[pgsagar]

Ozzy, nice colour! I guess it is a new colour. Looks different from old silver colour. And, regarding after-market electric fitments, be wary. If any apprentice mech goofs up, you will have trouble on hand, later. I have heard so many horror stories of cars catching fires to electricals conking out due to faulty aftre-market installations that I decided to keep mine absolutely stock ( my Lancer is heavily kitted out though, but never a problem there luckily ).

[vigsom]

I've known cases where the after-market fog lights are wired to turn on with the park lights.

If that were a standard solution,why would a fog light manufacturer provide a switch and a relay in the kit?

[ozzyrules]

The dealer agreed that they goofed up. Unfortunately, they didn't have stock of the relay and switch. Have to go back sometime next week to get this sorted out.

[ozzyrules]

Since this will be our only car for a bit, thought I might as well get some extras.

Got these done at the dealer:
Fog lamps: Rs.4500
Rear spoiler: Rs.5000
Body-color painting of ORVMs and door handles: Rs.2500





Got these done elsewhere:
Tyres: Rs.8000 (on exchange of OEM tyres for Yoko A-drives 175/70/R13)
Seat covers: Rs.6000 (in art leather material)




Wifey loves the car, especially not having to use the clutch and shift gears. To quote a radio ad doing the rounds, "Keep the wife happy, and your happiness will follow"

[ash_blore]

Originally Posted by ozzyrules

Wifey loves the car, especially not having to use the clutch and shift gears. To quote a radio ad doing the rounds, "Keep the wife happy, and your happiness will follow"

Wifeys will love the car. Its brilliant. My wife loves the A*AT as well. It is almost 1 year since we bought the car and in fact my wife and I always want to drive it!

Your car looks very nice, good color choice and getting the handles and ORVM in body color makes it look much better.

When taking the car on highways, I suggest you use the 3,2,1 for overtaking and D gear for steady state driving.

Other than that, good luck and happy motoring.

[ozzyrules]

Originally Posted by ash_blore

Other than that, good luck and happy motoring.

Thanks! We're headed to the hills over the weekend. Will post an update once we're back.

[bigwheelz]

An update on the inital fuel efficiency.
Completed 1000Kms a week ago. Did tank full method to measure Kms per full tank.
Got 470Kms first time and 480 Kms second time. Good efficiency I think.

Another thing that happened, 10 days ago. One morning, the car won't start. Imagin a 25 days old car not starting. Since all indicators, CD player were working so battery issue got ruled out.
After 2 hours of waiting, the service van arrived.
After playng with the fuses, these guys then did something on the left under side of the engine and the car started.

On asking them what the problem was, they said that the spark plug has a lock which was not properly fitted. I accepted that. Ofcourse I didnt pay for the emergency services.
Took the car out in the evening the fuse box cap above the accelerator, break came off. They didn't fit it properly.
Called up the guy again and gave him a piece of mind. He sent the guy. this time in 5 mins.

The cars running fine. But I guess this is a rare issue that happens during assembly.

[jinojohnt]

Valuable lessons I learnt after 15 years of sending cars to the service station:
1. As far as possible, do not give the car for 'repair'. If you can live with the issue (for e.g one of my car's gear lever shakes), do not let them open anything for repair. Most of the times these ill-trained mechanics create more issues in other parts when they repair one part.
2. When repair is essential, google and collect as much info about all related parts so that you would be able to closely monitor the repairs.

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by bigwheelz

Did tank full method to measure Kms per full tank. Got 470Kms first time and 480 Kms second time. Good efficiency I think.

And what was the fuel-volume that went in for each full-tank ? Asking so as to be able to calculate the FE. And this is Pune city-driving ? With or without a/c ?

With all the Metro work happening in Chennai and the resultant traffic-jams, I sometimes wish I had our A*-AT here - would have been so relaxing for the feet.

[bigwheelz]

Originally Posted by supremeBaleno

And what was the fuel-volume that went in for each full-tank ? Asking so as to be able to calculate the FE. And this is Pune city-driving ? With or without a/c ?

The volume that went in was close to 32 litres.
This is worse than city driving. Everyday the car is driven on a road where it takes 25-40 mins to cover 4 kms. Around 20% driving with A/c.

[ozzyrules]

Slightly OT to the recent posts - the bars in my fuel gauge don't move up until a few Kms after refuelling. The first time I noticed this, I thought the petrol bunk guy had cheated me and almost took a u-turn to go back and fight!
Anyone else noticed this behavior? Wondering if it's 'normal' in A-stars.

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by ozzyrules

Slightly OT to the recent posts - the bars in my fuel gauge don't move up until a few Kms after refuelling. The first time I noticed this, I thought the petrol bunk guy had cheated me and almost took a u-turn to go back and fight!
Anyone else noticed this behavior? Wondering if it's 'normal' in A-stars.

Normally it will take time if the car is on. If you switch the car off while refueling, it will come on instantly.

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by bigwheelz

The volume that went in was close to 32 litres.
This is worse than city driving. Everyday the car is driven on a road where it takes 25-40 mins to cover 4 kms. Around 20% driving with A/c.

That is like 15kmpl, which is awesome FE for an AT car in B2B driving.

Originally Posted by ozzyrules

Slightly OT to the recent posts - the bars in my fuel gauge don't move up until a few Kms after refuelling. Anyone else noticed this behavior? Wondering if it's 'normal' in A-stars.

Like Aroy mentioned, it is normal. And from my experience, I see it in my Baleno too, though it has the needle-gauge. After fuelling up, it takes a km or so of driving before it comes up to the full level. Though I have no idea about the connection with vehicle being off/on while fuelling.

[pgsagar]

Originally Posted by supremeBaleno

That is like 15kmpl, which is awesome FE for an AT car in B2B driving.

I get 15 kmpl in in-city drives all the time. Fuel efficiency IS indeed strong point of A-Star. And yes, highway rides see the number creeping up to 18-19 kpl.

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by supremeBaleno

Like Aroy mentioned, it is normal. And from my experience, I see it in my Baleno too, though it has the needle-gauge. After fuelling up, it takes a km or so of driving before it comes up to the full level. Though I have no idea about the connection with vehicle being off/on while fuelling.

The fuel level sensor and the gauge are designed to change slowly, so that every jump and shake of the car does not show up on the gauge (older Fiats/Ambassadors had a moving coil sensor/meter pair which would vibrate with every jump and incline. Later they changed it to thermal activated moving iron unit which would change slowly and not show every pot hole/speedbraker/incline etc in real time).

If you fill petrol while the gauge is on, it will change slowly. If you switch it off, the gauge resets to zero and shows the fuel level (nearly)instantly once switched on.