1 year and 14K review of my XUV700
The car: Electric Blue shade looks apart in a crowd
I had added PPF, so cleaning is bit less of headache, though waterspots says hi if left under sun or long run. Cleaning the car is a task of it's own. Driving is fun and easy to move around with the light weight steering wheel. I would not say suspension is upto the mark, especially for a luxury line SUV. I can feel the broken road and it's depth on almost all roads in Kerala, thanks to lack of maintenance and politics.
The sound system is remarkable, although I have experienced few bumps here and there with it. The main lighting (park lamps, DRLs, dim and bright head lamps, fog lamps) which are LED based, floods the road with clear and bright lights, though there were situations where vehicles in the opposite lane were unable to tell if it was bright / dim that was on. The brake lights and sequential indicators are also adequately visible and bright, but the reverse lamps ( shining with halogen) are not bright enough in any dark places.
The interior lighting is something below expectation, but is enough for most use cases for 1st and 2nd row passengers. I have added illuminated scuff plates, so that it is easy for people to board and offboard without feeling for the side footsteps. The diesel engine is powerful and I get a mileage of around 11.3 KM/l on rural roads and 13 - 15 on Highways, but the car is mostly driven on rural roads with hills and valleys, though not steep. AWD has saved a lot of trouble when climbing roads paved with stones or climbing fully load and fueled. The ground clearance could have been another inch or two more as the car adjusts the GC based on state of movement, amount of weight, brake application etc.
When turning on roads with unusually high footpath borders, there were situations where left wheel's mudguard at front portion has scraped against the raising and got roughed up a little bit. The 360 degree camera view is great and had a very good resolution, though response time has a delay of ~1 to 2 seconds. Even though it has a front camera, front proximity sensors are dearly missed and there has been situations with fender benders, most of them were nearly missed except a few. First service was performed smoothly, but the second service, which I scheduled at 8300 KM on odo was a sad and pathetic story. The second service was attended by a trainee at Eram motors, Calicut and even though I specifically mentioned the car is AWD and ensured PTU oil change was in the list, they simply forgot to change and never thought of mentioning it.
Not sure if the QA at Eram was doing such a lousy job verifying the work. I had strong suspicion that something else might have messed-up and ofcourse it was. The car had covered around 2k KM on odo before I gave it for the PTU oil change and they did change it this time, but now they were asking me to pay a large amount. Checking the final RO, I found that they had the audacity to sweetly and unapologetically add labour charge to a job falling under 2nd free service! After a few to and fro, they agreed to charge only for material cost, which was merely ~300 INR. By now, I have lost around 20000 overall, apart from the actual 2nd service cost, on time, effort, fuel and mental agony. All I got back was machine coffee at the service center :/ .
Now, coming to the part where I suspected something else might have gone wrong, indeed it did. Till now the car was parked in multiple places, but after this service it was left at garage for a week. I noticed oil drops on the ground when I moved it for washing. With great effort and squeezing under, I found that the Engine oil tank's nut was covered with oil (and has been driven like that for a couple of thousand KMs). I cleaned it with a rug and noticed the oil was all over the nut again. When complained to Eram directly (without going through Mahindra because their TAT is more or less 2 - 3 working days, that too forwarding my query to Eram), they asked me to send the car back to main service station 50+KMs away from my home. I declined and told them I can in worst case bring the car to their commercial showroom around 18KMs from home.
They agreed to send technicians to check it there. When they checked, they suspected it might be a loose or bad torquing on the nut, so gathered a spanner and tightened it. I was wondering why did the technician who did PTU oil change not notice the engine oil leakage or did he loosen the wrong nut in first place? Any way, they gave me the opportunity to give them the earful on next day when they asked for feedback :lol:
Few things I wish M7M had added to the top of the line models:
1. Front parking / proximity sensors
This should be mandatory for all cars, whose bonnet is around waist high of an average person in India. There are children and small pet animals like cats, puppies, small dog breeds, poultry etc that might be directly near front wheels or corner and are easy to miss due to blind spots.
2. Rear proximity alert of traffic.
The rear parking sensors do a good job, but obstructions or cars approaching from sideways are easy to miss till they are too close. M&M should add a electromagnetic wave based sensor on rear bumper to enable RTCA
Has anyone done this from 3rd party shops in south India?
3. Auto dimming IRVM.
Even their lower models have this (XUV3xO). They should allow customers to retrofit it as a post factory safety kit along with 1 & 2 above.
4. The A pillar has a huge blindspot when taking twisted turns with right side justification or a 90 degree turn. You will have to lean forward or fall backward to check for vehicles on those right side turns. Proximity sensor can warn from getting T-boned in such cases, if there are two sensors around front wheel arches.
5. Front wheel well sound deadening pads are not joined correctly
The front wheel well pads are made of two peices like that of rear wheel wells, but they are not stiched / bonded / riveted together like that of rear wheel wells. This allows dirt and water to seep to inaccessible areas of normal cleaning.
6. Increased ground clearance.
The GC needs to be increased by another inch or two from 200mm to 230mm or 250mm to acomodate fully loaded car
7. Cover for negative terminal of car battery.
The +ve termina is covered, but -ve terminal is exposed to dust, water and air and can get corroded pretty fast in long run/
8. Reversing lamps with LED instead of halogen or a more powerful halogen.
9. Puddle lamps for all doors.
Currently, puddle lamps are given only for first row doors. Doesn't the 2nd and 3rd row passengers need to get out at night / low light?
10. Puddle lamp under ORVM.
It would help to give lighting for side view cameras, as well as aide in ingress and egress. There are slots at the bottom of ORVMs (heck, they are not covered with fixed caps, so there's even no need to cut out the slot). Why don't M&M release an updation kit or accessory for the same?
11. Additional air bags for first row seats.
The seats have only one airbag (on door side). There should be another airbag to prevent driver's and codriver's head from hitting each other during a side collision or T boning.
12. Kit for adding ventilated seats to older L models.
This can be also released as a kit as the temperature during sunny days and summer in India is never going to go down.
13. More powerful blower for ventilated seats
Current update includes lesser powerful blowing, even in highest speed.
14. Battery disconnection switch
Most of the cluster screen issues can be quick fixed by disconnecting negative terminal from battery and wait for few seconds before connecting back. M7M should provide a disconnection switch kit or add powercycle button for cluster power / ECU
15. Ability to copy recorded videos and captured images via inbuild AccessPoint using Adrenox app.
This would allow customers to download the data without rusing to service center, as not all customers live close to service centers. As the access is only enabled in Adrenox, the data transfer would be secure, whether it's over WiFi or mobile network (least recommended).
16. Internal lighting for 3rd row passengers
While it was good to have a 12V socket on last row, there needs to be lighting for 3rd row passengers as well, either from roof (not possible to provide as an addon kit) or from the 2nd row seat's back (allows retro fitting as addon kit).
17. Boot lamp
Right now, if all seats are up in the 7 seater, boot is pitch dark. Even if the last row is down, the boot is barely visible. Having a dedicated boot lamp, triggered when boot is open, is immensely helpful.
18. Lamp on boot door
This is also something M&M needs to add, as when the boot is opened at night, the lighting is poor. As the door is made of non-metal, magnet based light bases can't be stuck to it. Only option is to retrofit by drilling into the pad.
19. 12V socket near driver or front passenger side
Most customers are currently forced to stretch the last bit of cord for vacuum or air pump.
20: 230V socket in the driver's handrest
This would be very helpful to people who need to charge their laptop or camera or similar light electronic gadgets.
21: Cover for cupholders in the 2nd row middle seat or sliding cupholders
This can double as a phone holder for kids sitting in back or keep the cupholder hidden. We are tlaking about a car that M7M has as it's top of the line offering.
22. USB / USBC socket on the 2nd row needs to be doubled
These two sockets should enable fast charging to USB PD (instead of 230V socket).
23. USB / USBC sockets for 3rd row.
24. Cargo net as an addon accessory kit.
25. GI screws, nuts and bolts accessories and exhaust pipe.
The current screws, nuts and bolts have already started rusting.
26. Lesser panel gaps
The panel gaps in doors and bonnets are large enough for insects to build their nest as well as dust to accumulate on door hinges and wiring harness covers.
27. Lighting inside engine compartment
This should source power from a backup battery isolated from other circuitary, so the engine compartment is visible at night during repair. You know your customers might get forced to have an urge to disconnect main battery once in a while (long or short).
28. The ambient lighting from street lights should not turn off auto dimming headlamps
Currently if the car is near to a street lamp / floodlight, the bright lamp is turned off. In rural areas, the street lights won't be able to cover the area car will be travelling towards (may be a turn or a shade or the street light is tilted) causing blind spots right in front. The camera should identify a street lamp from vehicle coming towards in opposite lane.
29. The switching time of auto dimming headlamps should be a second or lower.
This or point 28 needs to be enabled to avoid blind spots right in front when going above 15 - 20 kmph.
30. Felt or leather pads on the lower portion of information cluster.
31. Paddle shifters.
32. Powered front passenger seat (at-least to and fro, recline and incline, including boss mode).
The existing customers should have an option to retrofit this available as an addon kit.
33. Sliding middle seat.
This helps to improve legspace in last row, as well as optimize space usage when last row is folded down for luggage.
34. Cover for 2nd row single seat's hooks on floor board.
Dust and sand can currently get stuck on the felt material used over sound dampening pads, as these two spots are lower than nearby surfaces.
35. I might not have noticed / it's not occurred, the football in the boot sound issue.
However I have noticed fuel / dpf hitting the tank walls when slowly flowing through rough road early morning (as nothing else is present as noise).
36. DPF fluid / DEF level in Adrenox app.
This way it's easier to keep tract of DPF fluid levels.
37. Total engine runtime displayed in Adrenox app and infotainment cluster, apart from trip meter.
38. Welcome message get's triggered even when doors are closed (driver / co-driver already seated).
This should be triggered only once right after engine has been started and not multiple times when doors are closed or after an auto stop start event or car is started in few minutes after it was turned off.
39. Auto close window glass for all doors with anti pinch.
40. Window open alert when car is under following conditions:
i. A/C turned on
ii. Air recirculation is turned on
iii. Car is moving at morethan 5/10 kmph.
41. Powered boot door
The boot door is already light weight, so the powered boot door would not require a powerfull motor to lift or pull down.
42. Transparent bottom view in 360 degree camera
This would allow driver to see the immediate road condtions especially helpful for narrow road and pot hole navigation.
43. Powerful cooler for handrest cooling
Current cooling capacity for handrest is very poor. Only when air blows, we can feel cooling.
44. Telltale lamp for AWD, so driver does not need to take eye off to see the status.
45. Automatically record fuel filling odo reading in Adrenox.
This would help customers to accurately track mileage after each fill, full or partial. Adrenox already knows fule level has changed, also syncs the odo as well. Why not corelate both data?
46. Small indicator lights on interior door locks to indicate lock (red/orange) and unlock (green / blue / white) when the actuator / know is pulled.
47. Footwell lamp for front and 2nd row.
This should illuminate when any door is open or like interior lamps, turn off after count down.
48. Infrared based camera instead of light based.
This enables clearer night time visibility, even if it comes with a video processing lag, atleast for rear camera.
49. Ability to switch embedded SIM provider from VI to any other 3 MSPs.
50. Switch to use internal embedded SIM for Android auto / Apple carplay if phone does not have internet connection or instrument cluster detects network issues on phone's internet connection.
51. AWD badge for AWD cars, like automatic badge in Thar.
52. Automatically bring up surround view when crawling through / driving under 15 kmph for a min or more.
Slow moving is mostly because driver is either in a traffic or narrow road or carefully checking surrounding before each meter.
53. Auto brake in slow moving when an obstacle is present in near proximity.
Right in front view, if an obstacle is present, automatically brake or alert driver to avoid rolling and hitting (similar to auto hold).
54. The rear door plastic cladding near rear wheel arches need to have more liping, so dirt from tyre would not seep into door pad rubber.
55. Dirt / Sand / Mud / Unpaved road drive modes.
56. Display tilt and turn angle of front and rear wheel axles.
57. Rubber / foam padding between wheel wells and plastic cladding.
This helps avoid dust and dirt from settling in-between the gaps, as well as improve esthetic view.
58. Improve driver drowsiness monitoring with dedicated sensors like in driver state monitoring system (DSM).
59. The front wheels extend outside wheel wells and the mud guards are ineffective. Both Front door panels get fair share of dirt and grime during wet conditions.
60.The reverse camera is very poor in displaying videos at dark places or night. One can barely identify the rear terrain.
It is especially God's blessing if you want to reverse during a night with rain and you're in a place with miniscule to no lighting. Atleast the reverse lamps and brake lamps could have been more powerful LEDs instead.
61.The brakepad wear sensors are too fragile and one of them broke off during a routine checkup for brakepad wear. Will have to live with it for another 3K Kms. Not sure why M&M chose such a supplier.
62. I was eyeing the dark seats of the new editions and was wondering if older 7OO can get them inplace swapped at expense of customer? Really fedup with white seats and service techs carelessly dirtying them. It happens every time the seat cover comes off and the techs don't care to put it back.
63. And it happened again. The SA was just blabbering words because he did not knew what really caused RPS to die for second time. Last occurred in Dec, 2023. Anyway, RPS was replaced under warranty. But the issue happening for 2nd time in 7 months after first change causes a lot of concern.
64. Send alert via Adrenox when there is a software update for the car info cluster, maps or any control units.
I believe M&M is collecting such metadata via telemetric data, so why shouldn't the customer know about the changes and features in next release?
65. Found that inorder for smartwatch companion app to work, you need Adrenox phone app running and connected to car (car can be in state of powered on, engine running or turned off).
66. Need somemore sound dampening, especially on underbody and side door panels.
I booked XUV700 on 6th July and was was having constant discussions with the sales representative of the dealership regarding different aspects of the deal like insurance, loan process, delivery timelines(I wanted it to be delivered on weekend of 14th at all cost) etc and based on these discussions, I know for a fact that the dealership I was in contact with or their sales representatives were not aware of these price reductions till 10th of July.
In fact it was me who shared a twitter news post with sales guy on evening of 9th and he wasn't aware of this price reduction at all and only confirmed it to me that the news is correct and they've been communicated this as well on 10th.
Just sharing what I know.
Got the delivery this Sunday and as per dealership they haven't even been able to submit road tax since RTO is still showing old prices and not reflecting the new ones as of now.
1. Kindly recommend a Service Centre in Hyderabad for 10k Service.
I am originally from Bangalore and I have Petrol AX7L AT.
I will be driving back to Bangalore and will be staying for 2 days in Hyderabad. By the
time I reach Hyderabad, the car will touch 11K in Odo
I don't want to delay the service further to be done in Bangalore.
2. Also, please recommend the Engine Oil I should opt, to be changed.
