully depressed the clutch was not getting disengaged completely, resulting is harder shifting. Took it to my mechanic. He said that he will need to put a bearing spacer at the end of the clutch cable to lift the pedal up. He did it in 5 minutes, charged Rs 50 & the gear shifting again has become very smooth. My journey with my Indica continues

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

p.s: Yesterday the gear shifting had become very hard. The clutch pedal had gone down considerably compared to the brake pedal. Obviously even when the clutch pedal was fully depressed the clutch was not getting disengaged completely, resulting is harder shifting. Took it to my mechanic. He said that he will need to put a bearing spacer at the end of the clutch cable to lift the pedal up. He did it in 5 minutes, charged Rs 50 & the gear shifting again has become very smooth. My journey with my Indica continues

The above joy of smooth gear shift did not last for long & within a week of the above adjustment the ghost raised its ugly head again . Twice I faced the problem when I had to slot my car in the office parking lot. I could not simply slot in the first gear, putting in the reverse gear had also become a nightmare. Somehow I managed with adjusting the clutch cable & drove the car for 2 days (150kms). In the worst case, I had to switch off the engine, then the first gear would slot in easily. I would perform the same exercise for putting in reverse.

Before any major catastrophe could happen I took the car to my mechanic yesterday morning @ 09:30am. He said the clutch cable is absolutely fine & the problem could be in the clutch fork, for which the clutch/gearbox would have to be dismantled. I told them to start asap. Meanwhile I had to leave the garage to go to the Concorde showroom to do the PDI of the Vista D90 for my B-I-L. I told Ramesh (garage owner) to call me when the clutch is fully dismantled. I got a call @ 12:00 noon & Ramesh told be that the clutch fork is cracked & bent. It will have to be replaced. I asked him if he had a spare in stock else get one asap from the nearby Tata Service centre. He said, he had one in stock, I gave him the green signal immediately. New fork was fitted, all the assemblies put back in place, the drained gear oil & coolant was refilled & car handed back to me by 03:00pm. Since the steering & suspension ball joints were removed I had to get the wheel alignment done after this work

The charges were as follows


The 2 cracks clearly visible


The wider crack from another angle


Harish said that this is a common problem in the older generation Indicas. The fork is welded on a shaft. Usually the welding joint is the place where the fork develops a crack or bends. In the new design the fork & shaft is an integral part made out of forged steel. Forgings usually have higher fatigue strength & such problem of cracking/bending won't occur in the new fork design.

Moral of the story:

With things like these I sometimes doubt on Tata's engineering capabilities. A part like clutch fork, which is subjected to so much stress during daily usage, was not a forged part in the first place . They had to make the change after multiple failure reports from the field.

[AutoIndian]

Friends though it is a bit late to report this I wanted to share this with the group. After I got the clutch fork changed, I was doing my week end ritual of washing my car last week. When I opened the bonnet, I saw some shiny metal piece in the recess near the engine mounting. On having a closer look & fiddling it by hand, I realized that it was a 8-9mm size spanner sitting happily in my engine bay. It then clicked me that when I got my car from the garage on 23rd, one of the careless mechanics might have dropped it in there & forgot to remove it from there. I drove the car for 3 days, almost 200 kms, with that tiny spanner merrily sitting there in my engine bay. Had it not fallen in that recess, it could have easily got into one of the belts/engine parts and caused havoc, while going over a speed breaker/pot hole. I thank my stars that a major catastrophe was averted.

My sincere request to all TBHPians, always have a cursory look in the engine bay or underneath it at least once in a week to see that all things are in place & no foreign object has been inadvertently left there in the engine bay (as in my case). This is all the more important after you get your car from the service centre/garage.

[johnruben]

I have a Indica turbo 52k km on odo, from last couple of months i am having one strange problem, low beam is not working, i have driven more than 3 times to prerana motors & all the three times they have changed the fuse & one time they even replaced the bulbs, the moment i bring home, its gone. Can anyone explain me why this is happening ?
Only the high beam works & the low beam doesnt, i have no idea what could be the problem.

My other problem is i hear a thud noise from vehicle's left side, could it be the suspension or something else, this happens only when i enter dirty pot holed roads, but in clean highway there is no sound.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by johnruben

I have a Indica turbo 52k km on odo, from last couple of months i am having one strange problem, low beam is not working, i have driven more than 3 times to prerana motors & all the three times they have changed the fuse & one time they even replaced the bulbs, the moment i bring home, its gone. Can anyone explain me why this is happening ?Only the high beam works & the low beam doesnt, i have no idea what could be the problem.

When you say the low beam is not working, are the low beam filaments of your bulbs getting fused or the filaments are good, but not getting on? You can visually inspect the filaments & check if they are good & not fused.

I will share my personal experience here. 6 years back I faced this problem of headlamps (upper beam) fusing, 4 lamps in two days were gone. Courtesy to the discussions in TIUG group, the problem was traced to the alternator. Alternator was generating voltage spikes (due to a faulty voltage regulator) & these spikes were getting passed to the bulbs through the battery. Due to this issue the horn blew weakly at times & the tachometer needle was dancing to its glory. Overhauling the alternator at Lucas TVS fixed the issue & bulb filaments never fused after that.

In another incident about 3 years back one fine day, I noticed the low beams of both headlamps were not working. When the lamps were inspected, the filaments were found to be OK. Got it checked with the Lucas TVS guy & he diagnosed it to the faulty relay that was fitted for the higher wattage lamps. When the relay was replaced the same old lamps' lower beam started working fine.

My other problem is i hear a thud noise from vehicle's left side, could it be the suspension or something else, this happens only when i enter dirty pot holed roads, but in clean highway there is no sound.

Perhaps your suspension damping has gone. An easy way to check out is press the car down firmly by giving pressure over the bonnet & then release it. If the car returns to its normal position smoothly, then the suspension is good. If it bounces back to its earlier position then the strut needs to be replaced. I was experiencing a similar thud noise from vehicle's left side, whenever going over a pot hole or speed bump. Replacing the LHS strut resolved the issue.

[johnruben]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

When you say the low beam is not working, are the low beam filaments of your bulbs getting fused or the filaments are good, but not getting on? You can visually inspect the filaments & check if they are good & not fused.

I will share my personal experience here. 6 years back I faced this problem of headlamps (upper beam) fusing, 4 lamps in two days were gone. Courtesy to the discussions in TIUG group, the problem was traced to the alternator. Alternator was generating voltage spikes (due to a faulty voltage regulator) & these spikes were getting passed to the bulbs through the battery. Due to this issue the horn blew weakly at times & the tachometer needle was dancing to its glory. Overhauling the alternator at Lucas TVS fixed the issue & bulb filaments never fused after that.

In another incident about 3 years back one fine day, I noticed the low beams of both headlamps were not working. When the lamps were inspected, the filaments were found to be OK. Got it checked with the Lucas TVS guy & he diagnosed it to the faulty relay that was fitted for the higher wattage lamps. When the relay was replaced the same old lamps' lower beam started working fine.

Perhaps your suspension damping has gone. An easy way to check out is press the car down firmly by giving pressure over the bonnet & then release it. If the car returns to its normal position smoothly, then the suspension is good. If it bounces back to its earlier position then the strut needs to be replaced. I was experiencing a similar thud noise from vehicle's left side, whenever going over a pot hole or speed bump. Replacing the LHS strut resolved the issue.

Thanks for your reply, first time they blew up extra bulbs during fitting & testing & it lasted for a week, 2nd time the bulbs were alright but fuse had gone & they changed fuse & it immediately started to work but only till i reach home & again kaput, 3rd time, same thing fuse changed, lasted about couple of hours, now i am driving in high beam only & is not a good idea at all, do you think i should change the relay & try? since i dont have any other electrical problems, between this started after i changed battery to Amaron, earlier my stock exide had died.

I will check what you said for the suspension & reply this thread, thanks for your reply.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by johnruben

now i am driving in high beam only & is not a good idea at all, do you think i should change the relay & try? since i dont have any other electrical problems, between this started after i changed battery to Amaron, earlier my stock exide had died.

You can give it a try. Replace the relay & check if your existing lamps' lower beams are working. If not then the problem could lie somewhere else.