[Kosfactor]

Originally Posted by sgmuser

I have two ROXX ready for delivery based on what I choose. The beige 4WD and a 2WD. But looking at the complaints I'm thinking of taking different route. Hycross is the one I have shortlisted. I want peace, Mahindra cannot simply provide that.

Keeping Roxx aside for a moment.

If Hycross is the first automatic in your garage then you'll probably be happy for sometime but otherwise you are going out of your way, by a lot. Soon you will be out of the driver's seat into the back seat.

[DCTfanatic]

Originally Posted by sgmuser

Hycross is the one I have shortlisted. I want peace, Mahindra cannot simply provide that.

Both the Roxx and the Hycross are spectacular machines in their own space. But two very different beasts.

To answer your questions of reliability, issues, niggles and the SC experience, the short answer is Toyota will be a better experience. The Hycross will mostly be free of random niggles of QC issues that come and go. Only by luck you may face some major faults which will be one off and Toyota will address swiftly.

If you are expecting a seamless ASC experience with minimal involvement, few follow ups and quick service, depends on your ASC but generally Mahindra is not the way to go unless you are willing to be proactive and involved. Toyota will offer the typical Toyota experience - pickup your car, service it, figure out any issues, inform them to you along with the solution that they already implemented and return the car to you in the same day. With Mahindra, your mileage may vary.


In case of Mahindra and the Thar Roxx, over the span of the next year or two, niggles and even major issues such as the LCA recall of the XUV700 may come up. Major issues will be addressed by Mahindra. But your experience with niggles and one-off problems will completely depend on the ASC you visit and the age of the product. The XUV700 when new was peppered with issues. But by 2022, Mahindra had solved most issues at the production level itself. Our 2023 XUV700 AX7L has been almost issue free. Recently, the driver window motor gave out. I took the car to the SC and after one look by the SA, he said it will be replaced under warranty. 30 mins later, I was driving back home with a new motor installed. I have a good rapport with a couple of XUV and Thar SAs at my local ASC. My service experiences have been pretty good.

But I am someone who dives into the mechanical side in-depth, converses with the technicians working on my cars and often gets extra preventive maintenance work done regularly. I also have the T&C of the warranties by heart for all our cars and have borderline abused them; for example:- in the case of my Tucson, I have made Hyundai change things like AC vent trims that are falling apart within 2 ears and steering control buttons that are getting lose, ambient light sensors, etc. amounting to near 2L worth of parts that I would have paid out of pocket otherwise. My regular ASCs for all my cars know I am not someone they can dupe easily and this usually gets me good treatment from them.

I think that answers your question about Thar vs Hycross in terms of reliability and after-sales service.


As for pitting the two cars head to head as products, below is my take on the matter.

Rather than put them head to head directly, I suggest you first pin point your priority of expectations from the car. Below is my take on both the cars after owning a Roxx D AT AX7L and driving my cousins Hycross for 3 months as a daily. I wont focus too much on the obvious stuff that most general reviews have mentioned about the cars. Rather I will focus on the main areas of the two cars that stood out to me in my time with both the cars; drivetrain, suspension, interiors and value.

Hycross: Strengths and Weakness
In case of the Hycross, you can expect an effortless, comfy and smooth people mover. The suspension is great, the EPS has very good feel and the hybrid powertrain is well calibrated for smoothness and efficiency. Irrespective of city or highway; i get between 16-19 kmpl always. Full load on highway saw a dip to 15.7 once. Intercity trips with 2 people have always returned 17-18 kmpl.

The size of the car is masked surprisingly well by the steering and suspension tuning. The monocoque chasis greatly eliminates the old body-on-frame woes of the Crysta, making this very car like to maneuver.

The first major problem I felt with the Hycross is the torque; or the lack thereof. Power is there. But it comes only when you are pushing the powertrain and the engine is screaming like a banshee; trying to force the power through the e-CVT. When you are going at cruising speeds with par throttle and suddenly require a burst of acceleration, the response from the powertrain is very slow as you roll onto the throttle. The engine shoots the revs up and gets very vocal and the car gradually accelerates faster as the e-CVT catches up. The electric motor is not very helpful at higher double digit or triple digit speeds. The clear lack of torque comes shows here. The instant response that you would get from old 2.4 and 2.8 D engines in the Crysta is missing here.

In sub-60kmph situations, this is not much of an issue as much of the work is done by the electric motor here; the engine mostly kicks in as a generator for the battery.

The second issue I feel the Hycross suffers from is the interior design, quality and feel. Specifically for the price that the top spec ZX/ZX(O) commands. The cabin feel just does not justify the 32L price tag in my opinion. My 2019 Seltos GTX feels like from a segment above when compared to the Hycross, even though it is almost half the price. There are too much hard plastics on the dash, the center console and arm rest creak like crazy and the overall design vibe is more Suzuki than Toyota.

A smaller remark, not a problem that i feel with the new Hycross is that it has lost its rugged and simplistic nature that the 1st gen and the Crysta had. The Hycross feel more like a bigger C segment crossover rather than an MPV version of the Fortuner.

Thar Roxx: Strengths and Weakness Comparing to the Hycross
In terms of comparing this to the older Thar, it is night and day. The new body-on-frame platform has delivered well. It has not magically made it car like to drive. But all the dealbreakers of the 3-Door Thar that prevented it from being a good city/daily car have been fixed IMHO. Body roll creeps in a bit in certain cases but not even close to what you would expect from a car of this size and height. Minor imperfections of on city streets no longer upset the ride and the FSD struts have taken away the harshness from the suspension setup. Drop the tyre pressure to 30psi and the car almost glides over most roads.

But compared directly to the Hycross, the Hycross will feel like a magic carpet. This is not due to the Thar being bad but rather the the Hycross inherently having the upper hand due to its monocoque chassis.

If you want to know more about how the Thar's suspnsion setup compares to other cars like the Fortuner and the Scorpio N, you can refer to this post:
#post5948668 (Mahindra Thar Roxx Review)

The streeing is superb. The ESP is very easy to flick and twirl at parking lot speeds while having good feel and feedback as speed builds up. It makes the car feel much smaller to drive and inspires confidence.

The drivetrain is where the opposing personalities of the Thar and the Hycross come out. The Hycross is designed to be driven in a laid-back manner, crusing at fixed speeds and silently taking people from A to B in an efficient way without too much drama. Expect more from it and it will deliver but not in a happy manner; and with a constant, loud and raspy pro test from the engine. If you are someone who has minimal braking and hypermiling tendencies baked into your laid-back driving style, the Hycross is the one to look at.

If you want constant alertness and a smooth, linear surge of torque on tap at almost any speed in almost any gear, the Thar is the one to go for. Both the Petrol and the Diesel will give you that but the Diesel compliments the car better. There is always torque in reserve whenever you ask for it, the engine is very well refined and the the NVH is superb. For a diesel with rivals such as the 2.8 D of the Fortuner and the 1.5 D of the Koreans, it is petrol like till 2-2.25k rpm.

The gearbox is very smooth as well. The TC is well and crawls well in traffic, even in 2nd gear. The shifts are snappy enough when pushing and smooth enough when cursing calmly.

But there are 2 drawback of the transmission.

The first is the TCU tuning philosophy that Mahindra has for all its TC gearboxes. It is too aggressively tuned with a performance oriented mindset. Mahindra always prefers to have the gearbox be ready for a quick request of power. This is done well and shows when driving the car in a spirited manner. The drawback of this is that the gearbox does not allow for an upshift, even manually, before 2k rpm in any gear. This leads to annoying situations in city driving where you are at 1750 rpm in 3rd gear at 45 kmph but to shift to 4th, you need to get to 2k rpm in 3rd which comes at 50kmph but you don't have the room in front of you to accelerate or maybe by the time you do, it is time to slow down for a traffic light and the whole experience becomes very tense and not smooth.

The second issue with the gearbox is the 4th gear. It is toooooo tall. It goes from 50kmph @ 1500 rpm to 72 kmph @ 2000 rpm. Combine this with the fac that the car wont upshift till 2k rpm and you rarely get to go past 4th gear at city speeds.

These two issues of the gearbox combine to have a big impact on the FE of the car. I have tested all different scenarios in the last 4.5k km of driving my Thar and the city driving FE comes out to between 8-9.5 kmpl. It will just cracks the double digits if you are very gentle and calm with the throttle. But a bit of aggressiveness and the FE drops to even 7. The Hycross has never dropped below 16 even in bumper to bumper traffic for me.

Out on the highway is where the Thar disappoints the most. At speeds upto 85, the FE will come out 14-15 if driven in a docile manner. Push to 100 and the non aerodynamic shape makes the FE drop to 13. This was particularly disappointing for me as my dad's XUV700 with the same diesel engine give 17-20 kmpl on the highway. There is a possibility of the FE going up after the first couple of oil changes. It did in the XUV as well. Lets see.

If all of the above is something you can deal with then I think the the Thar AX7L beats out the Hycross in terms of value (ignoring the 3rd row aspect). The interiors of the AX7L particularly feel superior luxurious with soft touch leather literally every where. The steering shape and leather feels good to hold and and the dual displays make it feel very modern. For 21L ex-shrwm, the Thar's interior outclasses the Hycross even if it was priced the same. At 32L for the Hycross, it is a no-brainer; the Thar wins outright.

The size of the seats are the only deal breaker I have found in the interior. I am 5'8", but if I was an individual with a taller frame or back issues, I would steer clear of the Roxx.

[DCTfanatic]

Originally Posted by BSaikia09

During the 2,000 km service, I changed the engine oil and filter, even though the service advisor mentioned it wasn’t necessary and could last until 10,000 km. Despite the advice, I decided to proceed with the oil change. Now, after driving 8,000 km, the oil level has remained normal . I will check with the service advisor again during the next service.

Hey is your Thar a diesel? And if yes, did you notice any change in FE before and after the oil change?