[Guderian]

Note from Support: All meet posts from the thread titled Fleet Admiral Togo Heihachiro - Toyota Fortuner. Life Sails On...
have been moved here. This thread originally started by mdsaab, so some of the continuity of the posts might have changed.



Hi Dot, Noopster & mdsaab,
It was a pleasure for us (Admiral & I) to have met you Pune folks and your rides this morning. 'twas truly great fun discussing all things automobilia and everything else under the sun.
Thanks, guys, for the wonderful time and taking time out on a wonderful, pleasant, lazy Sunday morning.

What else can I say ? Remember that 1975 Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby & Amos movie ? That's all I want to say...'Let's Do it Again !'

Lots of snaps and report together with the drive snaps later on with the Scorpios will of course duly follow in due course of time.

Watch this channel for more.

Please free to put up your snaps here or on your threads. Look forward to that !

[dot]

Originally Posted by Guderian

Thanks, guys, for the wonderful time and taking time out on a wonderful, pleasant, lazy Sunday morning.

What else can I say ? Remember that 1975 Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby & Amos movie ? That's all I want to say...'Let's Do it Again !'

Certainly we will.
@noopster has already posted some snaps. More will follow.

And I must say, Admiral has the cleanest engine bay there ever was. Its an inspiration, no kidding.

[F150]

Originally Posted by Guderian

Hi Dot, Noopster & mdsaab,
It was a pleasure for us (Admiral & I) to have met you Pune folks and your rides this morning. 'twas truly great fun discussing all things automobilia and everything else under the sun.
Thanks, guys, for the wonderful time and taking time out on a wonderful, pleasant, lazy Sunday morning.

What else can I say ? Remember that 1975 Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby & Amos movie ? That's all I want to say...'Let's Do it Again !'

Lots of snaps and report together with the drive snaps later on with the Scorpios will of course duly follow in due course of time.

Watch this channel for more.

Please free to put up your snaps here or on your threads. Look forward to that !

Oh. I missed the chance to meet the admiral. Please let me know when the next meet is planned.

Dear Guderian,

I admire your style of writing and have been following your thread for weeks now and it is on my bookmarks.

How often do you check the tyre pressure ? Did you ever try nitrogen as tyres filled with nitrogen don't loose tyre pressure for months ?

[Guderian]

Originally Posted by dot

Certainly we will.
1. @noopster has already posted some snaps. More will follow.

2. And I must say, Admiral has the cleanest engine bay there ever was. Its an inspiration, no kidding.

1. Thanks for the info and will have a dekko on his thread.

2. Ouch ! That hurt ! Because I hadn't cleaned the engine bay as usual on Sunday morning. Why ? Because I was in Pune meeting you folks right ? And by Wednesday this week I sure am going to be hit by the cold turkey of not having my Sunday fix and a feeling that something is not quite right.
But then guess what...it is more than adequately compensated by the drive and more importantly meeting all of you.
Cold turkey ? Naaah ! Not this week.

Seriously, at the cost of repetition, let me state that I couldn't, frankly, care about the looks. But engine bay cleanliness and the engine and its sub-component's performance/s is/are of paramount importance. Of course good, prim and propah looks is like the icing on the cake. And not the other way round.
For me.

Thanks for the appreciation, dot !

[Guderian]

Originally Posted by F150

1. Oh. I missed the chance to meet the admiral. Please let me know when the next meet is planned.

Dear Guderian,

2. I admire your style of writing and have been following your thread for weeks now and it is on my bookmarks.

3. How often do you check the tyre pressure ? Did you ever try nitrogen as tyres filled with nitrogen don't loose tyre pressure for months ?

Hi F150,

1. Pity you missed coming in and joining the gang yesterday. But nothing to despair there should be another one coming in - sometime soon - if I have determined, correctly, the group's proclivities ! So we shall catch up.

2. Many thanks for the warm words and thanks for being around. Join the fun !

3. I check the tyre pressure every week. But top up requirement is generally once in two or three weeks. As mentioned earlier Admiral's tyres loses about 0.5 PSI every 2/3 weeks.

I didn't/don't want to actually fill Nitrogen as it could change the drive dynamics. Because all tests of any vehicle and therefore the tuning of various components are carried out under standard conditions. They wouldn't use Nitrogen there, I guess, during tests and so the components of the suspension, steering etc would be tweaked with tyres running on standard 'air'. And with a lighter gas like N I am sure there would be some difference to the drive dynamics - however small. So 'N'o go.

Possibly this thinking is what kept me off installing the Pete's Box in my Scorpio even after it completed it's 5 year warranty in 2010. I would have then needed to put in the K&N filter as well to aid the Pete's Box push. Lengthy explanation to that - but some other time.

So no N for Admiral's tyres.

Though - I love a healthy dose of N2O (Nitrous Oxide) on this channel and elsewhere every now & then - if possible, every minute.
What's that ? Laughing gas of course !

[Zappex]

Greetings General!

This sunday when you sent me a message; My phone battery died. Without a charger and stuck up in 'social commitments' I couldn't reply back.

Originally Posted by Guderian

Dot, Noopster & mdsaab,
It was a pleasure for us (Admiral & I) to have met you Pune folks and your rides this morning.

So this was the meet you were talking about. Looks like I missed a lot!

You were to put up a thread on dawn patrol in the meet section. Please go ahead with that and see if others want to join in.

Then its the 28th, I guess...

Adios!

[Guderian]

At Last......! Sunday May 22, 2011.

... A drive, a drive !

After being cooped up for weeks in the city and feeling very claustrophobic the Admiral at last got a chance to do what he likes doing the best. Setting the highways and trails on fire.

And so when a group of Scorpio owners( and TBHP members to boot - Kaiserketkar/DJ et al) decided to have a drive and meet at Pune - who was I to refuse ? And the drive to Lavasa though done many times before by the group but each drive is a unique one when done with friends ! And the first time with the Admiral made it very unique for me of course.

And also was the keen desire to meet up folks, whom I had met on this thread, in flesh and blood. And they were dot, mdsaab & Noopster (met earlier - but that wasn't enough really ).
But they couldn't make make it to Lavasa. So the plan had be tweaked to meet all. Afterall the Admiral was running out of the city for a breather and nothing mattered in the bid to meet everyone.

So plans were made to land up much earlier at Pune to meet up with the Civic/Vento posse and head of with the Scorp riders a little later on.
And what a wonderful day it turned out to be !

But then as usual I'd prefer to say my side of the story (Noopster has his view of the meet already there on his thread !) with snaps. These snaps may be a little off quality thanks to the dirty windscreen, thanks to a light drizzle !

Started off at the crack of dawn:


And soon enough reached the gates of paradise:


Ahh Paradise ! With a threat of a downpour enroute. Ideal conditions for testing out the Admiral.


A ghostly snap on getting into the Bhatan tunnel:


Grey clouds loom and a light drizzle annouces the intentions of the clouds:


Dash ! Do you have to pay to be in paradise ? Anyway paradise or not the M800 wallah's Sunday is ruined:


Anyway coming back to my Q. Do you have to pay to be in paradise ? I thought your good deeds got you there !


And it did look that everyone and his uncle wanted to be in paradise too !


Would that have been any good ? No way ! Nothing like sailing with the Admiral.


During the drive I had intended to experiment a little on the FE. So from Thane to Lonavala did a sedate 80-100 KMPH (mostly at 80 KMPH) after resetting the MID to zero.
From L'vala to Pune I did a 100-120 KMPH run again after setting the MID to zero. The increase in speed was also booted by dot's call that they were already at the rendezvous point ! But an experiment is an experiment. Results of the same at the very end - in Part 2 of the report !

Soon enough Pune arrived in a jiffy. Almost 25 minutes ahead of the scheduled 8.45 am. And what do I see ?

(Left to right - dot, noopster, mdsaab and mdsaab's GPS device. That seemd to hog all the attention !)

Soon enough we were a the CCD outlet which was mercifully empty.


All action !


Noopster in his thread mentioned that I was declared to be a (suspect) engine bay expert, but I state before that event, others tried their hand too ! Here the debate was whether this was the front end or rear end of dot's vehicle:


To such an extent that they made dot confirm it by checking where the steering wheel was:


Soon the focus turned towards the Admiral and his ways:


Of course over coffee and cookies a lot many topics were chatted up. As this is a family channel they cannot be reproduced here. Because ladies would turn red in the face and children would get bored of...well...automobilia trivia !

And we moved on for a proper photo shoot:


Snap of the morning ! Admiral and the bevy of beauties:


Not sure what mdsaab was upto but it had dot very worried:


And soon enough the growlers arrived. Scorpios announce their presence:


Introductions done. Handshakes completed. It was time for the Civic/Vento posse to leave.

And a promise extracted for a leisurely full day meet and a drive !

(End of part 1. Part 2 with more snaps, the Lavasa drive, Admiral and the Scorpios, behaviour of Admiral in the hills, the FE experiment results and everything else follows. Hold on to your saddles !)

[amitwlele]

Kicking myself for planning my Mumbai trip on the weekend. On Sunday was thinking about leaving for Pune early and catch the Admiral on the expressway (not sure if that would have been possible ) but family things caught up.

[Guderian]

Originally Posted by Zappex

1. Greetings General!

2. So this was the meet you were talking about. Looks like I missed a lot!

3. You were to put up a thread on dawn patrol in the meet section. Please go ahead with that and see if others want to join in.

Then its the 28th, I guess...

Adios!

1. Saludos Zap !

2. Pity you missed it. Good fun too. But then the next one is always the better one. Or so says the optimist.

3. Yeah will sort out some of the professional tangles and put up the intimation note on the meet section.

May 28th it is...

Originally Posted by amitwlele

Kicking myself for planning my Mumbai trip on the weekend. On Sunday was thinking about leaving for Pune early and catch the Admiral on the expressway (not sure if that would have been possible ) but family things caught up.

Hi Amit. Don't be harsh on yourself - I'll let you know some good spots. For kicking y'self and then you can be very harsh on yourself from being just harsh !

Not to worry there could be something coming up rather soon hopefully.

It would have been nice to have linked up on the Expressway and driven along and you could have joined in the meet which followed.

So catch up sometime soon.

[dkaile]

Excellent write up Guderian... (though you will forgive me for skipping from page no. 15 to this last one. If there is some juicy must read material I missed do let me know the page nos.)

Now to get to the point. I am in the process to upgrade my exiting Toyota's to the Fortuner and would like your valuable views on certain queries -

1. What is the mileage in the last 3 months you have done till now and your total maintenance cost till date? If I read correctly, the average FE figures you are getting is between 10-11kmph. Correct me if I'm wrong.

2. Is there any auxillary/usb input available in the stock music system. If I presume correctly, its not there, then how do you make do with your digital music library, or do you stick to cd's? I would love to see the touchscreen dvd/aux system they have just introduced in the Corolla (to go on sale in June) being put in this goliath immediately, otherwise it would be a sham that a lower specced vehicle in their arsenal would have a higher specced ICE...

3. I currently own a Corolla and a Qualis and how would you rate the back seat ride quality compared to those two, if you have tested those or in general, if not.

4. Have the roof rails deteriorated further or holding out fine, as per your initial view.

Recently saw their boot camp video and was really impressed to see its capabilities (of standing on 2 wheels).

[Guderian]

At Last......! (Partie Deux)

And so 4 Scorpios and a lone T - Innova joined the armada along with the Admiral. Formidable force that.

However one of the Scorpio Captains (Comfortablynumb on TBHP) sitting regally in his Captain's chair in his Scorp, called Scout, suddenly heard his radio set crackling. He had received a radio signal ordering him back to the base.

Couldn't figure out what but many of heard some snatches of radio tattle:
"Where ? I don't care ! If you are not here in 10 minutes, I'll have you sell the Scorpio. I mean it. Who ? Who Admiral ? He can go and drown himself and the rest of his ships for all I care. You be back here mister !"

It was not a male voice. And mothers don't talk thataway. Neither do girl friends.

And none of us eavesdropped as it's a bad habit.

Soon a white Scorpio raised its mizzen mast and turned tail sailing away from the armada. One could only guess how the Captain's name came to be Comfortablynumb.

With that departure the Armada was downgraded to a Flotilla in the Admirality charts.

And the adventure continued. Once again let the snaps do the talking !

And as always the initial part of the drive into Lavasa was exciting.

With traffic and narrow roads:


And swaying rears !


Soon a break to allow the Innova to join - which was being driven very sedately.
Discussing the pros and cons of buying a TFort:



Soon the narrow roads and swaying backs were left far behind.

Admiral now forgot all about swaying rears and hugged the curves very well indeed. Following Kaiserketkar's Tiger (- as in Teeguh/Tiger, Panzer corps most feared equipment.)


Soon another break. This time for some fresh air for all. A relaxed drive, you see !


What is Kaiser doing behind the Admiral's back ?


Soon wonderful roads again. Nice dream run really.




Temghar Dam ahoy ! Cast anchors:


The flotilla stops for a look see:



One side of the dam:


And the other:


Eternal dam-nation !


The whole 'dam' group:

(L-R: ND, (ladies n kids), DJ, SA & Kaiser. Of course, one bloke was missing here.

Admiral and cronies on entering Lavasa - at a viewing spot.

(L-R: Unanmed Scorp(ND's), Admiral, Tiger)

The first view:


Lunch - at Oriental Octopus - hey - you mean there are Occidental Octopuses too ?!!

Fly Thai. Get the connect ?!!

Individual squadrons to peel off from the flotilla.
At departure point near the highway:


Return to paradise or somewhere there !


At the end of paradise...Expressway ends in 500 meters !


Spotted - a worthy competitor ? Admiral salutes. And zooms to base.


At base a survey of Admiral reveals only some spalshes which add to his character:


And finally the Admiral was given a mild cleaning around this area and in the front and was given his new medal & ribbon. This medal & ribbon was pinched from mdsaab in the morning, during the photoshoot. Pinching TBHP stickers has become a habit. Last time it was from Noopster and now this ! Thanks mdsaab !


And after a 12 hour day - left at 6.15 am and got back at 6.18 pm - one was left with only one thought as why can't all days be like this ?!!
If wishes were horses...


And now coming to some attributes of the Admiral.

1. FE: As mentioned earlier - set the MID at the start of the expressway and did the distance from that point to Lonavala at speeds of 80 - 100 KMPH. The MID showed 14.7 KMPL. After deducting the difference it normally shows between MID and tank to tank calculation currently (ranging from 0.25 KMPl to 0.30KMPL) it should be 14.40 KMPL.

At Lonavala, reset the MID, increased the speed to 100-120 KMPL till the end of the expressway. On exit from express way it showed 13.2 KMPL. After 'standard deduction' (!) - 12.90 KMPL.

From that point to Lavasa and back on the highway it showed the reading at 9.3 KMPL (9KMPL). Thanks to all the twisties and slow run etc for about 60 KMs.

Back on the expressway I let the Admiral rip constantly at 140 KMPH, whenever possible. Not beyond. The MID on docking read as 11.3 KMPL.

This morning I filled up fuel and the tank to tank calculation showed 11 KMPL exact overall (MID 11.3 KMPL). This was the next fill after last Saturday, reported here. Included about 60 KMs of city running too before hitting the expressway on Sunday morning.

The sweet spot seems to be 5th gear, 100 KMPH. You'd get some amazing FE returns.

2. Handling and suspension: I must say that the suspension has settled down and the handling feels very comfortable compared to the comfortable feel in the long southern drive in April. Or maybe I am getting used to it more and more ?
Threw Admiral hard at some of the corners at it while returning from Lavasa as there was no traffic at all, both during the ascends and descends. Admiral really held its poise very, very well despite his height, weight and girth.
No pitching, rolling or yawing. May be compared to the Scorp. But I found it superbo ! Owner's pride ?

3. Tyres did its job well. But did feel that there is some amount of humming on the expressway.

4. On the return turned off the juke box and just listened for sounds inside the cabin. Pin drop silence except for the mild humming and my breathing. Even the rear most row seat's rackets are now silent, thanks to the taping activity of the anchor points carried out in the 2nd service. Some noise was heard from the glove compartment in some rare rough patches. Should surely secure the loose contents there.

5. Driving fatigue and discomfort - Nil.

6. Since it was the first real showers, checked out the wipers as well. Worked very well and the wiper rubbers are top quality - no streaking etc. But one feature is missing compared to the Scorp. Not sure what is the name of the feature. But it works like this - after you spray the windshield with the wash water the wiper automatically swipes three times and stops. In the Scorp after a wait of 10 seconds it swishes one last time to catch the dribble of the remaining wash water coming down from the water arc from the top of the windshield . Get what I mean ? This doesn't seem to be present in the TFort - one has to do it manually by pulling the stem for one last swipe.
The rear windshield wash and wipe is also super. Very slick in operation and does the job well.

7. Engine noise increases in the cabin as you cross 140 KMPH, however it is suprisingly much less than what it was in March this year. Engine too seems to be opening up and settling down.

8. Music system is decent. But when the AC runs at full speed - 5 notches ( when on starting and the climate control is on auto) it creates quite a racket and the music volume does need to be increased quite a bit.

9. AC continues to be excellent - chilling-wise. But the blower at speeds 4 & 5 is truly noisy. It creates some 'funny' situations. When driving back I had switched off the music system, as mentioned. Everything sephulchral silent and the AC blower was at speed 3. Just superbly humming along.
Sun peeked for a few moments and the brains behind the climate control suddenly felt that the temp had increased and kicked the blower to full suddenly causing a racket in the cabin.
I jumped out of my skin - in that silent cabin suddenly to have a hundred banishees wailing was too much even for my hardened senses. I look around if someone had seen me jumping up in my seat.
Nobody had at 140 KMPH.
I smiled a silly smile at myself (more to calm my frayed nerves) and drove on.

10. Deeply felt the need for a padded arm rest (miss my Scorp !) and padding on the doors just below the door switches console. You see while throwing the Admiral into a left turn my right knee/lower thigh sometimes goes painfully into the hard spot/projection on the door.
Never had this issue on the Scorp - because never threw the old chap this hard !

11. As per the observations received from Kaiser who was tailing me for sometime - the gait and posture of the Admiral was good. No waywardness or out of line movements observed. No smoke trail on changing gears etc -not a wisp.

12. On wet roads (the first rain/ freshly drizzled roads are more dangerous that the completely wet cleaned out roads due to the treacherous muck, grime and water forming a deadly skid trap) Admiral was very, very sure of himself.

So there you have folks, as I experienced the Admiral in a variety of conditions.

Perhaps the best comment came from Kaiser's lil' daughter, who is incidentally the youngest old member having attended all group meetings since she was 3 months or so old, when during one of the breaks she very shyly whispered to me " It looks like a bulldog from the front !" This was after Admiral was behind Tiger for a long time on the way to L.
When I gave her a quizzical look she quickly added - " Not me, Mama said so !"

Today it hit me. Did the mama feel that the Scorpio looks much better ?

But Bulldogs look nice, cute and fierce all at the same time right ?!!

[mdsaab]

@Guderian
Lovely post of the pics and what a lovely morning it was.
Love the sense of humour, we were still scratching our heads till you finally came and explained that the engine of the civic is indeed placed in the front. Well @dot was still confused even after your clarification and has set up an appointment with Honda, to get the engine checked out. I hope they solve his issues and do indeed give it in writing that the engine is placed ahead of the steering wheel.
Look forward to a long leisurely meet real soon.
Drive Safe!

Edit : The pics in your post #648 haven't come through.
Sticker was my pleasure.
Thanks for the Coffee, but please confirm that you are paying next time as i would have upgraded to a Large one. LOL!

[noopster]

Herr General, images are not uploaded in your last poat- care to repeat the process please? It kills the pleasure without pics!

Mods- pls delete this post after the correction- thanks!

[Guderian]

Originally Posted by mdsaab

Edit : The pics in your post #648 haven't come through.

Originally Posted by noopster

Herr General, images are not uploaded in your last poat- care to repeat the process please? It kills the pleasure without pics!

All snaps correctly placed now !
Please have a dekko now.

[dot]

Originally Posted by mdsaab

Well @dot was still confused even after your clarification and has set up an appointment with Honda, to get the engine checked out. I hope they solve his issues and do indeed give it in writing that the engine is placed ahead of the steering wheel.

HAHA. Good one.

Need I inform everybody that some people could not sleep in anticipation of meeting the Admiral.

Yes, Scorponok is having some knocking issues, half of which was rectified today. Hopefully it will be done by tomorrow. And need I tell that Scorp is getting enormous help from Herr General.