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You shouldn’t be making ANY payments before doing the PDI. Only when you are satisfied with the PDI you should be making the further payments.

A few interesting and pretty balanced reviews of our Scorpio N from the Australian and South African markets.

Nice to get an idea how Mahindra stacks up in comparison to other International brands in these markets as per their reviewers’ estimation.

https://youtu.be/jgQ7keOS5LA

https://youtu.be/o3aGX3Af-XQ

https://youtu.be/3XHylVXzpI4

After a lot of research for a bigger car, I had finally booked the Scorpio N 4WD AT in the first week of January 2023. Previous cars I have owned and driven include a 2013 VW Polo Petrol Highline and a 2018 Hyundai (Next Gen) Verna 1.6AT SX(O). Along with the Scorpio N, I had also made a booking of the Hyundai Tucson Platinum Diesel. The Tucson is definitely a level above the Scorpio N but I just could not let go of the thought of getting a Four Wheel Drive Automatic SUV for the price being offered by Mahindra.

After a lot of follow ups with both the dealers, finally decided to go ahead with a Silver Scorpio N 4XPLOR AT, and got the delivery on 14th of April. Once I had seen the first glimpse of my Scorpio N, I cancelled the Tucson booking and the booking amount was swiftly refunded by the dealer.

First job after getting delivery of the Scorpio N was at 3M Car Care (Topsia, Kolkata) for a full PPF, CR70, etc. After that, installed Autotech 7D mats and a much deliberated (and unhappily decided) rear bumper guard. Although the bumper guard heavily reduces the departure angle, could not imagine cycles/rickshaws/scooters hitting the bumper in bumper to bumper traffic (happened a lot on the Verna).

After these jobs, headed straight to the hills of North Bengal, chose a farmstay at Bijanbari (almost 2 hours from Darjeeling). These farmstays almost always have nil or poor roads leading to them and I thought it was a good way to test all the 4XPLOR features to understand the vehicle better. The highway drive from Kolkata to Siliguri was sublime, with an FE of 15.0 kmpl. Siliguri to Darjeeling stretch saw the FE dip to 12 kmpl, and further reduced to 10.5 kmpl once we reached the farmstay after the steep ascent and off road session. We experienced heavy rains, hailstorm, high winds as we travelled from Darjeeling to Bijanbari and had to select 4WH for the last 7 kms or so leading to our stay. After experiencing the 4WD system and the amplified confidence it provides in tricky situations, I was beaming with happiness for choosing this vehicle over the 2WD Tucson.



As for the discussed niggles of the Scorpio N, here are my observations:

• On an extremely Hot afternoon (real feel almost 45 degC), both front and aft cameras stopped working. It did not recover that entire day even after a lot of restarts. Read the manual which said cameras may not operate at extreme temperatures (less than -20 deg, more than 60 deg). However the cameras worked fine the next day and did not have any issues in the entire trip of over 1500kms. Cameras are not at all laggy like I had noticed on the Test Drive vehicle and I am not facing any issues with the quality of either cameras during use. However I cannot stop thinking of the high def resolution of the Tucson 360 camera system.

• Wireless Android Auto works like a charm

• The overal cabin feel for night highway drive, is excellent and there is even an option to switch off the glaring illumination of the speedo and tacho, which I found very useful.

• Windshield wiper controls are very convenient. I really liked the single button press spray and wipe pattern.


Things which are slightly irritating and would require me getting used to are:

• Auto Start/Stop system

• Cruise control cancellation only through the brake pedal

• Lack of good storage spaces around the driver

• No pitch angle adjustment of the driver seat electrical adjustment


A query regarding the 4WD system if any other owner can clarify:

I can hear a single 'clunk', everytime when the steering is moved to either extreme left or extreme right, with the 4WD engaged. Can anyone throw some light on this?

Reviewing the feature list between Z8 & Z8L, the only thing I came up with are below.
1. Driver Drowsiness Detection ( DDD)
2. 6 Way Driver Power Seat
3. Camera (Front)
4. SONY 3D Immersive Audio 12 Speakers With Dual Channel Sub-woofer

The cost difference between the two models in Bangalore right now is a little over Rs.2L. For me, #1,2&4 are not so mandatory. That leaves the front camera part and wondering if that can be fit as an accessory.

Are there any other features which I am missing from the Z8L, which are not available in Z8? The above is from their official brochure.

If you are looking at the manual variant, Z8 dosent get alloy wheels.
approx 58k-60k for the set (17 inch ones)

If i recall - i think wireless charging is also missing

Correct.. I missed this. I think I can live without this one.

Sorry, I should have mentioned. The comparison was with Z8 AT Vs Z8L AT.

The most frustrating omission is the automatic IRVM. What was Mahindra thinking when they gave a manual one in a 30L Vehicle. :Frustrati

I am aware that we can insert an SD card in XUV700 for recording the camera feeds. Do we have similar option with the Scorpio N also? I couldn't find this information in this thread so thought of asking as the Z8L has a front camera along with the rear and this can substitute the requirement of dashcam.

Congratulation on your new car. Wish you lots of happy and memorable miles.

Does that mean Mahindra has updated the software or hardware or both?
As per previous/online reviews there is lag of upto 1-2 seconds.
What's the manufacturing month/ factory billed date? As per information, March onwards Mahindra has done some silent updates in terms of quality checks/controls.

Yes, I had noticed the significant lag in the test drive vehicle as well, and I was pretty upset about it, to the point that I had firmly decided to install a dual channel dashcam with the display over the IRVM. However, once I saw the camera quality in my car, I decided not to buy anything for now, as long as I dont want to record anything as a dashcam.

As per the VIN of my car, manufacturing date is Mar 2023. Factory billed date is 31 Mar 2023.

False alarm. Today, spent some additional time figuring out the mechanism and found it to be working fine. The doubt was sown as the previous salesperson also agreed to my misdiagnosis during PDI.

I had taken out the fuse of the auto start / stop in my Scorpio, worked for me.

Is this clunk happening in 4L or 4H? Either-ways, please try not to go full lock to lock when in 4WD mode unless absolutely necessary.

And Mahindra really needs to work on storage space optimisation, this SUV is supposed to be a comfy and fast tourer and I would want couple of water bottles handy, plus, mobiles / wallets etc in storage spaces near me.

Comes with Apple CarPlay overseas already? What are we, chopped liver?

:mad:

You missed out the wireless charging and the Drive Modes (Zipper/Zapper/Zoomer)


I found a major annoyance with the start stop feature in the AT. Let us say you are in D and the engine shuts down with the automatic start stop feature and you turn of the start/stop feature. Then when you take your foot off the brake, the car will not start. You have to come to P then start the car manually using the start button. Very annoying. !!

They should allow us to permanently disable the start stop feature.

This Idle Start Stop is the most annoying feature i've ever come across in a car. The first thing I ensure after starting the car is to switch this irritant off. Imagine, you stop momentarily for a pedestrian/motorist to pass and the engine shuts off. It would be detrimental to the life of the battery too, more so for diesel cars. Not a great situation to have 5-6 cranks in a span of 10 minutes early in the day.

I guess this is equipped to score some brownie points in RDE norms, if I'm not mistaken.

Yes, you would be better off switching off the feature after the car has auto started after a stop. I'm trying to explore ways to permanently kill this so called feature. It's become such a fly in the ointment.