[Sommos]

Originally Posted by rpmmachine

Could you please explain in detail about the LCA upgrade? I'm not aware of this, and the suspension on my XUV is bad too. But the dealer always ignore it, saying this is normal behavior.

The LCA replacement was meant for vehicles manufactured prior to Oct' 2022, if I remember correctly. There was a cut-off VIN mentioned in the circular.

Post Oct' 2022 the vehicles are fitted with the modified LCA. Also this was not a mandatory recall but on case-to-case basis.

As @Abirnale has already mentioned, the replacement of the LCA has made a stark improvement in my car also.

[abirnale]

A quick dash to Jayamangali Blckbuck Reserve yesterday, and we have a detailed trip-log here: https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...lackbucks.html (TheRedSparkle Story: In Search of Blackbucks)

Sharing some car pictures from the drive:







After a long time, a drive of around 300Kms drive was well worth it! With the kid’s exams almost half way through, looking forward to brighter days ahead!

[abirnale]

Another trip - we are back to tripping mode again!

Read the short writeup and see pictures here: https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...b-birding.html (TheRedSparkle Story: B for Bandipur, B for Birding!)

TheRedSparkle stands at 58750 km mark and this week it should get it’s 60K servicing done. And then we have a three state crossing trip coming up. It should be more fun bringing you the stories from our travel.

For now, some pictures from our trip this weekend:











Stay tuned for more updates!

[for_cars1]

Originally Posted by abirnale

[*]Easy Entry& Exit: for the driver isn't really easy. Takes an awful lot of time as the seat travels too long backward. Almost squeezing the knees of the passenger sitting behind.

Ideally the driver seat headrest in a vehicle should be positioned nearer to the B-pillar around the highest point of the upwardly curving A-pillar so that the driver can get adequate headroom. In this seat position, the steering and the pedals should be accessible to the driver without the need to slide the seat forward.

This concept of the driver seat auto sliding forward in the XUV700 results in lesser headroom and also brings the driver's head closer to the windscreen and the curving A-pillars compared to other cars.
This is the reason the driver can't get out of the vehicle with the seat set in driving position and has to wait for the seat to slide back and allow the head to reach the roomier/higher part of the window.
Definitely felt the driver headroom to be less than optimal in the XUV700, the presence of sunroof further lowering the roofline.

They would have implemented this sliding to position the front seats as forward as possible to free up space in the rows behind.

The seat auto slide forward is more a bug/design flaw cleverly disguised as a 'feature'.
Every driver should be able to exit the vehicle from his/her set seating position without the need to slide the seat backward.

[abirnale]

Not exactly as the title says but a 1000 km prior to that, I got the 60K service done. As usual, the oil change continues at every 10K kms. The service was done ahead of time anticipating a loooong drive for the week! More on that in separate travelogues!

60K Service Updates:
This is probably after the longest gap, that I had to go to ASC - the good part in this is that I did not have much trouble with car that warranted a ASC visit! But the bad part is - TheRedSparkle did not stretch it's leg for past 10-12K kms like it used to do. Nevertheless, as usual, booked an appointment for a Good Friday morning at Chrome and shown up at 9.15am there. A couple of things that were on my mind which is in addition to the routine visit requirements for 60K kms service:

• ICE is acting up again - disconnects more frequently, Apple Maps don't show up on MID console.
• Top-up the DEF and be ready for the long drive
• Engine Oil change
• Retorque'ing the various bolts, door hinges and ensuring the underbelly to be all fine after a recent off-road drive around the lakes.

The visit was expected to complete in 2-3 hours, but there were surprises in store! See the pictures below:







The servicing part was simple and fast - they had Ultra V4 in stock, got all things done in less than an hour. The catastrophe struck when they wanted to clean the brake-pads and fit back - the anti-theft lock key broke! With the spare key at home, it took some time and helping hand + dunzo to get the spare key, loosen the bolts and put things back after cleaning! This anti-theft key is a Mahindra genuine accessory! Shocking to see it give away so easily - I have to now write to customer care for warranty claim and/or to obtain the duplicate key. Such a tedious process.

Also, noticed some discolouration on one of the alloy wheel - not sure if it's a defect/ issue with quality or something. Asked the ASC guys to find out. Hoping to get some clear answers and possibly no safety risk.

Also, noticed that on the font left wheel-well, there is a visible mark on the body from tyre rubbing during one of the tightest turning - Refer the second picture above. I did not "feel" this while probably I parked the car in a tight spot sometime earlier. But then to rule out foul-play I got ASC to recheck the alignment and everything seemed to be fine. The conclusion was - I most likely would have tuned the EPS to the extreme end while climbing on the stone/ curb or making tight turns. I Will keep an eye on this to see if there is anything else that can cause such marks.

As part of the ICE complaints address, re-flashed the Silverbox with more latest build for the same version as before.



The apple maps now show up on the MID too, and I can now run google on main screen, Apple on MID




In all total, summary of the servicing:



Total charges: Rs. 8267.

So now with all these things out of the way, TheRedSparkle was ready to take us back on roads - the place we love to be!

Stay tuned for the two travelogues to come out of assembly lines to take you through #TheRedSparkleStories. We are going out to search some flamingoes and to see some real big cats - In Bandipur, we only heard the soft growl, now we wish to see it!

[abirnale]

A summary of update (kind of!):

After the 60K service was done (a 1200km ahead of time), we completed a nice family drive-cation in first week of April. The detailed updates of that drive are here:

• https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...-t-tigers.html (TheRedSparkle Story: T for Tadoba, T for Tigers!)
• https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...lamingoes.html (TheRedSparkle Story: In Search of Flamingoes)

The drive included about 2500 KMS round trip via KA, MH, AP, TS. It involved driving on the National Highways, non-existent state highways, country roads, the Samriddhi Mahamarg and everything in between.

I wanted to highlight some of the observation on this drive related to the car and how it behaved here in this post:

• If there is one thing about the car that is undisputed, that is: This is an excellent highway mile muncher, period. For the single day drive (my solo driver, max till date) happened with #TheRedSparkle. I drove from tadoba to Bangalore in a single day for about 1100 KMs! I was as fresh as I could be in the smaller distance drives at the end of the day. For the entire day, the car did not cross 120kmph on speedo and yet managed to munch this distance in about 17 hours with four sizeable breaks!
• This trip highlighted the ADAS features at it’s best for me. The drive on Samriddhi Highway is so boring that unless I am forced, I will not go there again. To survive whatever I had embarked on that highway, ADAS - ACC was used extensively on that road for about 97-98% of the times! It worked like dream! It is a real deal!
• When you are on such a predictable road, and use light foot, the car surprises you with an amazing FE. On MID console I saw numbers hovering between 15-16 kmpl whereas the T2T method revealed about 14.5 for that section. And note, mine is AT, AWD and laden with full cabin, 10 days worth of packing including ample accessories, storage boxes, etc.
• After the service and re-flashing of the hardware, I have been using three maps at a time on the phone! Apple Maps for those quick glances on the MID, Google maps for actual navigation on main CE and RadarBot for thos critical alerts So far, all is well - had CarPlay disconnect about 4-5 times in the entire trip of about 2500 kms. The apple maps resume automatically, google doesn’t on reconnection. Only once the CarPlay scree became unresponsive - everything else works but ICE when into CarPlay screen, blanks out. Go back using other screen options form IC Knob buttons, you can access and do everything as normal - I think this is to do with CarPlay itself playing games.
• The AC in the car is built in arctic circles, I assume. In the simmering heat of 42 degree celsius, my passenger were sitting in car with fleece or using a shawl to cover them! I like the Auto AC at 23.5 and they forced me to keep it at 26-27! We were only using front AC, the rear one is almost never used in past 2 years plus.
• MH mostly has great Vi network - a couple of times around Solapur/ Dharashiv area, I used Adrenox remote functions to start the car and cool it down before we step-in. I want to use it again and again at my base location in BLR too but Vi wont even function in this area - zero coverage in most areas.
• The MID console display was kept rotating manually between TPMS and Maps most of the times. I fill N2 in all tires, keep pressure around 35 PSI. While on this drive in hot summer and on cemented highway roads observed the temperatures in tire to reach about 55 degrees and pressure to be around 40-41 PSIs. Highest ever I saw on my car. Not sure if that is normal but glad, our speeds were in check, we had a peaceful drive without any issues.
• I understand that the panoramic sunroof is debatable feature. In my view - it is super useful. We used it to max while in jungle/ country roads and when sun is not beating us down. The curtain that comes up to close the sunroof is descent enough - it doesn’t let the heat come down - feels as comparable as roof itself when it comes to shielding the cabin from sun through sunroof.

And to round-up the post, here are some pictures of the car at various points in our recent drive:



















Thank you for reading, see you soon again with more updates on #TheRedSparkle as well as our travel - the long-drive moments are back again!

[Ravi Parwan]

Awesome pics and a great travelogue.

I do notice that you have both your tow-hooks deployed on your car. Any particular reason for that?

AFAIK, they are to be used in emergencies only and would impact your aerodynamics. Also, in the front bumper, at high speeds the amount of air entering through that hook hole would also put unnecessary pressure on the plastic fasteners keeping the bumper in place.

Not to mention they are a risk to the other traffic in case of a shunt, god forbid.

[abirnale]

Originally Posted by Ravi Parwan

I do notice that you have both your tow-hooks deployed on your car.

Thank you, yes just been lazy to remove. Car has helped a couple of stranded hatchbacks to be pulled and brought back on road though. So far, didn’t have any issues with the aerodynamics etc. as speeds have been far below the situation where I have to worry about aerodynamics.

[abirnale]

Originally Posted by Ravi Parwan

I do notice that you have both your tow-hooks deployed on your car. Any particular reason for that?

This happened today:

https://youtu.be/8UimURcBn3E?si=KGQHHOFNGFHC_grD

Just another day in #NammaBengaluru - There was this large pothole/ under construction lane and the Brezza front left tire got stuck in it. The car was simply going forward and without any signs, the front tire just sank in - thats what it looked like. It was very deep hole. The rear-right tire went up in the air. I approached the vehicle in that narrow lane from opposite side in order to cut the traffic and make it faster to home. The school/ college kids walking in that lane for lunch were laughing at the middle-aged stressed driver/ owner of the vehicle. The passerby vehicles honking at him non-stop and his co-passenger stuck in the seat as door cannot be opened up. How insensitive people can be? A sure shot moment for getting freaked out for that driver! There was one good soul though who was trying to help the gentleman. He was trying to put some stones, lift the bonnet and what not. Though the technique to rescue the stuck car may not be right, that soul’s intent were right.

As I approached the car, I realised, I can help this car! I didn’t want to create a scene - pulled over a little further, gently approached the driver/ owner of the car - he without any hesitation, asked for help. Rest is what happened on the video that was captured on the dashcam - rear feed, unedited. A tip for the car that is getting rescued - the driver in the car should put the gear in N, don’t use brakes unless about to hit something. And my instructions were disregarded by the stressed driver anyway - can’t blame the driver, he was visibly stressed out.

So in the hope to pay it forward, TheRedSparkle pulled the Brezza backward! I am sure the person will remember the incidence for sure and someday will help someone else and the chain might just come back at me to help me someday when I need it.

Long story short, I think I will leave the tow-hook as-is for now

[IGNORE the video thumbnail - it’s for crediting TheRedSparkle which otherwise cannot be seen in the video!]

[Ravi Parwan]

Originally Posted by abirnale

Long story short, I think I will leave the tow-hook as-is for now

LoL, if a picture is worth a 1000 words, a video has to be worth 10,000!!

My heart was in my mouth seeing the person applying brakes when you are pulling his car.

Kudos to you for helping out a person in need.

[abirnale]

^

Hey Ravi, but yes - the risk of shunting is still there. Have to still be cautious and take them out someday though.

[swiftnfurious]

That's a great gesture. Kudos to you.

Originally Posted by abirnale

This happened today:
... The school/ college kids walking in that lane for lunch were laughing at the middle-aged stressed driver/ owner of the vehicle. The passerby vehicles honking at him non-stop and his co-passenger stuck in the seat as door cannot be opened up. How insensitive people can be? ...

Very true ! People just love seeing others suffer - how the mobile cameras come out at an accident site shows the level of insensitiveness of the current population. I always wonder what do they get doing it. Less said about the current gen, the better. I had once 3 students on a bike indicate that my tyre is punctured, when I was waiting at the signal. Parked it a little ahead to check after the signal turned green, only to realise that they were having their fun time doing it.

[Amrit@wheels]

@abirnale, salute to you, kind sir. As you stated, people just love to watch others suffer and instead of helping someone, they'll just keep shouting and honking to make things even worse. I have a similar story to share, sadly without a dashcam footage. There was a puliya (large pipe under the road) being installed on a nearby road. An old-aged uncle in his duster couldn't brake on time and the front wheels of the car got buried in the ditch. To make things worse, it was raining non-stop. We were traveling to a nearby gurdwara in our 2010 Fortuner. We had just upgraded the tyres to CrossContact ATs'. My father and I looked at each other, and without uttering a word we understood the task. He got down to get the towing rope, I overtook around 3 vehicles between me and Duster via the unpaved side and got the Fortuner in position. We attached the rope and within 2 minutes, the Duster was out. The old gentleman was very grateful and he even tried offering me some money, but we politely declined and proceeded towards our trip to the gurdwara.

[abirnale]

Bengaluru is unusually hot this summer - we just hit the third highest temperature in April ever in Bengaluru. To beat the heat and see some hues of setting sun, we thought of going a little higher in altitude: Made a quick drive/ visit to Devarayanadurga Hills. Packed some watermelons, home food and went up there with a family friend. Spent the beautiful evening over weekend and returned back in a few hours. The experience of calm without having a crowd around is a rare experience nowadays.

We truly enjoyed the short drive, filter coffee at Shree Ratnam Veg on highway, and a beautiful sunset! Nothing extraordinary as such but the peace and calmness we witnessed on Friday evening (voting daya here) coupled with half an hour spent in absolute darkness watching the city lights, skygazing with relatively cooler breeze was fun!

Some pictures form the drive:















See you soon with more updates.