[timuseravan]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

Today my Orange tank completed 6 months of its existence. Odo stands at 6.5K km. It is chugging along quite well, mostly home - office - home daily commutes. Only issue being observed is the drop in coolant level (discussed elaborately on the TUV official review thread). Right now it is just below the minimum level mark. Will keep it under observation in the coming days. After 2 weeks a 500+ kms round trip is planned to Barshi (Solapur district), mostly NH9. Will be able to test true highway capabilities of the tank then.

Looking for some good car freshener and magnetic sun shades before the trip. Any suggestions?

Congrats on the milestone!
I was recommended the Able Spider brand of magnetic shades. I have placed order last week - expected delivery is tomorrow.
You cang et them online at Amazon and Flipkart.

[AutoIndian]

Today being a Sunday, carried out the weekly ritual of car cleaning. Then decided to fit the magnetic sun shades and mud flaps from local accessories shop. Hence headed towards the Car Studio shop in Kasarwadi (Nasik Phata). He didn't have the sun shades, but had the mud flaps, MRP 650/-. So gave him the go ahead to fit the mud flaps. The front ones were fouling with the protruding edge of the foot step. The fitter then drilled a hole at the fouling portion of the mud flap and fitted in position. He said that some customers had cut fouling portion of the foot-step instead. Some pictures of the mud flap.

RHS Front mud flap - Note the foot-step protruding inside the mud flap

RHS Front mud flap - Another view

RHS Rear mud flap

LHS Rear mud flap

LHS Front mud flap

While the mud flaps were being fitted I asked the sales guy if he had the M-Tek roof carrier, Supersport Carbon model. He enquired with the dealer & said it was available. It will take 15-20 minutes to get it from the dealer, which was 4 kms away. Cost 5,500/- (10% dsicount on MRP of Rs 6000/-). I gave the go-ahead. Initially the fitters struggled putting the clamping bracket exactly in place. In their third attempt they were successful. Total bill came to Rs 6,100/- (including Rs 650/- for mud flaps), rounded off to Rs 6K. Tipped the fitter Rs 50/-. Here are some pictures.

[rakesh_r]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

While the mud flaps were being fitted I asked the sales guy if he had the M-Tek roof carrier, Supersport Carbon model.

Autoindian,can you please show the full pic of the tank.Want to see how the car looks like post the roof carrier installation .

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by rakesh_r

Autoindian,can you please show the full pic of the tank.Want to see how the car looks like post the roof carrier installation .

Sure Rakesh, give me a day's time. If possible I will click some pictures today during lunch time and share it. If not, then tomorrow I will definitely share them. Even I wanted to see how the car looks like post the roof carrier installation and missed out on talking the complete car's picture on the day of installation.

On a side note, today when I took my tank to the Service Centre for coolant top-up, while crossing the huge humps inside the centre my front LHS mud flap fouled with the hump and cracked. Fortunately it did not come off. Will see if Feviquick can do the magic of fixing the cracked area.

[rakesh_r]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

On a side note, today when I took my tank to the Service Centre for coolant top-up, while crossing the huge humps inside the centre my front LHS mud flap fouled with the hump and cracked. Fortunately it did not come off. Will see if Feviquick can do the magic of fixing the cracked area.

I think the mud flaps are a wee bit lower than usual. Doesn't Mahindra have those as an optional accessory?

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by rakesh_r

Autoindian,can you please show the full pic of the tank.Want to see how the car looks like post the roof carrier installation .

Here you go. Roof carrier seen from various angles

[rakesh_r]

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[CrAzY dRiVeR]

Looks subtle. Nice addition.

One funny question though- In the last pic, it is clear that there is only a wall behind the TUV. That said, how did you manage to get a shot from so high up in the third pic? TUV itself is very tall if I remember correctly.

[arun_josie]

Originally Posted by CrAzY dRiVeR

Looks subtle. Nice addition.

One funny question though- In the last pic, it is clear that there is only a wall behind the TUV. That said, how did you manage to get a shot from so high up in the third pic? TUV itself is very tall if I remember correctly.

Maybe he used a selfie stick with mobile cam on selfie mode and timer

By the way, the roof carrier really looks nice.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by CrAzY dRiVeR

Looks subtle. Nice addition.

One funny question though- In the last pic, it is clear that there is only a wall behind the TUV. That said, how did you manage to get a shot from so high up in the third pic? TUV itself is very tall if I remember correctly.

Originally Posted by arun_josie

Maybe he used a selfie stick with mobile cam on selfie mode with timer

By the way, the roof carrier really looks nice.

Thank you CrAzY dRiVeR & arun_josie for your compliments. The all black roof carrier gels well with the black roof rails and forms an integral part of the car. It doesn't mar the sporty look of the car and convert a SUV into MUV. CrAzY dRiVeR, you are right, there is only a wall behind the TUV, but arun_josie you are off the mark, I didn't use any selfie stick with mobile cam on selfie mode with timer. I jumped up high to take that shot, just kidding. There is a provision called "rear foot step" on the TUV, stepping on which you can get into those jump seats. What I did was to open the rear door, climb on the rear foot step and take that shot. The side and rear foot steps comes in very handly while cleaning the roof top. All the steps are very robust & can easily bear my 80 kilos of bodyweight

[icemanz]

The 100 bhp mhawk engine option has been released on the T8 and T8 AMT variants. Hope mahindra also includes the mid row Air conditioning and seat belts for the third row jump seats.

[AutoIndian]

Completed the one day return trip to Barshi (Dist: Solapur) on Saturday. The whole family had to attend a function there starting @ 10am and we wanted to start early @ 05:30am. However getting the kids ready so early in the morning is a herculean task and we managed to flag the start when the clock struck 06:00am. We had two cars at our disposal, My family in our TUV and my cousin with his family in their Vista. Just 10 kms from our home when we reached Khadki, my cousin asked me to stop. On asking him the reason, with a worried face he mentioned that the clutch pedal of his Vista is acting funny. After changing the gears it does not return to its original position. On asking if he was facing any issues in gear shifting he said no. He mentioned though that sometime back he had changed his slave cylinder. He informed me that if he spots any Tata Authorized Service Centre enroute we will make a stop and get it rectified. I agreed with him. I told him to lead the way & I will follow him. We crossed Khadki Bazaar, Holkar Bridge, Bombay Sappers, Bund Garden bridge, Circuit House, Race Course Road and reached Hadapsar. From thereon the Solapur highway started. It being early in the morning there was hardly any traffic & it was smooth sailing.

After exiting the city limits the toll road started, the TUV following the Vista. The Pune-Solapur-Hyderabad highway has become very smooth. Wonder when it has become NH65. It was earlier called NH9, not sure when this name change happened. We crossed Loni-Kalbbhor, Urli Kanchan, Yavat, Warwand, Patas, Kurkumbh, Chaufula, Bhigwan. We then spotted a good restaurant, Hotel Shree Veg at Bhadalwadi and decided to take our first pit stop for breakfast. It was 8am (2 hours) since we started our journey and we had covered good 128 kms. This is a good restaurant with clean wash rooms, ample & covered parking, separate family rooms. We had a good South Indian breakfast. Some pics at the restaurant

Hotel Shree Veg on NH65 @ Bhadalwadi near Bhigwan


TUV parked in one of the parking bays of the hotel


TUV up close


The green lawn in front of the hotel


After having sumptous breakfast and a photo session to compliment we started our onward journey. We crossed Loni-Devkar and then the Indapur bypass. I recollect how one used to often get stuck up in traffic at Indapur, not any more. Moving further we came across the Ujjani dam on the left hand side. Though the backwaters have dried up water was being released in the river, perhaps to quench the thirst of downstream villages. We then came to Tembhurni. Here we lost our way. This town too has now been bypassed. Instead of taking the flyover we got down as there was in intersection. The road towards left was SH141, Solapur-Dhule state highway going to Karmala. We then proceeded straight and finally spotted the Barshi diversion. From here on the road straight goes to Barshi and Latur. We took the Kurduwadi bypass and finally reached Barshi @ 11am. The function had just started. Took some snaps of the TUV parked outside the venue.

[AutoIndian]

Before starting for this trip I had fitted the CoverKraft Magnetic sun shades that I had ordered online from Snapdeal. A set of 6 shades costed me Rs 1159/- These shades helped to keep the car cabin cool in blazing hot sun. The front two shades have got a zip, which is quite convinient for paying the toll at toll booths without removing the shades. These come with magnets, which make the shades stick to the door frame. The shades for the quarter windows come without magnets, but they fit snugly on the window beading. In the morning the AC blower was on speed-1 and later in the day on speed-2. Yet the cabin was quite cool even for the rear seat passengers. Some pictures of the sun shades.

The front RHS door sun shade


The rear RHS door sun shade


Both the front shades come with a zip. Quite convenient for paying the toll at toll booths without removing the shades

[AutoIndian]

After attending the function and visiting some relatives we started the return journey at 05:00pm. The road from Barshi to Tembhurni is not in good shape. There are some bad patches, but nothing that could worry the TUV. In fact the TUV loves such roads. I could easily maintain a speed of 60-70 kmph in 5th gear. I didn't even slow down for small speed breakers. We took a hault for snacks and tea just beyond Indapur, "Lucky" veg restaurant. We feasted on Kanda-bhaji, wada paav and tea. The quality was very good and indeed we were lucky to spot this hotel. By the time we left the hotel, it had become dark, so I wiped clean the front windshield & both front wing mirrors and window glasses. The stock headlamps of the TUV along with the fog lamps light up the road very well. I rarely used the high beam and the low beam was sufficient enough. The high seating position with good stock lights make night driving on highways very convenient and confidence inspiring. I am sure that I am going to venture on long highway drives more often from now onwards.

My cousin stopped by a petrol pump to tank up his Vista. I too took this opportunity to make a tankful in my TUV. It gulped 46.46 litres of diesel and had covered a distance of 665 kms since last tankful, giving me a mileage of 14.32 kmpl. Note: 400 kms of this has been on highway and the rest in-city driving with 100% AC. I am yet to test pure highway mileage, should be between 15-16 kmpl is my wild guess

When it was around 9pm, we spotted a good restaurant, "Sugar & Spice". This hotel has recently been opened (5 months back). Food quality is very good. We had a lovely dinner there and passed some time as we wanted to reach Pune outskirts after the peak traffic hours & so did we. We reached Hadapsar at 11pm and at 11:45pm we touched home





Overall it was a nice trip. My Orange tank performed flawlessly. Even on very bad roads there were no rattles. The suspension soaks up the road irregularities quite well. The tank just glides over small pot holes, bridge joints, small speed breakers. The only issue I faced during the trip was that the bluetooth was acting funny. Though it was showing the phone as connected, it would not connect the calls at times. Happened this 2-3 times and I didn't have a clue why that was happening. I checked under the hood today and the coolant has maintained its level since the last week's top-up. Have covered 600+ kms since then. This trip has given me the much needed confidence to take the tank on long highway drives now without second thoughts.

[vinitbhavi]

Hii auto Indian have been a reader /follower of your tank ownership and your love for her shows. I love the details you put into each post, keep it up.I recently got home my cheetah and have been putting up many accessories. The one I have left out was the carrier.Seeing your tank I'm quite liking it compared to the Mahindra roof carrier. I would like to know how if at all it affects the aerodynamics and reasons if any for choosing it over the original Mahindra.
Wishing you happy munching miles in your tank.