[swaroopanand_86]

This post has been delayed quite a bit as I was out on a long due vacation!

Well this is how my hunt for a new car began. In the stables at home was my 2010 1.2 Fiat Punto emotion (shown in picture below). I bought the car in June, 2010 and gave it a facelift. I got done:
a) Racing Stripes with pin stripes,
b) Changed my tires to Yokohoma S Drive and upgraded the rims to Lenso Raiden SC 01
c) Got HID kits for the headlights and fogs
d) got upholstery from G Sport
e) LED Strip lighting for the front grill.

The car has been one of its kind since its birth and has always been an eye-catcher wherever I go. My wife always tells me that there is no other Punto like this (and I would like to believe that :-D).

I would extensively drive my Punto. Although initially I found it to be an apt buy, I slowly realised that the car is not really meant for tall guys like me (I am 6 ft 3 inches) :-). Since I couldn’t put up with the constant knee pains that Punto gave me while working the clutch, I finally decided to buy a new car! I gave away the Punto with a heavy heart (thankfully, one of my dear friends picked it up, so I still get to meet my first born).

So the hunt for a new car began in the first quarter of 2012. The criteria I was looking for was a diesel power train (especially because petrol prices are the most expensive in Bangalore and my punto would return a miserbale mileage of 9 to 10 kms per liter), with a comfortable and adequate driving position for somebody my height and an on-road price within two million rupees. I was also wanting a car with reasonable ground clearance so that it does not scrape the numerous "scientific" road humps in Bangalore. The options I considered are as follows:

Vw Vento Diesel: I found the car to be a driver’s car and quite engaging to drive. But I was not happy with the ground clearance of the car and the Value For Money (VFM) factor of the car. Also VW’s notoriously expensive after sales and service put me off.

Skoda Rapid: I found the suspension setup in the Rapid to be better than the VW Vento. But for a car which costs more than a million rupees on road I found it to be wanting in VFM and also the ground clearance was wanting. This car actually makes you feel like your driving the poor cousin of VW.

Hyundai Fludic Verna 1.6 Diesel & the Elantra: I found these cars to be great VFM and the power delivery was great in the diesels. I was also reasonably happy with their ground clearance. But the cars wallow around like a boat caught in the high seas if they are even slightly pushed and that put me off of them.

Chevrolet Cruze LTZ Automatic and Manual: I found the car to be absolutely amazing. It’s an absolute driver’s car and the power delivery was absolutely fantastic. The independent suspension set-up of the car gave it the best ground clearance out of the sedans I have driven till date. Unfortunately the back seat was a completely different story for me. When i sat upright in the back seat, my head would touch the roof and that put me off and did not convince me to part with two million rupees on Road.

Toyota Innova: I had to test drive this car as it was recommended by soooo many of them as the perfect car for my height. I was terribly disappointed with the car to say the least. The car absolutely lumbers on in city traffic and makes its bulk felt and does not even slightly feel agile. I found the engine to be terribly underpowered and the on-road price, the various models command in Bangalore absolutely did not justify the feature list they provided.

Renault Duster 110 RXZ: This was the promise car I was waiting for quite some time. I was happy with the looks of the car and its interior fit and finish. But the driver seat adjustment and the steering column adjustment in the car is quite a different story. I think this is not a car for somebody who is over 6ft tall. If I adjust the driver’s seat to my comfortable position the steering wheel literally sits on my lap. But the suspension set up of this car is absolutely amazing and I love the way it irons out the bumps. According to me the suspension set up is even better than the XUV.

Sangyong Rexton RX 7: I absolutely loved the feature list and the drive of the car. The auto box on this car is absolutely amazing and the button gear shifters on the steering wheel take triptronic shifting to a whole new level. But under thigh support is atrocious in the car. The only comfortable place to be in the car is the front seat. The back bench severely lacks in under-thigh support and if you sit in the last row, you will have your knees shoving your chin. The braking of the car also felt slightly inadequate and during the TD, I constantly found my self in the triptonic mode down shifting the car to use engine braking. Also I was not convinced with the 25 lakh on road price in Bangalore.

I finally decided that XUV 500 is my car!

Why the XUV 500: Well my cousin brother bought his black XUV W6 in March 2012. It was from the 2nd lot of the cars when the lottery system began. So I was not a stranger to the XUV.

I had the opportunity to take my brother's XUV to Chikmagalur and Devbagh-karwar. During these long drives I was able totally appreciate the car's good as well as the not so intrusive bad qualities. What influenced me to buy the XUV is divided into the good, bad and ugly as follows :-) :

a) The good about the XUV:

i) What impressed me the most was the bucket-load of equipment that the XUV gives as standard (I still feel they should have provided telescopic steering in the W6 also). When we compare the XUV to the competition in the price bracket, according to me the only cars which give it competition in terms of equipment are the verna, elantra and the cruze. As I have enumerated above I think the Scorpio is a better handler than the verna and elantra and the cruze has a ridiculous back seat.

ii) The black interiors of the car which comes with certain exterior colours like the Red, Opulent Purple, Moondust Silver, etc. The XUV looks really suave with the black interiors inside.

iii) The front seats of the XUV according to me are the best that there are in any car within 2.5 million rupees. They provide absolutely brilliant back support and under thigh support.

iv) The car looks really good front the front and the sides. I absolutely love the styling of the headlamps, the housing for the projector headlamps and the DRL's look fantastic and makes the car look like a cheaper cousin of the Audi from far, especially at night.

v) The back bench is very comfortable and this is one of the few cars on sale in India, where if a driver of my height adjusts the seat to his comfortable driving position, somebody of the my height can also sit right behind the drivers seat. Many, many cars have atrociously failed this test.

vi) Its an absolute highway cruiser. I did not have any difficulty hitting speeds of 170 Kmph on my brothers XUV.

b) The bad about the XUV:

i) I was not very happy with its suspension and I still am not. I still feel that the big bumps intrude too much into the cabin and unsettle the car by giving it significant body roll. The suspension of this car is its achilles heel. It just does not feel like a monocoque construction. There is significant body roll when pushed hard around bends and harsh bumps really do unsettle the car. But when you compare the XUV to the competition, i.e. SUV's or sedans in the price bracket it operates in, it just simply blows them away. Its a much better handler than the safari (which my brother-in-law owns) and does not feel like a truck to drive and its a huge leap from the Scorpio (which my brother owned before purchasing his W6) and gives acres of space and bucket-loads of gizmos compared to the Duster.

ii) I feel the gear box is a bit notchy and the 2nd gear in particular a problem to engage in my brothers car. The gear box definitely needs improvement. The cars pulling power at lower RPM in 2nd gear seems inadequate.

iii) I also found that when rev hard from standstill in 1st gear there is quite a bit of torque steer pulling the car to one direction.

iv) I feel the front design, especially the whiskers inspired by the cheetah are a bit of a over kill and does look out place in light colours such as White, Silver and to an extent in red.

v) The leg room in 2nd row is excellent, but I really hope they had provided rails for the 2nd row in order to liberate more space in the 3rd row. The current set-up forces the 3rd row to be used by people who are short that 5'7''-5'8'' over short hauls. But my wife who sat in the TD vehicle for the entire TD told me that it was more than adequate for her( She is 5'7'' tall).

c) The Ugly about the XUV:

i) The only let down in the XUV according to me is the suspension as enumerated above, plastic quality and reliability of quipment.

ii) Especially while driving my brothers XUV, I found the following issues:

a) While refueling on our drive to Devbagh, I pressed the fuel open lid button and the switch just collapsed into the dash!!

b) On the same drive, I also had issues with the cruse control. We had stopped for lunch and when we re-started our drive again, I wanted to engage the cruse control and pressed the steering mounted button for the same. But for some inexplicable reason, the cruse control refused to engage. The only solution was to stop the car, completely turn off the ignition and switch it back on and engage the cruse control.

c) The beige interiors and the look and feel of the Plastics are atrocious. Unfortunately to the best of knowledge, beige interiors come with exterior white and black colour.

d) We engaged the hazard lights once in the night during the drive when we stopped the vehicle by the road side. When we wanted to dis-engage the lights, the button just refused to switch off the lights. We had to give it a good wack to switch it off.

e) The center arm rest feels flimsy. And if you exert a little weight on it while shifting positions, it feels like it might buckle.


Despite the the above, I felt XUV to be the best VFM option and the only option in the market to tick all my criteria especially the driving position and ground clearance, but my dad felt it looks like a truck!

The Convincing Process for dad: Dad was not that convinced about the XUV and did not think it was wise to spend 17 lakhs on a Mahindra. But after the numerous test drives of the above mentioned contenders even he felt that the XUV gave the best bang for your buck, but he still feels it looks like a truck!

The Buying Experience: We decided to go for the W8 FWD as that’s the only model in which opulent purple is available in and has black interiors and I, dad and my wife absolutely love the colour (exterior and interior)on the XUV. So colour was the sole deciding factor for the variant. I did not want a AWD especially after reading TeamBhpian Debuda's travelog. His W6 has been all over the place where you think you would find the necessity for a AWD.

We decided to buy the car from Ananth Cars on Bannerghatta road and we placed the booking on 18th Feburary by paying a booking amount of Rs. 50,000/-. We knew somebody in the dealership and decided on Ananth Cars for the same reason. The sales executive came home collected the booking amount and gave us the booking form.

The quote given by Ananth cars was as follows a) ex-showroom price Rs. 13,40,156/- b) incidental expenses for RTO Rs. 8,000/- c) Registration amount for RTO 2,52,887/- d) insurance 60,000/- coming to a grand total of 16,61,043/-

I got a call from Ananth Cars on the 21st Jan saying the car had arrived at the stockyard. I very badly wanted to do a comprehensive PDA of the car flowing the cue of other TeamBHPians like Debuda. Unfortunately I was tied down with work and could not do it. Dad finally decided to take delivery of the car on the 25th of Jan. unfortunately for me he took the decision on the evening of 22nd Jan . So the entire 23rd I had to run around to arrange for the balance amount and talk to other insurance agents as I wanted to take insurance from outside, as I was confident I would be able to get it at a much lesser premium.

I was able to arrange insurance from United India Insurance taking a bumper to bumper comprehensive policy at a premium of Rs. 40,000/-. Finally the Velvet Revolver was registered on the 24th and we arrived at the showroom on the 25th afternoon. I conducted a mini PDA to check for the obvious things and found the car to be in order. I went for the following accessories at the showroom for the car:

a) Crome garnish for the headlights
b) Crome garnish for the grill
c) Side body moulding
d) Crome garnish for the tailgate
e) Reverse camera
f) Rubberised floor mats
g)Rain visor
h) Illuminated scuff plates

The freebies that I was able to extract from the showroom are as follows :-D:
a) Crome garnish for the headlights
b) Crome garnish for the grill
c) Rubberised floor mats
d) Rain visor
e) Illuminated scuff plates

I am still awaiting the balance accessories as there is a shortage of supply from Mahindra. I hope they do not start another lottery system for the accessories . The accessories from the list that were in stock and that were fitted to the car on delivery are as follows:

a) Crome garnish for the headlights = free
b) Side body moulding = Rs, 2,000/-
c) Crome garnish for the tailgate = 1,000/-
d) Reverse camera = Rs. 2,791/-
e) Rubberised floor mats = free

I am still awaiting the balance accessories from the dealership as there is a shortage of supply of the same from Mahindra. I hope they will not start another lottery system for accessories!

First Impression of the Velvet Revolver: I love the colour of the interior as well as the exterior. The issue of the torque steer seems to have been addressed and I did not find it in the Velvet Revolver. I feel the 2nd gear is geared very short and the the 3rd gear is geared very tall. So at lower RPM's I find myself shifting gears often when i require the pulling power. Hopefully this will settle once the engine runs in. It was not this significant in my brothers W6. I have come to accept the shiney bits of the dash and it does not bother me. Well this is the first SUV=XUV at home, so the feeling has been accelerating and I feel like an absolute bully in the car, especially in Bangalore traffic :-D.

I will let the pictures taken by my sweet wife to do the talking about how the delivery process went.

Day 1: of the Velvet Reolver just was all about the pooja. When i took delivery of the car it had already run 30 Kms, probably for the registration. One thing that I would want to mention about the Odo is that, the problem of being able to reset the Odo within the runin of the 1st 500 Kms still exists and I was able to erase 30 Kms off the Odo! Another annoying aspect of the car that I have noticed is that when the seat belts are not buckled, the buckles tend to keep knocking against the pillars of the car when I go over a bad patch of road. Mahindra needs to really come up with some design solution to improve cabin environment on this front. Such minor irritants really let down a good car

Spent rest of the day showing the car to close relatives and was easily able to stuff 9 people in the car with the driver. I fianlly ended the day with 30 Km on the odo.

Day 2: of the velvet revolver at reset odo 30 Kms was all about giving it a facelift. Now the ingredients in the facelift of Velvet Revolver are as follows:

a) Sun Film
b) alloy Wheels
c) Speaker upgrade
d) side foot steps
e) Fog lamps
f) Horn
g) Led strip lighting for the front grill.

Now I shall explain each Component in detail and I am uploading pictures accordingly in that order.

Sun Film: I opted for 3M's CR 70 sun film for the front windshield and the sides. This sun film has an VLT of 70% and heat rejection of 50%. It provides glare reduction upto 23%. I am very satisfied with the sunfilm. I haven't had any problem with the cops for the sunfilm either. It has drastically improved the efficiency of the AC by chilling the cabin quicker than usual.The stock glass of the XUV although claimed by Mahindra to be tinted, dosen't feel one bit like it.

Alloy Wheels: My prayers were answered when I got Bridgestone Duller HT tyres with the Velvet Revolver. I did not upgrade my tyres. I wanted alloy upgrade because I really wanted the Velvet Revolver to stand out from the crowd of other XUV's. The XUV has a very unique PCD of 139.7 with 5 holes. So the alloy wheel patters were quite limited. There were a few options in Plati and HR. But I was really not happy with the design. Finally I found a design of my liking in GTR with 139.7 PCD. The model no. of the alloy wheel is 551 and I opted for the chrome finish in 17 inches only as i did not want to upsize from the stock size. It was also available in dull silver, but i thought, Chrome finish best suited the heels of the Velvet Revolver.

I was able to successfully transfer the tyretronics chip to the alloywheels and its working fine and I haven't lost tyretronics feature. But there was an issue with the spare wheel. As the hub of the design that I had choosen was much bigger than the hub of the stock alloy, I had to slightly modify the clamp provided to hoist the spare wheel. I hope the pictures provide necessary clarity.

Speaker Upgrade: I had heard a lot of issues with the ICE upgrade for the XUV and especially about trying to fit in a sub-woofer with all three rows up. All discussion on TeamBHP gave me enough in-sight to go for the right upgrade for my Velvet Revolver. I have only upgrade the speakers and fitted a sub-woofer. I haven't touched the head unit. The stock speakers on the XUV are atrocious to say the least and this upgrade was more of a necessity. The equipment list for the speaker upgrade is as follows:

a) For the front doors: I went for Focal Performance series PS165, with tweeters, midrange 6 inch speakers and cross overs.
b) For the rear door: I went for Focal 165 A1 SG with tweeters, midrange 6 inch speakers and cross overs.
c) Sub Woofer: Rockford Fosgate Prime 10 inch, model No. R2SD2
d) Amplifier: JBL GTO 504 EZ four channel amplifier with built-in Hi-Lo converter for the speakers of the four doors. JBL GTO 501EZ mono-block amplifier for the sub-woofer.
e) Sound Proofing: Ballastic Sound proofing mats for all four doors.

As the GTO 504 EZ amp had an built-in Hi-Lo converte, I did not have to touch the head unit at all. The orginal speaker cables were tapped and connected to the amp. The sub woofer box was custom built to make sure it fits with all the seats up. There is some vibration from the sub woofer if I really pump it up as there is no space near the boot to provide adequate damping and as I have noticed, the majority of the vibration is not from the tailgate, but from sides near the last set of windows. I am trying hard to eliminate it completely. Otherwise the entire setup is absolute bliss :-D. The speakers are fitted in 6 inch MDF spacers to further mitigate vibration.

But I am particularly not happy with the equalizer settings of the stock Head Unit and I am trying to figure a way to either change the Head Unit or try to work with the existing one

[n.devdath]

Congrats on the purchase Swaroop. The purple is indeed a very flamboyant color for the XUV and gives it a very suave look. This should be first purple XUV on TBHP.

Wish you many happy miles with it.

[swiftnfurious]

What a co-incidence! Two XUV ownership reports were unlocked today. Both of them sold their Puntos to buy an XUV!

Congrats on the buy and wish you miles of happy & safe motoring!

Please do update with more pics of interiors and exteriors too!

[PatienceWins]

Congrats Swaroop. The vehicle looks good in purple.

I am 6'2" tall and your buying process will be helpful to me when I upgrade.

Wish you a happy and safe journey with the Cheetah!

[SDP]

Congrats swaroopanand_86! The purple is arguably the best color on XUV. I love that color. Did not opt for it myself as it was a bit too dark for my taste and looked different from different angles. BUT, no doubt, a purple XUV makes a loud statement wherever it shows up.

Glad that you managed to extract a few freebies from the dealer. Its high time the dealers get off their high horses.

Congratulations once again. Enjoy your ride and drive safe!

[getsurya]

Congratulations, Swaroop!

Great color, though might need detailed pictures of the color and the additions, as well.

Happy Motoring!

[Shreyas Aterkar]

Congrats Swaroop. Its raining XUVs here. Nice color, in the darker shades I prefer this one though my favorite remains white. IMO, the chrome bit on the door handles looks nice & classy, did you go for it?

Also, would love to see more pics especially of interiors.

[jkrishnakj]

Congratulations Swaroop. Real good car there, and i simply love the purple XUV's. Will keenly be following your thread as well, besides the one i am reading about from SDP & Debuda's. Who knows whats in store for me, come Sept 2013, when the lease of my Safari ends.

[Mudhalaipatti]

Post deleted by the Team-BHP Support : Please do NOT post one-liners that add little or no informational value to the thread. We need your co-operation to maintain the overall quality of this forum.

Please read our rules before proceeding any further.

[MetalBuff]

Hello Swaroop,

My hearty congratulations to you. A die hard Slash fan, eh?

Have seen this shade a lot many times in Mumbai and can be mistaken for Black in the first glance. However, when the purple shade really shows, the XUV surely looks majestic. This color surely adds élan to the XUV's opulence. Superb!

That said, you'll have a tough time maintaining the sheen. A lot of elbow grease to follow but hey, isn't that sweet pain

Any ICE upgrades in the horizon? Needless to say, many more pictures expected. Bring them on!

You have landed yourself with the best that money can buy in that section of the market (per your requirements). Cheers!

-Shivang Gandotra

[swaroopanand_86]

Picture continuation of the Speaker Upgrade.

The passenger seat of the car had to be removed to fit the amp in the car. When the seat was reinstalled and the airbag connection plug reconnected, the car showed airbag inflation warning on restart. I had to take the car to the dealership to have the warning reset. The dealership was nice enough to do it for free on a Sunday

Side foot Steps: I did not buy the side steps from the dealer as I was not happy with the design. I think the design available with mahindra does not gel well with the car. So I had side steps from C Track Model No. R300 fitted to the car .

Fog Lamps: I wanted fog lamps as I felt the low beam of the XUV is inadequate. I realized this while driving my brother's W6. I opted for fog lights from KC Hilites. I went for the Apollo Pro series. I had the clamps custom made. I could fit it without cutting the front grill. The clamps are fitted to the front frame beam, without compromising its structural integrity. The bulbs are 100 watts and I find it to make up for the inadequacy of the low beam in spread and reach.

Horn: I changed the stock horn as I felt it wasn't loud enough. I got the Velvet Revolver a pair of Bosch Symphony horns. A separate cut-out was not required for the installation of the same.

LED Strip Lighting for the front grill: I had done this with my first born and I could'nt resist myself. So I went ahead and had it done for the Velvet Revolver too. There is plastic moulding that is present around the radiator as seen in the pics below. It is right behind the Mahindra "bunny" grill. I had white LED strips stuck to it, to give a diffused light effect to the grill. I opted for white so that it gels well with DRL of the headlight. I have provided a separate switch, cut-out and fuse for the light. None of the original wiring is touched to install the same.

This was my phase 1 of the uplift. For Phase 2 of the Phase lift of the Velvet Revolver, I have in mind a ECU remap by racedynamics and an upgrade on the airfilter.

Right now the ODO of the Velvet Revolver Stands at 657 Kms. I had the opportunity to taker her out to the NICE road last night. Was able to hit 120 Kmphr and did not want to push hard as I did not want to go above 2500 rpm. But i felt steel rings are required on the internal hub of the car as I encountred some wobbling between 80-100 Kmphr. Will keep you guys updated on the same.

The car gave me a mileage of 9 Km/hr on the 1st full tank. I hope the efficiency will improve as the engine runs-in

[GTO]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to the Initial Ownership Section. Thanks for sharing!

[Rajain]

Hi

Congratulations. Its a great vehicle and I wish you many many thousand safe kms.

I just wanted to check with you a few points -

a) I am assuming no head unit upgrade but with the speaker upgrade - did you get that done from Mahindra or from outside. If it was from outside whats the stance of Mahindra on outside work? Any warrenty issues?

b) I like the KC hi lites. Very good lights. Same question. Whats Mahindra stance on outside work? I am assuming you would have got it done with a rely. Also, if you see the side profile of the cheetah you will notice that the KC hi lites project forward. Since they are below the headlamp level you might also want to be careful that they don't brush onto a high pavement. Also, I'd never use them in the city.

Long time back I was considering XUV but eventually settled for Ertiga. I must say I like the cheetah. Keep the pictures coming and safe driving.

Cheers

[CRtorquefan]

Congratulations on your new XUV.

You're really having a great taste towards the customization towards your car.
Though i'm not a much fan of the latter, but liked the bits you added or customized.


Can you throw some light on the ballistic door insulation mats. IMHO, they seems to be a great addition, considering the road noise or environmental imperfection, we're incurring in our daily life.

& What about the car perfume or else ? To keep your car fresh & inviting, as it's quite difficult to keep the cars' interior smell free & inviting, considering the plasticky upholstery they're having nowadays.

[swaroopanand_86]

Originally Posted by Rajain

Hi

Congratulations. Its a great vehicle and I wish you many many thousand safe kms.

I just wanted to check with you a few points -

a) I am assuming no head unit upgrade but with the speaker upgrade - did you get that done from Mahindra or from outside. If it was from outside whats the stance of Mahindra on outside work? Any warrenty issues?

b) I like the KC hi lites. Very good lights. Same question. Whats Mahindra stance on outside work? I am assuming you would have got it done with a rely. Also, if you see the side profile of the cheetah you will notice that the KC hi lites project forward. Since they are below the headlamp level you might also want to be careful that they don't brush onto a high pavement. Also, I'd never use them in the city.

Long time back I was considering XUV but eventually settled for Ertiga. I must say I like the cheetah. Keep the pictures coming and safe driving.

Cheers

Hello Rajain,

The head unit cannot be ugraded at the moment because the air conditioner and other car information bits are synced into it. There is no head unit in the market yet which can takeover these bits of information from the stock head unit. The same issue existed with Chevrolet cruze earlier.

Its a pure question of investment. I am awaiting for some company to invest on the XUV to make their after market head unit compatible with the car.

Coming to the speakers I had it fixed outside. I have not touched the stock wiring given by Mahindra and as such there is no warrenty issue there. All the electrical addition say the speakers, amps, fog lights and the led strips are connected through separate wiring with relays and fuses in place.

Coming to the positioning of the fog lamps, it was fixed at that height after due R&D to ensure it is high enough to not hit any pavements.

Originally Posted by CRtorquefan

Congratulations on your new XUV.

You're really having a great taste towards the customization towards your car.
Though i'm not a much fan of the latter, but liked the bits you added or customized.


Can you throw some light on the ballistic door insulation mats. IMHO, they seems to be a great addition, considering the road noise or environmental imperfection, we're incurring in our daily life.

& What about the car perfume or else ? To keep your car fresh & inviting, as it's quite difficult to keep the cars' interior smell free & inviting, considering the plasticky upholstery they're having nowadays.

The ballistic mats are noise insulation mats. They are stick on mats. They are applied on the door after removing the door padding. Its basically done to help the acoustics of the speakers. The speakers are already housed in 6" MDF spacers. These mats in addition to the spacers help in cutting down on vibration, there by improving the sound quality when i pump up the system .

The added benefit is that they also improve on outside noise cancellation to an extent.