[adzegeek]

** Note - Ignore the rant style and sentiments if you are Safari/Toyota fan - you see its just about what you feel **


Booked 4wd drive mhawk in second week of October after seeing a few intrepid souls before you doing the same on tbhp.

The “Ute” – as your daughter likes to call it after seeing an Aussie Programme on TV was not your family’s preferred choice to begin with. Wife all the time was looking for Honda Pilot like-to-like replacement after moving back to India – with lots of space to store things on your weekend trips, easy soccer Mom personality,-profile car ,good ride quality, ability to get out of sand/mud/dirt with a flick of a switch/ good looks and a decent price tag– You?– you were looking for 4WD, Butch looks, lots of low end Torque, Reliability, a bit of DIY if possible, some road presence to ward off the magics and Indicas. There was no way you were going to let your hard earned money flow on more-than-double-than-it-should-be priced Honda/Toyota/Nissan in-spite of you owning them sometime in the past abroad - (Wrangler Unlimited would have been different matter though…). Needless to say you didn’t find any of that in your test drives with a budget meant not to cross 15 lakhs.

You being the sentimental Tata Old-Timer wanted to give Safari the first shot. Boy – it was a horrible ride – it felt worse than a boat. The TD vehicle was in shambles with its odometer disconnected. The steering made horrible sounds when turning. The handling inspired no confidence – it felt like the Safari will fall apart in no time. Wife gave you that dirt looks …“you ex-Tata employees….I lived with that horrid company of yours for years but I am not taking one more Tata product in my life” (I will have my revenge though – Landmark is so much better than other book stores)

All your friendly (and boring) US returned neighbours pitched for reliable as rock (and boring) Innova –your wife loves it. You hate it – thankfully your daughter overrules – she doesn’t want to own the cab. Saved – You did rather be seen in your underpants than driving this,– but she is your daughter after all – God Bless.

MHawk – sort of compromise for all to being with – but wife drives it on Outer Ring Road - and the torque overwhelmes her. Micro-Hybrid appeals to her Green nature. You - you were sold immediately on Torque and butch looks and Ugly backside - but for one problem. The Sales guys were nice – repeatedly making their way around your busy schedule – even holding your 8 month old boy while you take numerous test drives. But no 4WD!!!!!!!
4x4addict in the meantime started slipping in posts about the impending arrival of the mHawk 4wd – so you wait – You continue to make use of your Bianchi while wifey uses i10.

Toyota announces Fortuner – and you “manage” to get a test ride – it rocked – till you try to stop it – and nearly didn’t. Then heard the price and the waiting period – and you were like – No way – you are going to dish out this much money for 4runner clone. My family brands me stingy this and Stingy that – but no boss, no way. You give facile Shankar Balan’s logic of owning two scorps – or twenty nanos in that and what not. Cold war continues in family with In-laws throwing in tit-bits like x - son of y bought Toyota F and you keep ignoring and brooding saying you havent found what you were looking for (and play U2).
All the while Toyota & Mahindra folks keep calling you to decide and you keep deferring the decision. Pressure mounts on getting a big vehicle with arrival of extended family, but what to buy? Tata – never called – You guess they were getting their daily dose of latest of Tsk1979’s dancing prancing horse whose URL you gave them three times to three different people.
2 more months pass – and then 4x4addict’s PM comes in with arrival of 4wd Mhawk – that’s it – no ifs and buts – Now I started calling Mahindra to push this through. Color – that just killed me – white and black – Black it is – no doubt – Your wife reminds you of the dirt all the old cards accumulated and reminds that there is a weekly off for the car cleaner. So you say – sitting inside I am not going to see the color so what difference does it make and you give go ahead for white – and send in the booking amount. (useless excuse but you really dont care by now..)


You subscribe to Scorpio Issues and solutions and try and ensure your family does not suffer a rude shock because you are expecting a few things not to work.
Six weeks to go and you keep reminding the salesman to make sure it is coming on time – tell him about SST’s 10 week delivery time and try and dig into Linkedin to see if you can discover some Mahindra employee in your network (3 degrees of freedom not mattering..)
And then when you know it has left the factory, your bosses decide to send you on a 18 hour flight to New Zealand to be part of some god forsaken 10 day review of obscure product you had never heard of.
You finish the review in a week - record of sorts - You get a call on the day you are starting back from NZ that the Ute has arrived… atleast that makes 6 hour stop over at SG bearable. You ask him not to register till you do the PDI yourself. He tells you that it is somewhere near Vizag (oops sorry some 30 km in horrid traffic from where you stay ). You tell him to get into showroom so you can do all inspection there. To save time and precious paper, you edit the tbph excel spreadsheet in font 8 and remove whitespaces through a linux script to kill the time at the airport – now a compact 8 page double sided print ready to go…
You arrive and start driving towards the showroom and then hear some bloke wants to make United states of Telengana and some other folks have decided to throw stones at the cards/showroom windows – hey, You will say Jai Telengana and may be they will allow you to look at your Ute.

NOT TO BE

To Be Continued…

[4x4addict]

Congratulations man. As you correctly pointed out, buying a 4WD SUV for 10 lakhs in India is definitely a compromise of some sorts. Since the only choices are Tata Safari and Scorpio 4WD. Both have their pros and cons and ultimately you have to buy what you feel is the lesser devil.

[AWD]

Congo Geek, Scorpio 4x4 is the better option in the segment.
Though I do not subscribe to the view "one can buy 2 Scorpio's or 20 Nanos at Fortuners price". Going by this logic, one can buy 2 Gypsies or 10 Nano's at Scorpio's price!
Still its you who had to decide & buy, so what ever logic suits!

[jaysmokesleaves]

Very enthusing narration. Hope you get your Ute soon. Good thing you waited for the 4x4. Im sure it s bang for buck, except for the skirts its wearing nowadays. Looks more like Manisha Koirala trying to do movies again!!

But hey, hope you put the 4x4 through its paces and we get a solid review from you.

Congrats.

Cheers,

J

[.anshuman]

Congratulations!! 4wd version of the Scorpio is proving to be very popular on T-Bhp. A lot of people were waiting for this version to come out since long time. Anyways please post the pictures and a detailed review.

[adzegeek]

Originally Posted by AWD

Congo Geek, Scorpio 4x4 is the better option in the segment.
Though I do not subscribe to the view "one can buy 2 Scorpio's or 20 Nanos at Fortuners price". Going by this logic, one can buy 2 Gypsies or 10 Nano's at Scorpio's price!
Still its you who had to decide & buy, so what ever logic suits!

Thanks AWD - BTW Safari has LSD and Scorp Open Diff.

Note I used the word "facile" logic as I never bought into the argument - but what the hell, I was getting bombarded about who bought what - but throwing 23 big ones wasnt VFM for Fortuner when 3 hours away I would have paid less than half of this.

all judgements are subjective and we tend to put some objectivity around it

[AWD]

You are welcome Geek, that's right Fortuner doesn't seem VFM.

Oops, guess I skipped "facile"! Nevertheless, you have made a fantastic purchase, enjoy your ride & do post some pics.

[Off Roadie]

congrats buddy awaiting your reviews pretty humorous narration.

[n.devdath]

Wow wow and wow,
what a narration. Loved reading it. Congrats on your buy and looking forward to one of most interesting and riveting reports on TBHP.
Congrats once again, and yes, don't stop penning.

[Rahulk76]

Congratulations...A noble straight from the heart narration

Enjoy your ride and drive safe.

[suman]

Now this has to be one of the best that I've read on the forum

Heartiest Congratulations!! Have fun & put up some pics for us real quick!

[adzegeek]

You inch closer to the dealer showroom with the world going mad around you. No one really knows whats happening but all shop shutters are closing down. You get a call from the salesman saying if you want you will have to do PDI at the showroom basement – you think its fair enough – but situation gets worse – so you decide to be the only non-paying customer at a three storied bookstore – you play the guitar expecting things to cool down – Telenganites may decide to call it a day – but no. Even worse there is a two day bandh in offing – you then manage to sneak into the showroom to check out the Ute.

Its there with 6 other white scorps but it’s the only 4wd. You go through basic checks but cant drive it. You see the selector is on 4H – you casually enquire whether this is how it was driven on tarmac from Stockyard to showroom – they don’t know what to say. You give them the benefit of doubt. Start the engine and listen for sounds you hear clicking – what the hell? Then you realize it is Dave Mathews of DMB playing his licks on the acoustic you put in the CD. You change it to Kings of Leon who sound like pussies of Pashtunland – you make a mental note of finding some secure slot to put in Bose Sounddock when you go out for drive because this ICE is piece of crap. You pull out the cheque book write the cheque and confirm delivery date based on whims and fancies of Central Govt and the Telelanganites.

Your bro calls you not to act like an idiot (me? – he bought Endy and everyone developed impulsive vomiting disorder sitting in the middle row!). Wait for things to cool down before taking the delivery.

So you wait – call the Yoko dealer to ensure you can change the tyres from showroom.

Two day bandh – and you are out of station. You have like 2 hours to take delivery before you go off again to Chennai. You land up there and see the Ute with Chrome plating – who asked for it? It now looks like a Politico van….. You ask them to rip it off – they do some and plead helplessness for all the stuff which has double sided tape – You say OK - You can live with that. There is a person for service center explaining the operations - he doesnt know a dime about 4 wheel drive operations. But he and the salesman beg you not to tell this to the call you would be getting from their call center. You say you will not if he can lend you the maintenance manual for 4WD for two hours - No deal boss. You are in generous mood - but you remind him to brush up his details on 4WD.

No Temp registration done so far – saar – Mahindra has not sent the details of mHawk 4WD to RTO and anyway the RTO staff is agitating for better pay. RTO needs better pay – they all have field day fleecing the 2 wheel drivers in Hyd?? They give you a TC and paste a TC number – you look at the TC – expiry date May 2009!! You crib – he says sir don’t worry no one stops a scorp – it is politicians dig. You try and remember all the Police folks names in case someone stops you. He promises to get the TR in a weeks time.

You drive out – and head to Yoko dealer – SORRY IT IS CLOSED! – Now this is not done – You fret and fume and you have very little time and kms left for the change – You do mental math and convince yourself that you will get it changed later on in life as you saved lots of cash not buying the Toyota F. What a bummer!

You drive down the open road - feel the rush – comparable to some unmentionable stuff you did in college. Take it and zoom straight to rock blasting zone on Outer ring road. Turn on 4H and climb up the slippery hillocks. Feel the 4s working – good – the truck drivers give you a weird look – don’t normally get folks drive their brand new utes up dusty hills. You make sure you can put 4L – run through the list 4x4addict and anup had given for testing 4wd. Now shift back and reverse and wait for the click to come from hubs – did it or did it not? You reverse again. You definitely heard it. One final splash through the shallow lake waters before you head home - dirty but satiated.

Now take it for family’s spin out. Wife gives it some going over - She will be the one driving whereas you will cool your heals in Delhi. You come back 3 days later and take it out again – a good Samaritan stops and says boss your car is tilted – you do notice it now. You call the salesman and he basically says it may be an optical illusion. You ask him if he reckons you do dope or what? Make an appointment to go over to big service center 30 KM away the next day and rake up the brains of people on tbph to ask them what can go wrong – it is the torsion bar setting – anup and 4x4 opine. Land up there and find No 1 mechanic measuring and saying 35 mm depressed. He goes off for Lunch leaving in hands of guys who started looking up diagrams on slx 4wd maintenance manual. You tell them to wait for the alpha mech to come back – you sweet talk him into doing the work – and he finishes off in 20 minutes.


FE: 11.3 Kms for first 500 Kms – your wife did most of the driving – no wonder


What You like

• The Gear shift and the gear ratios and the power

• Road Presence (now that it is not limping to one side like Big B's shoulder)

• Are you hallucinating or what but you see some ladies in your complex throwing admiring (?) looks at the Ute when you come in to pick your daughter from the school bus – never happened in your whole life - even with that Wrangler Unlimited! Butch baby Butch

• You wear dark Tag Heur glasses which means basements are problems – this light sensor is a nice thing to have - appreciate it.

• You take calls while you drive safely with Bluetooth handsfree

• People make way on road esp the Magic/Ace/Auto drivers.

• 3rd gear does not vibrate like others' cars - but maybe once honeymoon period gets over we shall see...

• TPMS and your handheld pressure reader are within +- 0.5 psi of each other – which means all the pumps around you are wrong.

What You Hate

• The ICE – the only thing for which it is worthwhile listening to is the static
• Not much otherwise...

Now for some pics.... Sorry - D90 lens has gone kaput so will make do with some substandard Sony shots.

[Jimmy_u]

Hi adzegeek,

Congrats on a Great buy !! Look forward to some interior pics from you soon.......

can you please tell me if the 4Wd version has cruise control as an option ?


Regards.

[MileCruncher]

Hey Azdegeek, thats a real nice piece of writing. Please don't stop an dlet us know how did the acquisition go.

And some pictures as well please

[adzegeek]

Right now the stock car - is getting better - so will post Internals etc after a few days.

Taking Ute to the Water


Someone dropped a white Ute in the middle of nowhere. Hate that Chrome #@!$$$




Resting in the fields



Now being tested by Primary driver (and not the weekend warrior)