[chaksjr]

My Ecosport was munching away kilometers on Southern highways, taking me to work, to weekend outings & to places around the Southern states.

Come mid 2023, personal & professional reasons prompted me to try and move back to the NCR. A couple of months of searching and finalizing the deal, I was all set to move back to NCR at the end of August. Goods & car shipped off, me & mom landed in Delhi, borrowing an old Rapid from a friend until my car showed up.

Couple of months down the line, settling into work, comes GRAP a knocking! Banned are BS4 diesels, which puts my Ecosport into confinement at my apartments' basement parking. Irritated and pissed at having to play Russian roulette with taxi apps each day, I decide to sell of my car and get quotes from Cars24 & Spinny.

Spinny is ridiculously low without room for negotiation. Cars24 offers a decent deal but I turn it down due to want of slightly more, plus GRAP is retracted and I am content at being allowed to drive my car again. GRAP comes and goes throughout the winter but I wade through it, resisting the urge to sell my car.

During the end of February, I sit down with a colleague to try and completely understand the corporate car lease equation. Once I do, I realize that owning a new car would be beneficial, not to mention that I can buy a petrol and get over this headache of temporary bans.

I stroll on over to Kia, Hyundai & Tata showrooms the following weekend. I test drove the following, with an initial budget of <10L ex-showroom.

1. Kia Sonet 1.2 - while the interiors are certainly wow, the engine performance was rather underwhelming. Coming from a decently strong diesel, I could not get myself to accept this engine.
2. Tata Punch - performance surprisingly felt stronger than the Kia, but I wasn't too impressed otherwise, primarily due to the dealership's take it or leave it attitude. I actually wanted to drive the Altroz i-turbo but was clearly told that none can be made available for a TD.
3. Hyundai Exter 1.2 AMT - drove it just for the sake of being offered one, had absolutely no plans to buy an AMT. Moreover, do not really like the Exter's exterior's.

I requested the Hyundai dealer (Himgiri, Sec 53, GGN) for an i20 NLine TD, was informed that it can be booked for office/home but none available at the dealership. Nevermind, asked them to bring one to the office that Monday. Though I really wanted to TD the manual, Hyundai only had the DCT to offer.
The car came, took it for a spin along with a colleague (who owns a Seltos IVT). I instantly liked the surge and the briskness the car offered, and I quickly reminded myself that the manual would feel even better. I was sold. Colleague remarked that it felt faster than their Seltos too.

Booked an i20 Nline N8 DT MT a couple of days later with the same dealership. Verbal communication was 4-6 weeks for delivery. I made a personal booking even though the car would actually be a corporate buy. This was the 1st of March. Some internal methodology within the dealership meant that my actual request to the factory was not placed until a PO was issued to the dealer 2 weeks later on the 14th of March. This meant I had already lost 2 weeks from the initial commitment. Come end of March, no sign of being allotted a vehicle, despite continuously following up with the dealership. They remarked that they had not received an allocation during March and were hopeful of being allotted one in the 1st week of April.

In the meantime, my Ecosport is sold to Cars24 on the last day of the FY for 3.5L. I then borrow an i20 Elite from a friend until the new car arrives.

1st week of April comes and goes, silence from the dealership. I escalate to Hyundai, and the dealership GM steps in to calm me down. She tells me that she will personally follow up for an allotment ASAP from Hyundai & would update me daily on the same. Initially I am told that a car will be allotted and dispatched between 15th & 17th April, which doesn't happen. On April 19th, I write an email to a Hyundai CRM explaining this situation and that if not allotted a vehicle soon, I will be taking my business to another brand.

While I don't receive any reply to my email, the dealership GM messages me that a vehicle will positively be allotted to me between 22nd & 24th April.
I inculcate some patience though my hopes weren't high. Thankfully, on 23rd April, the GM calls & informs me that a car has been allotted and was dispatched the day before, she shares the VIN as well. Relieved, the excitement slowly starts to build up. On 27th evening, I am informed that the car has arrived at the dealership, and is available for inspection.

My mom and I drove down to the dealership the next day and inspected the car. All was well except a minor scratch on the front left corner of the skirting. I requested the SA to get it buffed out before delivery (they couldn't completely but nevermind, didn't want to hold back on the car just for that).
Gave go ahead for invoicing and delivery was planned for the 1st of May.

Post lunch on the 1st, I headed out of office to the dealership, while mom took a cab from home to the dealership as well. Documentation, delivery, demo took about an hour & we were out of the showroom around 1530hrs.

Basic accessories were offered free of cost during PO confirmation, the same were fitted on the car (mud flaps, floor mats, god statue & perfume). Made them add door window visors and door edge guards, paid for them just before delivery.

Got 5L free fuel and then tanked the car up. Named him Blue Boy in my head. Headed straight to the Kamakshi temple for the pooja.

Coming to the driving experience (thanks for reading till here ), the manual gearbox is GREAT. The shifts are short, they're precise, the gears seem well gated and I haven't missed a shift yet. Turbo lag is well contained (much better than the DCT), and while driving sedately during my office commute, I seem to be able to extract 14.5-15kmpl. Android auto is working well, the AC fan is quick even on the lowest setting.
The exhaust note is deep & throaty, take it upto 2.5k-3k RPM and it sounds very decent. Haven't pushed the car much, easing into it and letting the engine settle down for the first few hundred kms.
While the seats and suspension is certainly not as soft as the regular i20, coming from an Ecosport (which itself had quite the stiff ride), I am perfectly ok with how this car is dealing with speed breakers and calmers.

Attaching some pictures below my Blue Boy











Hoping to keep this thread updated as the car munches kilometers and plants many smiles on my face.

[chaksjr]

The car completed 1000kms early in the morning today. I went to drop mom off and had a nice 60kms morning drive from Gurgaon to Delhi and back.
I've been enjoying pushing the car when traffic and roads allow and otherwise driving it gently though traffic, listening to the slight burble in the exhaust
1st service is supposed to be at 1500kms, so probably in the 1st week of June.

[chaksjr]

I gave the car for its 1st service (1500kms / general check up) to Himgiri Hyundai, located at Hero Honda Chowk (sector 34), Gurugram.
I had purchased my car from Himgiri in Sector 53 and hence decided to stick with them, at least for the 1st service.
I had requested for a pick & drop of the car from my office, located in Udyog Vihar.
While I was almost expecting to have an underwhelming experience (due to reading numerous accounts on car dealerships & service centers on this forum), I did not expect that a general check up (wherein the SC actually has to do NOTHING) would be a disappointing experience.

I will use bullet points to list down what all happened -

1. Driver disconnected the dashcam immediately after exiting my office post picking up the car. While the front only had its power cable removed, he went ahead and completely removed my rear camera from its mounting and left it hanging over my parcel tray.
2. I had requested the CRM, the service advisor (SA) and the driver about checking and correcting the wheel alignment, as I had a feeling that it was slightly off.
What they actually did was ruin it further, and now my steering is DEFINITELY off-center while trying to keep the car in a straight line. If you're not competent enough, better to just leave it alone, rather than ruin something further.
3. This "check-up" had to include a free wash & vacuum, as was informed to me by the SA. When the car came back, I noticed that the bottom 20% of the door hadn't been cleaned at all, on either sides. The bodywork was full of swirl and wipe marks (indicative of a dirty rag used to "clean" the car). The bottom skirting wasn't touched, or so it looked like.
4. When I started the car in the evening to head home, noticed the drive info showed "02:30hrs" of engine run time. My morning commute is 35 mins, the drive to and from the service center is a max of 45mins in total. This basically meant that my car was kept on at the service center for more than an hour, for god knows what reason. (I cannot know since dashcam was disconnected, remember?). Average FE had dropped from 14.xx when I gave it in the morning to 10.xx when I got the car back (I assume car was kept on and the service center guys were enjoying the AC while seated inside). DTE had reduced by way more than it should have.

Imagine disappointing your customer when you had to do NOTHING, just check and return the car.

While I haven't written and informed the service center of this (I plan to tomorrow), there obviously is going to be no resolution. The max I expect is that they would want me to send the car again for an alignment and better cleaning (how will you correct it now when you couldn't the first time?).

Let me sum up my first new car service experience.

I spent petrol to send my car to a service center, have its dashcam mount ruined, have my wheel alignment made worse, have employees enjoy the comfort of the AC in the car and then have it sent back to me, about as dirty as it was when I handed it over.

Needless to say, my car isn't going back to this particular service center.

[throttleAddict]

Originally Posted by chaksjr

I gave the car for its 1st service (1500kms / general check up) to Himgiri Hyundai, located at Hero Honda Chowk (sector 34), Gurugram.
I had purchased my car from Himgiri in Sector 53 and hence decided to stick with them, at least for the 1st service.
I had requested for a pick & drop of the car from my office, located in Udyog Vihar.
While I was almost expecting to have an underwhelming experience (due to reading numerous accounts on car dealerships & service centers on this forum), I did not expect that a general check up (wherein the SC actually has to do NOTHING) would be a disappointing experience.

I will use bullet points to list down what all happened -

1. Driver disconnected the dashcam immediately after exiting my office post picking up the car. While the front only had its power cable removed, he went ahead and completely removed my rear camera from its mounting and left it hanging over my parcel tray.
2. I had requested the CRM, the service advisor (SA) and the driver about checking and correcting the wheel alignment, as I had a feeling that it was slightly off.
What they actually did was ruin it further, and now my steering is DEFINITELY off-center while trying to keep the car in a straight line. If you're not competent enough, better to just leave it alone, rather than ruin something further.
3. This "check-up" had to include a free wash & vacuum, as was informed to me by the SA. When the car came back, I noticed that the bottom 20% of the door hadn't been cleaned at all, on either sides. The bodywork was full of swirl and wipe marks (indicative of a dirty rag used to "clean" the car). The bottom skirting wasn't touched, or so it looked like.
4. When I started the car in the evening to head home, noticed the drive info showed "02:30hrs" of engine run time. My morning commute is 35 mins, the drive to and from the service center is a max of 45mins in total. This basically meant that my car was kept on at the service center for more than an hour, for god knows what reason. (I cannot know since dashcam was disconnected, remember?). Average FE had dropped from 14.xx when I gave it in the morning to 10.xx when I got the car back (I assume car was kept on and the service center guys were enjoying the AC while seated inside). DTE had reduced by way more than it should have.

Imagine disappointing your customer when you had to do NOTHING, just check and return the car.

While I haven't written and informed the service center of this (I plan to tomorrow), there obviously is going to be no resolution. The max I expect is that they would want me to send the car again for an alignment and better cleaning (how will you correct it now when you couldn't the first time?).

Let me sum up my first new car service experience.

I spent petrol to send my car to a service center, have its dashcam mount ruined, have my wheel alignment made worse, have employees enjoy the comfort of the AC in the car and then have it sent back to me, about as dirty as it was when I handed it over.

Needless to say, my car isn't going back to this particular service center.

That's an absolutely horrible experience for a brand new vehicle going in for its first service at only 1500 kms. The service people need to think before they do something stupid to someone else's car just because they want to get their job done. Don't let this matter drop. Escalate it and write an email to the Hyundai regional head asking for compensation for your time and fuel loss, and especially for having the car running for two hours. I suggest you collect the report from the Bluelink app and attach it as proof. That should escalate the matter further, and hopefully Hyundai will learn its lesson and not do this to anyone else's car in the future.

[chaksjr]

HORN UPDATE

I have been wanting to change the horn ever since I got the car. Initially I asked my dealership that I wanted to plonk the Creta dual tone horns into the i20, they quoted me Rs 3,500 for the set. I was like

(in hindsight I could have just got the low tone and added it to the existing horn)

My colleague had the horns in his Thar changed and offered me the OEM Thar horn set. Took those from him and decided to do this on my own at some point.

I was finally able to do this today. Reached office in the morning and with the help of couple of my colleagues, removed the bumper, changed the horns and fit the bumper back without breaking anything

The Thar's horn's have 4 pin connectors whereas my i20 comes with a simpler 2 pin coupler for the horn. I had gotten the requisite couplers ordered from a site (evelta.com) and created the wiring.

The existing coupler in the car was a female and so my wiring had 2 male pins (thimbles) which were joined to the female coupler to complete the connection.

Images below

The Thar horn



Bumper removed



Final fitment



In other news, car has done almost 3,500kms. Fuelio says I've averaged 13.99kmpl through all my fuel fill ups till now, which is more than decent considering I've only taken one 500kms road trip wherein I averaged 14.5kmpl, remaining kilometers have all been in the city (commuting to office, weekend outings). This is a testament to my efficient driving skills

Thank you for reading!

[chaksjr]

Blue Boy completes 5000kms in 90 days

The car crossed 5000kms on the 1st of August. There is no update as such, car has been running along just great. There were a couple of rattles here and there which appear and disappear from time to time. I think I've just kind of internalized them

My average fuel economy over these 5000kms is about 14.2kmpl. I fill up 95 octane whenever I am able to find it (most pumps near my house don't have 95).

On my birthday night in July, my friends and I drove the complete peripheral expressway circle (its about 270kms), just for the fun of it. Enjoyed pushing the car throughout that drive, though I must point out that most of the EPE & WPE are not worthy of being called 120kmph roads, they're bumpy and jittery for the most part, adding to that there were repairs and constructions at many spots.



Till next time, safe driving!

[chaksjr]

My friends decided to gift me an exhaust modification on my birthday.
I ordered the Borla Pro-XS muffler, did not look around much for other options as a colleague at work already had this fitted to this i20NL, and I was familiar with the sound of it.

Once the muffler arrived, I went to Silencer House in CP for the fitment.
It took about 1.5-2 hours to complete the job, they also attended to a couple of other customers with smaller jobs in the middle, so could have been done quicker but I didn't really mind.

The muffler was changed, resonator removed, and MS piping used, connected via a flange available at the catalytic convertor exit.

Some photos below to show the change.













The cost breakup is below, for those interested -

1. Muffler - 17k
2. Tips - 7k
3. Piping & labour - 8k

There is a slight drone at normal throttle, I think primarily due to removing the resonator. But I'm getting used to it, and the sound on smashing the throttle compensates for it well.

[chaksjr]

10000kms update

The car completed 10000kms on a same day return run to Ranthambore to pick up a friend. This was on 28th November.

Agra Trip - 2nd November

Me and a very good friend of mine decided to visit Agra. He had never visited Agra before, and I just needed an excuse for a drive, especially since I had not yet taken my car on an expressway yet. I left home early in the morning, headed to Central Delhi to pick my friend up. We took the Yamuna Expressway, took a pitstop at one of the food courts on the way, then drove straight to the Taj.

I also managed to get a challan while in Agra, for being parked on the side of the road. The road was full of cars when I parked, then surprisingly all cars disappeared and I got an sms of the challan. 10 minutes after receiving the challan, I got a call from the police personnel who was issuing the challan to come and remove the car as some VIP movement was about to take place. [could have called without issuing the challan you know, ]. I got an average of 20.3kmpl during this trip, thanks to cruising at the speed limit all the way.

Early morning drive stats to Chanakyapuri to pick my friend up.



Couple of pictures from pitstops during that day.





Home - Agra - home trip stats



2nd free service - 9445kms - Professional Hyundai, Gurugram

After the disappointing experience with Himgiri Hyundai during the car's 1st service, I tried Professional Hyundai this time (on the recommendation of my SA at Himgiri). Professional doesn't have a sales outlet, as far as I can make out, they only run a service center.
The experience was satisfactory, no complaints. I was able to stand and observe the service on the shop floor. The bill came to Rs 3,737.







Ranthambore Trip & hitting 10000kms

This was again due to an irresistible urge to drive, going to Ranthambore and coming back the same day, just to pick up a friend, whose family was anyway taking a train to Gurugram the same evening
I cruised at 115kmph throughout, with the car returning an average of ~16.4kmpl.









Some random photographs

Efficient morning office commute!



Juicing up!



A smoggy morning in Gurugram



A beautiful orange sky



With my colleague's Thar in my parking spot at home. I had borrowed it for a trip to Bikaner with my mom in early October.



Fuelio Stats









On the whole, I am very content with this car, performance & efficiency wise.

[boniver]

Originally Posted by chaksjr

On the whole, I am very content with this car, performance & efficiency wise.

Those are very impressive numbers. I drive a car with the same engine-transmission combo (Venue Turbo MT), and I barely manage more than 14kmpl on highway trips. Similar numbers in the city, although I managed to get 21.5 kmpl on a couple of occasions when driving across the city in odd hours, but I had to be very very gentle with the throttle. Not my style

Just about 75 days with the car and the odo rolled over to 5000 kms yesterday during a highway trip.

[chaksjr]

Originally Posted by boniver

Those are very impressive numbers. I drive a car with the same engine-transmission combo (Venue Turbo MT), and I barely manage more than 14kmpl on highway trips. Similar numbers in the city,

Getting 20.xx kmpl is certainly only possible on an expressway (that too cruising at 100kmph). Venue might get slightly lesser due to weight and aerodynamics.
On a normal highway jaunt, I managed about 16.xx, going up to Muzzafarabad and back.
My cousin has the same combo as you, she gets about 13-14kmpl in the city as well, drives sedately though.

[Aditya]

My Hyundai i20 N Line Review - Posts moved to a new thread.

[Adheet Parashar]

About your first service experience. I had a similar experience with my I20 Nline. The service was miserable, with micro scratches all over the car and deeper scratches in multiple places. They blamed it on dogs(my car has covered parking in a gated apartment and the office has dust issues but no dogs). They came up with every excuse in the book to avoid doing anything about the scratches and in the end, they sent one person with a dirtier cloth and some buffing compound which only made it worse. Took me a week and having to spend 3 hours at the dealership before they could solve my problem...

Also hate their need to get a 10/10 rating without giving even 5/10 service and begging and crying about how it'll affect their jobs if they don't get it but offering no resolution to problems or any reason to raise the ratings.

[SixPistons]

Originally Posted by Adheet Parashar

About your first service experience. I had a similar experience with my I20 Nline. The service was miserable, with micro scratches all over the car and deeper scratches in multiple places. They blamed it on dogs(my car has covered parking in a gated apartment and the office has dust issues but no dogs). They came up with every excuse in the book to avoid doing anything about the scratches and in the end, they sent one person with a dirtier cloth and some buffing compound which only made it worse. Took me a week and having to spend 3 hours at the dealership before they could solve my problem...

Also hate their need to get a 10/10 rating without giving even 5/10 service and begging and crying about how it'll affect their jobs if they don't get it but offering no resolution to problems or any reason to raise the ratings.

Man! That’s bad but unfortunately most common with almost every service that cars in our house have been sent to.

What’s worse, at My N Line’s 20k service, I took it to Sapphire Mayapuri, where they were about to load my vehicle with the, wait for it…, wrong engine oil. Had I not been there, they would’ve confidently put in the wrong engine oil meant for the standard i20 1.2 NA Petrol Engine and called it a day of honest work on my vehicle.

How I got to know about it?
I casually asked the technician right before he was about to fill it up with oil. He casually mentioned that he doesn’t know and it is computerised delivery managed by the floor manager, who releases it based on the car that technician gives them in writing. Joke’s on the customer, because they wrong i20 2023 (or equivalent). What was intended to be an efficient system (probably to reduce spillage and chances of theft) would’ve pretty much screwed up a trusting customer’s(me) vehicle who entrusted the vehicle to the service center to take care of (eerily similar to a case I read about a Creta in the north-east that got a dose of the wrong oil, whose engine suffered major damage thereafter)

Even surprising, they asked me to leave the car with them until the morning after, in order to arrange the right engine oil. To fix it up afterwards. This is one maybe two days before rakshabandhan, a day I would need the vehicle in morning itself.

I may have only noticed it when my engine would’ve started showing up problems or worse, gone kaput. Or worse, it could’ve given it a slow death, if the oil properties were somewhat similar. This is precisely the kind of thing that I tell my dad to go to the service center for rather than giving the car over to *the guy*.

And this is not the first time I observed lapses in Hyundai service center’s actions. At another service center, I once saw a vehicle seriously thud into another as a technician backed out the vehicle from the service bay. They casually checked if everything is alright, also checking out reactions of other customers on the floor, although they may have damaged both the vehicle’s bumpers at the stress points by this action.

Another one(rather famous one on my profile) did not balance and align my vehicle’s wheels properly after removing and putting back the steering column as they opened the dashboard to replace a part in the A/C.

In short? List goes on.

I have observed them to be the worst caretakers of a vehicle and its better to stay close to your vehicle when in need of a service.

[turbowhistle]

Originally Posted by boniver

Those are very impressive numbers. I drive a car with the same engine-transmission combo (Venue Turbo MT), and I barely manage more than 14kmpl on highway trips. Similar numbers in the city, although I managed to get 21.5 kmpl on a couple of occasions when driving across the city in odd hours, but I had to be very very gentle with the throttle. Not my style

Looks like the newer Hyundai's have the FE numbers sorted. We have a first gen Venue with the same engine and our city number are strictly between 6-7 kmpl and 11 kmpl on highway trips. The car has run only 40k in the last 4 years so it hasn't hurt that much but I am happy to see some improvement.

[chaksjr]

Originally Posted by SixPistons

Man! That’s bad but unfortunately most common with almost every service that cars in our house have been sent to.

What’s worse, at My N Line’s 20k service, I took it to Sapphire Mayapuri, where they were about to load my vehicle with the, wait for it…, wrong engine oil. Had I not been there, they would’ve confidently put in the wrong engine oil meant for the standard i20 1.2 NA Petrol Engine and called it a day of honest work on my vehicle.

In short? List goes on.

I have observed them to be the worst caretakers of a vehicle and its better to stay close to your vehicle when in need of a service.

Man this wrong engine oil scenario scares the hell out of me. I was actually thinking about this too when the tech went to get the engine oil, but did not confirm with him. When the bill came, they had billed the right oil so I let it be. When one variant of the car is so much more common that the other, really need to be cautious of these things. Tech can easily mess up since they would be so used to the more common engine variant.

I would really not mind DIYing the basics of each service (engine oil, oil filter, air filter, AC filter etc), but considering warranty, I am bound to stick with a Hyundai SC.