| ANHC / Honda City Auto: Story of "Singh"'s boo"King"
Hello all this is my first post on Tbhp, been a longtime lurker though. A few weeks back, I was on the lookout for a new vehicle and I had no specific choices, except that it should cost around a max of 10-12 lacs, it should have more than 2 wheels and should be serviceable in Delhi.
Safari Trail
Till date I have driven mostly in the city, and exclusively a petrol hatch or sedan (Currently : Getz,Swift,Corolla). I was never into much of highway driving, and after reading a couple of travelogues here at team-bhp.com I thought this should change, I needed to reclaim my life.
Enter the new Tata Safari 2.2, it suddenly sounded as the answer to my soul’s cries. My cousin had been keeping a Safari every since it came out and never reported any issues with it. So I was off to Chandigarh to test drive his new Safari 2.2, the car all Indians dream of owning one day(quoting a Tbhp member).
I had driven and been driven in a Tata Safari before and I was thoroughly in awe of it. I test drove the car at night on Chandigarh’s empty roads; first impression: fantastic in-gear acceleration, fantastic ride and fantastic “views”. As I drove the Safari over the following day, the utilitarian nature and the imposing size of the car dawned on me. Reading tsk1979’s experience with his Safari was not encouraging either. I knew Safari would not be at home in the Delhi traffic, nor would it let me indulge in my “boy racer mode” attacks and on top of that it would require tremendous amount of patience to maintain.
Enter the Linea
What a beaut ! 18lakh car at 8lakh! Fantastic chassis ! 18kmpl average! I was intrigued, I hadn’t seen enough Linea’s on Delhi’s roads and I wondered why ? The more I researched the more I convinced myself this is the car for me. So off I went to Sanya motors, Mayapuri for a test drive.
The showroom was bustling with people, but I managed to get a test drive. As soon as I sat in the car, I was like *** ! The quality of plastics was shoddy and the white retro dials ugly. I asked the attendant is this the base model? His shocked reply was sir this is the top of the line model. Anyhow, I test drove the car for a mere kilometre on the super busy road, never felt that it was underpowered, no complaints of the ride but I needed a more thorough drive. I bid goodbye to the attendant and I went back thoroughly disappointed. Linea wasn’t the one, at least not for the moment.
Scorpio’s Sting
I was never a fan of Scorpio, always holding it to be an inferior product compared to the Safari, but reading Tsk1979’s and Raj’s posts made me reconsider. I thought maybe Scorpio could be the one? After all it had loads of features, was not as massive as a Safari, and had that fantastic mhawk engine.
So one fine Sunday I headed to Sri Durga Automobiles, the Mahindra Showroom on Rama Road. My father and I collectively gasped at the horror inside, the interiors were of the shoddiest build possible and the interior space was at a premium too. Reluctantly, I took a test drive, it planted a smile on my face; the engine was brilliant, acceleration and torque surge phenomenal, not rattled by the broken tarmac as I had been led to believe, and decent cornering ability considering the size of the vehicle. I was in a bind the issue with Scorpio’s interiors, size and the fact that car is expected to be more of a city car were working against the Scorpio. I was still keeping an open mind.
Linea Redux
My father suggested we head off to the Tata-Fiat Showroom stone’s throw away from the Mahindra showroom to have a look at Punto, for him and to test drive the Linea again. He turned out to be even more finicky than I was when it came to Linea’s interiors. Then we had a dekko of Punto, somehow the interiors of Punto look and feel better than Linea’s; I guess it’s to do with the darker colour theme and black dials.
We Test drove the Linea, the car certainly didn’t feel underpowered, the torque was addictive, the chassis excellent and ride good. If one could look beyond the white dials, average interior build and space this is the car but sadly I can’t. Punto, though could see addition to my family soon.
Banzai Charge !
I was still undecided, when my dad suggested that I should look at the time tested Jap petrol cars. Call it a co-incidence or divine intervention, the same day one of my uncle visited and suggested that I look at Honda and he was kind enough to lend me his Civic Auto for a couple of days. I was initially hesitant as I had not driven auto extensively but Civic auto was easy to drive and the paddle shifts were awesome. The car was well planted, the vtech engine begged to be revved, though it did not really inspire confidence when tackling broken tarmac.
Now, the only issue being at 14+ otr Delhi, it was not only well outside my budget but also not vfm. My uncle suggest that I have a look at City, as it’s as good as a Civic, I also remember reading GTO’s comment that City is 90% Civic at 75% Price, I felt that City would be a good choice for me. Its compacter dimensions would be a help in parking , auto would be a help in driving in the traffic, and 118ps Vtech engine would allow me to indulge.
So yesterday off I went with my father to the recently opened Automax Honda, Mayapuri to have a look at the City. The build quality of the City was certainly above a notch over the others I test drove. Interior space was impressive for its dimensions, I reckon they were a tad more than Linea’s, stock HU is pretty nifty too, can’t say the same about the speakers. I decided on the Bold beige colour but was not particularly impressed with the silver insert on the front panel, it somehow reduces the overall looks. Accessories price list is a total rip-off too, so is the absence of alloys, ACC and foglamps.
Test drive time, it was what I had expected of a car claiming to be 90% Civic, it had me convinced that this is the car for my needs: engine loved to be revved, ride and gearshift’s were good, visibility was fair. I got down to discussions with the sales rep, he said they didn’t have any discounts to offer but he offered to give me a discount on the Rs7500 anti-rust treatment, besides other small freebies. I liked the Bold Beige colour but he said that I would have to wait 14-15 days for delivery for it. He said he will come to my office tomorrow for detailed discussions as I had to leave.
Booked!
Today the sales rep came to my office, for the booking. We got down to discussions on the discounts, insurance and loan. I said I would get a loan from my Bank, HDFC, as I was getting a better rate of 10.25%. When it came to discounts he offered me 10,000 rs or the anti-rust treatment with a few freebies like mud flaps, pillows etc.. He also said that before the Jazz was released the City’s were being delivered on time not so anymore, and that it would take a maximum of two weeks for delivery. I asked for discounts on the accessories, he offered me around 5% but suggested that I not go in for Honda alloys as they were very expensive.
While we were discussing my uncle who lent me his Civic came in. He and my dad both asked me to get an Auto for myself as it made more sense for in-city driving, and I said why not? I handed him a cheque of Rs10,000 and booked a Bold Beige Honda City 1.5 S Auto for myself subject to my test drive experience, discount scheme and delivery schedule remaining the same; the car’s OTR came to about ~Rs 9,67,000.
Will head there tomorrow for a test drive and if all goes well, I will be a happy owner of Honda City 1.5S Auto by end of this month.
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16th July 2009, 23:57
