Team-BHP - Ford Aspire : Official Review
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Sorry to hear about the rattle in door or flexing issue of door panel when front windows are rolled down

Frankly speaking, I do not have any of these problems in my car

Touchwood !:)

Quote:

Originally Posted by runaldahiwade (Post 3919345)
Its a Diesel :)
Thanks Samaspire. Yes I raised it with the Service Station but theyre confident of this being a universal issue.
Front Passenger is quite a long play. Other 3 little lesser.

As far as I remember, it is present only in the front driver side for my Figo. I asked my SA about it and he showed me that all cars have this issue. He even went on to add that it is something to do with the Auto Up-Down functionality, which I doubt.

Perhaps, it is designed this way with the fault. :Frustrati

About the aircon, more often than not, if you start the AC it starts as Hi (28 deg) with full blowing fan. I know it is frustrating but I have kind of got used it now. So, whenever I turn on the AC, first thing with instinct is to bring down the AC to 23 and put it in Auto mode. This is by habit now,.

If there is a workaround for this do let me know for sure!

Quote:

Originally Posted by samaspire (Post 3917011)
:) :thumbs up

No. That is the last remaining edge guard that I had installed. The one's on the other doors have been removed. Here's another angle where it is clear...

Good that you noticed it - I will ask them to remove it before polishing.
It will, anyway be replaced with full length tubing.

Congrats Sam! Great to see you have your car back. They seem to have done an excellent job.

Quote:

Originally Posted by runaldahiwade (Post 3919198)
Great Review and information! Thank you.
I started reading this thread and within 15 days bought the Aspire (Titanium)

I will upload some pics soon.
Its been a Ford exchange for me, exchanged my old horse 2006 Fiesta 1.4. That was a used one and boy did it trouble me so much. In all honesty though, we had gotten ourselves a car without duly checking much.

Least to start, that I'm in love the way Aspire drives, but thought I'll share some bit which worry me for other buyers knowledge or suggestions for me :
1. The whole door inside plastic assembly moves when windows are pulled up or down. Theres not a small play but a proper 1-2cm thud which looks flimsy and Ford SA says its a manufacturing defect. I hope people in Sanand are following this thread.
2. No matter how I shut off the Air Con, the next time i start the car / air-con, 2 out of 5 times, it starts at MAX - 28 Degrees. Have no clue why that happens.
Will post more as I drive more
Aspire for the win!

Congrats on the buy! It's a great car except for minor issues..which really aren't issues as such.

Quote:

Originally Posted by runaldahiwade (Post 3919345)
Its a Diesel :)
Thanks Samaspire. Yes I raised it with the Service Station but theyre confident of this being a universal issue.
Front Passenger is quite a long play. Other 3 little lesser.

I have the same 'minor' issues. It's unbelievable how much the door expands. If my leg is resting against the driver side door and roll the window down, I can feel my leg jerk. I have noticed this on the navigator's side as well. The aircon also has the same issue in my car :Frustrati

Quote:

Originally Posted by AKTRACK (Post 3918218)
Congratulations!! on getting the car back Sam. As far as I can see they have done a good job.

Quote:

Originally Posted by karthik008 (Post 3919752)
Congrats Sam! Great to see you have your car back. They seem to have done an excellent job

I have not got the car back yet - the insurance guy is delaying now.

But the Ford mechanics have done a very good job on it. Maybe it helped that I have been visiting them regularly and have got friendly with most of them. Even the paint job is almost perfect after I got them to fix the small errors.

Visited the bodyshop again today and the car is ready - pending interior cleaning and polishing. Also asked them to get the 1st service done - have delayed the oil change to 2500 kms. I want to do one long trip before oil change.

Quote:

Originally Posted by karthik008 (Post 3919752)
.............

Congrats on the buy! It's a great car except for minor issues..which really aren't issues as such.
..............

Karthik008 did you get to take the car up to the hills?

Quote:

Originally Posted by C'estlavie (Post 3919856)
Karthik008 did you get to take the car up to the hills?

Not yet C'estlavie. I'm eagerly waiting to though, but only after the first service, which will be due sometime in April.

On a separate note, I must say that I'm seeing a lot of Aspires everyday now, even in parking lots. Still yet to see an AT though. Hopefully the trend will continue. I'm still amazed at what all this car offers in a package. It almost makes you never want to consider a full size sedan or big car, especially given how our cities are. brimming with vehicles.

Quote:

Originally Posted by runaldahiwade (Post 3919198)
1. The whole door inside plastic assembly moves when windows are pulled up or down. Theres not a small play but a proper 1-2cm thud which looks flimsy and Ford SA says its a manufacturing defect. I hope people in Sanand are following this thread

Quote:

Originally Posted by sudhirnam (Post 3919266)
Flexing issue is there in my car too. Maybe they are built like this.

Not sure if this would help - but my dad's Honda City from 2009 has this flexing issue on front doors too. But till date, has not caused any trouble / rattle after about 50K kms on our roads. So nothing to be worried here :thumbs up

I think this has got something to do with the 'caved-in' design of these modern cars built with a quest to have more space on the inside. As my Fiesta does not exhibit this flex.

The power windows do flex and I inquired during the first service and was informed that its normal, present in other cars too & not to worry much.

Regarding lower back support, yes there is gap and I have experimented with "neck rest" as perfect fit for this gap and so far happy with this workaround and arrangement.

Meanwhile since few days I observe the clock is losing time. appx 1-2 mins. Initially I thought the clock was not properly set but since few iterations I can observe this strange error.

Btw, Engine is where all the joy is, be it city or highway, It brings (S)miles. enjoy TDCi!!!

Hi All,

Here is my shout out to all you car aficionados! Any help will be greatly appreciated.

I am having two issues with my car for quite some time. I had posted this earlier on this forum on how the engine characteristics seemed changed.

First issue - Car feels heavy to drive. The sprightly nature of the engine is gone. I drive the car alone but it feels that the car is loaded with more people/weight. Earlier the car used to jump at the slightest touch to the A pedal. Now I have to push the pedal a little more. Even the engine has become coarse. Earlier, I could barely hear the engine when driving. Now, it is not that the engine has lost power, it still is fast enough and reaches decent speeds in no time but it just feels that something in choking the engine. It does not feel aspirated enough. There are no missing or odd engine noises as well.

I have taken the car to the Ford service station twice. Once after the first service and the second service. During the first checkup they cleaned the air filter and the car regained its lively nature for a day or two and then went back to its heavier self.

During the second service the SA drove the car and I asked him if he felt the car to be a little heavier, he affirmed but gave me strange reason and solution. He said that I was driving the car too carefully (slow) and should open up the engine and try to occasionally do speeds around 120-150 albeit carefully. Very strange advise by the SA :) Nonetheless, I followed the same however, have not felt an iota of a difference. The sad part is nothing changed even after the second service when they changed the engine oil, oil filter, air filter cleaning, wheel alignment and balancing etc. When I used to get my M800 serviced I could feel the new life in engine, but there was no change in the car. It drove exactly as before.

Also, one fine day, while taking the car out of my garage, I felt that the car was light to drive again. It drove light, for around 20-30 kms and then got heavy again.

I have spoken to 2-3 different SAs at the same showroom and they are saying they cannot do much if there are pick up problems in this car. Pick up modulation is not in their control. At most what they can do is to clean the air filter and clean the intake lines. I don't think it is the Pick up problem. The car picks up quite well, not like a new car but still. Its just the gruffness of the engine and the stress that I can feel, should not be there. Car is not generating any error codes as well. Even the mileage is great (22-24). I at times try to convince myself that since there are no errors and no change in mileage too, it might be my perception and cars are likely to loose that new out of the factory feel to some extent but just miss the old engine responsiveness. This car is its engine. Period.

Second issue - Car is pulling to the left. This is very very minute pull when i am driving alone, but the pull feeling increases when there is passenger onboard. I have got the alignment done twice and the balancing once. They even did the wheel rotation during the second service. Both times they took a lot of time to correct the left pulling, castor problems, if i remember correctly. But i can still feel the little steering pull. After second alignment, balancing and rotation the road noise increased considerably for some while but has settled down now to some extent.

I don't remember if i have hit anything, of have jumped over anything. The car scraped over stones a couple of times during my trip to Uttarakhand but that was quite some time back. Car has already gone through 2 alignments after that.

Is the second issue resulting in the first? Why are they not able to diagnose both issues? What should be my next steps?

I am someone who loves driving and these issues are driving me crazy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by AKTRACK (Post 3920573)
Is the second issue resulting in the first? Why are they not able to diagnose both issues? What should be my next steps?

Hope the air pressure are correctly maintained?!

Why don't you try and interchange the tyres i.e from FR >>> FL and FL >>> FR & RR >>> RL and RL >>> RR. Side swap i mean.

In the age of highly computerized systems such problems are going to be a nightmare to identify. I am facing a host of problems on my Honda City Vtec (2015) too including the annoying engine auto acceleration but thankfully there is no performance problem. At such high mileages I am inclined to believe though that you are not whipping the car enough to get the performance. Could it be that some insulation has been damaged and more noise is entering the cabin which is why you don't push the car? As for me, the day I watched some Youtube videos that said that you are actually supposed to rev during the break-in period and not baby the engine I started revving it good and hard. I only wish I watched those videos earlier and not at 1100km..

Quote:

Originally Posted by a4anurag (Post 3920577)
Hope the air pressure are correctly maintained?!

Why don't you try and interchange the tyres i.e from FR >>> FL and FL >>> FR & RR >>> RL and RL >>> RR. Side swap i mean.

Thank you for your response a4anurag. Tyre pressure is all right. In fact I keep it overinflated at 32 PSI. Like the jumpy nature of the car that way.

The interchanging already happened around 10k. It is 13k now. The way he changed is RL > FR, RR > FL and vice versa The tyre noise after that was horrible. It has settled an extent now. I guess the rear tyres to some time to get accustomed to the new position.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mxh (Post 3920589)
In the age of highly computerized systems such problems are going to be a nightmare to identify. I am facing a host of problems on my Honda City Vtec (2015) too including the annoying engine auto acceleration but thankfully there is no performance problem. At such high mileages I am inclined to believe though that you are not whipping the car enough to get the performance. Could it be that some insulation has been damaged and more noise is entering the cabin which is why you don't push the car? As for me, the day I watched some Youtube videos that said that you are actually supposed to rev during the break-in period and not baby the engine I started revving it good and hard. I only wish I watched those videos earlier and not at 1100km..

Sorry to hear about your City woes mxh. You are right about the perils of technology. The more complex things get, harder it is to diagnose and fix them.

The normal speeds that I drive is 80-90 and have frequently done 120s and occasional 140-150s. As far as pushing the car is concerned, apart from the speeds above, I have done 4 trips to Uttarakhand of which around 400-500 kms was all hills. The highways and the hills must have really opened the engine by now. I can confidently say I have not played safe here.

I too read extensively about the contrarian engine break-in theories. I believe them to be true. There is so much of the conflicting material out there, at times it is hard to take a stand given the huge nature of investments involved and more than that our love for our machines:)

I am thinking of changing to a new SC and will get the insulation checked as well. That may very well be the reason for the more engine and road noise.

Another observation - the car feels peppier, planted, rides well with AC ON. I mean shouldn't it be the other way round - peppier with AC OFF.

Also, the vagueness of the steering, more so in my case, though not unnerving, makes the whole thing a little more unpleasant.

AKTRACK, there is a slight possibility that your car's less-than-ideal pickup is caused by adulterated diesel (I assume yours is a TDCi). Have you tried changing the pump(s) where you normally fill up?

Quote:

Originally Posted by RSR (Post 3921073)
AKTRACK, there is a slight possibility that your car's less-than-ideal pickup is caused by adulterated diesel (I assume your car is a TDCi). Have you tried changing the pump(s) at which you normally fill up?

Thank you RSR. I have been filling from the same pump since time eternal since it is closest to my home. May be! I will try filling from a different pump. The problem started around 5k, it is 13k now. Has it been adulterated fuel all along:Frustrati

Quote:

Originally Posted by AKTRACK (Post 3920573)

First issue - Car feels heavy to drive.


Second issue -

For the first issue, disconnect the negative terminal of the battery and reconnect it after 3-4 minutes. This will wipe off the adaptive/learning memory of the ECU. If you feel the car is peppy as new, this issue is due to the learning mode of ECU.

I have a first gen figo and whenever my father drives it for 100-200 kms, the car feels lethargic to drive as he drives slow, lugs the engine a bit and up shift very early. The car jumps to its peppy nature whenever I exercise the above mentioned jugaad and remains fine until I drive.

You can try this and see if it works, as the ECU might be restricting the performance due to learning from slow traffic, jams etc.

Also, do the Italian tune-up once in a while to remove all the carbon/soot from the exhaust system. Bring the RPM slowly to 3-4 k RPM keep for 20-30 seconds and bring down to idle slowly. This should only be done once the engine is sufficiently warmed up.

Do try an independent tyre/wheel balancing shop for the second issue.


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