[mobike008]

Originally Posted by spadix

By the way BQ got her first set of scratches - just observed them 10-15 minutes back. For the last 2 days BQ has been taking rest at home because of knee-waist (and more, sometimes) deep water just outside the house and now also on NH9. So this is surely the handiwork of someone in the building. It could actually be the car cleaner too - the senile pig-headed guy just doesn't understand that he must not use water lying on the ground to clean the car (yes my wife saw him wet and squeeze the cloth with *that* water)!

I guess I will just have to find the time and clean the car myself.

These rains and our stupid stagnation (not drainage) systems are quickly putting paid to my hopes for a dream beginning month (including photo shoot ops) with BQ .

Regards,
spadix

Thats crazy he's using that water to dip the cloth and clean your car. If i saw my guy doing that would have given him one " Kaan ke neeche"

To ensure this is not repeated, I reckon you need to spend some time in KT and Product cleaning demo

[spadix]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Thats crazy he's using that water to dip the cloth and clean your car. If i saw my guy doing that would have given him one " Kaan ke neeche"

The guy's old, senile and thinks a bit high of himself because he's been in the good books of the land/building owner (who I think drives a red Octavia diesel whose reg. number adds up to 9). The only way is to thank him for the service he's rendered so long.

He refuses to wipe the alloys (gives some unintelligible excuse - happened thrice). After his first day at work I had to actually tell him to wipe the car dry so that water marks are removed!

He's regular (didn't miss a day over the last 2 weeks) and the car generally looks spotless and clean, but these scratches and the repeated misses of alloy wheel cleaning are wearing my patience down.

Originally Posted by mobike008

To ensure this is not repeated, I reckon you need to spend some time in KT and Product cleaning demo

Thanks, man! I'm assuming these are code words for some Youtube video? Or is it some section of the TBHP forums?

Regards,
spadix

[adimicra]

I am little late on this thread, but anyway hearty congratulations for such a wonderful car!
Hyd TBHP is rocking with 1 Cruze and 2 Civic purchases in quick time (if I recall collectly).
The Civic is my all-time favorite and have driven my friend's car once, the seating position and the dash board feeling is just awesome!

During my visits to the Honda showroom for buying the Jazz, I almost was bowled over by the Civic ( City never excited me) but then better sense prevailed and I returned to the Jazz!

A few years down the line, the Civic is going to be in my garage hopefully!

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by spadix

Thanks, man! I'm assuming these are code words for some Youtube video? Or is it some section of the TBHP forums?

Regards,
spadix

No siree, speaking in similar language to someone who's in product development.

Btw, KT = Knowledge Transfer

[spadix]

Originally Posted by adimicra

I am little late on this thread, but anyway hearty congratulations for such a wonderful car!

Thanks, adimicra! Many congratulations to you too for your Jazz. That's one impressive vehicle and to tell you the truth, if Honda had priced it a lac (at least) or so below its current level I would've had a really hard time.

Originally Posted by adimicra

Hyd TBHP is rocking with 1 Cruze and 2 Civic purchases in quick time (if I recall collectly).

Could just as easily have been 2 of this and 1 of that. I was suitably impressed with the Cruze after the TD but decided to go with the first love instead .

Originally Posted by adimicra

The Civic is my all-time favorite and have driven my friend's car once, the seating position and the dash board feeling is just awesome!

Amen to that! As I said in the beginning of the thread, this was one excruciating, 4+-year-long wait for me.

Originally Posted by adimicra

A few years down the line, the Civic is going to be in my garage hopefully!

Same here. The ANHC didn't excite me too (even drove a friend's ANHC in Bengaluru in April but wasn't convinced enough to opt for it over the Civic).

I wish the Civic in whatever form it is at the time you're ready to buy it is even more exciting than the current one. My plan was to wait for another year to accumulate some more funds but after having missed the Baleno and RS in similar manner (I wanted to buy new) I couldn't afford that to happen with the 8th gen. Civic.

Regards,
spadix

[spadix]

After 2 days of rest at home, BQ had a good day (130 kms) out today, courtesy of the rain gods sparing us yesterday night. The odo now reads 815.6 and BQ is getting very close to her first service. I'll get that done during the week so I can head out on to the highway the coming weekend.

The drive involved some really heavy rain driving on the smooth and traffic-free Nehru Outer Ring Road and PV Narasimha Rao elevated expressway. It was fun, and I also touched a new high of 130 kmph in a dry section, with the tacho barely crossing 3200 rpm or so.

I had one mildly scary moment when an Accord cab returning from the airport on the same route kicked up a huge amount of spray onto my windscreen. My wipers were on intermittent and there was a Qualis ahead which I was lining up to overtake, and the road was also narrowing down from 4-5 lanes to 2-3 for a short stretch. I slowed down slightly and put the wipers in normal speed. I was defensive enough so no heart-in-mouth moments, really. Lesson learnt; alertness alone isn't enough and the possibility of a teeny scratch on the windscreen (due to fast wiper and not enough water) is OK compared to losing visibility all of a sudden.

In the process I became a member of the AASI and also got number plates for the car. I initially wanted to go with Utsav plates but got standard ones instead for 400 INR. A bit expensive, perhaps but I saw a Xylo driver who bargained and got the front plate only for INR 170, so it's not too bad I guess.

I haven't received the RC yet (it'll arrive by post) and I don't know if I'm committing some offence by driving around with permanent plates without having the proper RC, but I thought the yellow T/R stickers were attracting undue attention (yes, those two scratches I saw yesterday caused a mild flutter in my stomach).

So full expense for permanent registration was 1025 INR (including plates) whereas the dealer wanted 3000 for it.

Regards,
spadix

[mobike008]

So you finally were able to stretch the Black Queen's legs up to 130kmph

Did you take a circuit route of entering the ORR from Gachibowli and then coming back via. PVNR expressway? That's the most wonderful stretch of 75kms + in Hyderabad to enjoy a high speed run of our cars.

Btw, Can you throw some light on what are the benefits of becoming a member with AASI? Also what are these Utsav plates, what is their cost and where can we get them?

Btw, how was the feeling at 130kmph? Description

[spadix]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Did you take a circuit route of entering the ORR from Gachibowli and then coming back via. PVNR expressway? That's the most wonderful stretch of 75kms + in Hyderabad to enjoy a high speed run of our cars.

Yeah, Gachibowli to Vijayanagar Colony and back via ORR-Shamshabad-PVNR both ways. It's ~90 kms from Gachibowli-ORR junction to Vijayanagar Colony (AASI office) and back.

I didn't rip too much as BQ's still running in and there was heavy rain. On top of that this is the first time I've driven the full Gachibowli-ORR-Shamshabad stretch (so far I've only been on this route in AeroExpress).

Beautiful roads!

Originally Posted by mobike008

Btw, Can you throw some light on what are the benefits of becoming a member with AASI? Also what are these Utsav plates, what is their cost and where can we get them?

More info on AASI services.

Utsav is here. They've discontinued HSRPs and are only selling "smart" plates which I don't find too useful. When RTO mandates these I'll go for them. For now I'm happy with the regular RTO-approved variety that's available in many road-side shops.

Originally Posted by mobike008

Btw, how was the feeling at 130kmph?

Three things stood out -

1. BQ feels like it's on rails. The handling is sharp, precise and delicious - egging you to push the limits even more. Also, the engine has so much in reserve even at 130 kmph that overtaking at those speeds will be very easy, I'm sure. The redline is 6800 rpm and at 130 kmph you're still well south of 3500 rpm in 5th.
2. The tyres get somewhat noisy at that speed. While we know the stock tyres are like that, perhaps the road surface also contributes a bit (I've seen surfaces where the tyres are very silent). There's some wind noise also, but it was windy and rainy after all.
3. I can't judge this yet based on just one speed run but the car lacks the feel of the European saloons at speed. It's not that it vibrates or feels like it's about to fly off or something, but you *know* you're doing some
   serious (for our roads and conditions) speeds. Surprisingly you don't feel that when cruising at around 100-105 kmph. This could be because of the low-slung nature of the car as well (the ground seems to rush onto you).

Regards,
spadix

[filcord]

guys, btw, the utsav link below sends you to the utsav site, but one of the links therein connects to a harmful site. Be careful.

[spadix]

It's been 29 days since BQ entered our lives. She's now racked up 1050 km and will get her first service (1 month/1000 km) done tomorrow.

While I'm much behind my target of 1700 km per month, what keeps me happy is that I managed 1050 km in 28 days where BQ actually sat idle for 7 whole days. So it's effectively 1050 in 21, or around 50 km a (running) day. This is still less than the 55 km/day average target, but once again, this 1050 was hit without any out-of-city driving. So there is hope , once the monsoon ends and our access road becomes more predictable, and BQ gets her service done.

The plan was to actually get the service done on Friday itself. By Wednesday EOD the odo read 973 km almost. One round trip to work on Thursday would've seen the odo touch 1000 km almost. We wanted to drive down to Bengaluru over the weekend so that I could attend a grand alumni meet on Saturday evening at Whitefield. However, Nature and our great Hyderabad roads had other plans. It rained hard on Wednesday night. In fact was driving through 20 feet visibility throughoust most of my drive back and got home just as the water levels in the access road to our home started rising above mid-of-ankle-and-knee level.

Obviously BQ wasn't going out on Thursday, and there was no guarantee of what would happen on Friday. No servicing before the weekend meant no drive to Bengaluru over the weekend :(. C'est la vie!

As it turned out, there was knee-deep water on Friday morning too. So I took the bike to work. By the time I returned, luckily the road had dried up, and there was no overnight rain on Friday.

Seizing our chance, we took BQ out for a spin on Saturday and once again hit the Gachibowli - ORR - Shamshabad - PVNR circuit. This time BQ was happy to touch 142 kmph (the one time I observed the speedo -- perhaps she did more too but I didn't notice) at least. No rain this time, though.

When I bought my Pulsar I remembered how creamy the bike felt in the first month, before the first service. The moment I got the bike back from the sevice everything had changed. For the worse, in my book. While the bike still retained its fast and furious character, it just felt too rough. I hope Pride Honda Service doesn't do the same to BQ. That's my overriding concern at this point.

To summarize my thoughts at the end of one month of ownership -

1. Buying and driving one of the best driver's cars this side of the hallowed Germans = INR 15.21 lacs
2. TCO as on date = INR 1685/km
3. Seeing women eye the car a second time, with a knowing smile on their faces, and trying to get a peek of the driver inside = priceless
4. Seeing Mom sleep like a baby in the spacious, comfortable rear seat and in the quiet cabin, in the midst of dense and noisy Saturday evening peak-hour traffic = simply, simply priceless!

May the pricelessness continue forever!

Regards,
spadix

[spadix]

I dropped the car off for the first service earlier in the morning. The service center opens at 9:30 am and I was there by 9:40 am or so. Sleepy Monday morning, and not all of the mechanics had turned up because of the rains. So it took some time before I could find someone to explain what all I wanted to get done on the car.

The expected cost for consumables is around INR 150 to 175.

The guy also wanted to know if I was interested in getting under-body rust protection. It costs INR 3800 + tax and comes with 5 year dealer warranty, which I felt wasn't too bad for the price. I didn't ask if this is 3M or some other brand. I'll call him up and find out. The other thing I have a question on is whether or not Honda does this already on new vehicles, in which case I probably shouldn't worry about it. The guy who spoke to me said it isn't done by Honda, and I just took his word for it.

I also asked him to call me up with a price quote for the chrome exhaust tip, which he hasn't done so far.

Despite my best efforts to ensure that the car doesn't go into service with excess fuel, the indicator still showed 5 bars (reserve light kicks in at 2) :(.

The car will be ready by afternoon but for various reasons I can collect it only tomorrow morning. While they have (paid) pick-up and drop, I don't want to let their drivers drive the car if I'm physically able to pick up and drop the car on my own. The service center isn't too far from home anyway.

Somehow I'm feeling very apprehensive about the whole thing, given Honda's not-so-stellar service reputation. Let's see.

In the meantime, if any of you has better information about under-body anti-rust coating (specifically if you know that it's already done by Honda at the factory) then please let me know and I'll cancel the order for the same.

Regards,
spadix

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by spadix

The expected cost for consumables is around INR 150 to 175.

Why even that much? My bill for 1st service was Rs.0

Originally Posted by spadix

The guy also wanted to know if I was interested in getting under-body rust protection. It costs INR 3800 + tax and comes with 5 year dealer warranty, which I felt wasn't too bad for the price. I didn't ask if this is 3M or some other brand. I'll call him up and find out.

Even i was enquired with this offer. But, i politely declined and not even asked the cost of underbody coat work.

Originally Posted by spadix

Despite my best efforts to ensure that the car doesn't go into service with excess fuel, the indicator still showed 5 bars (reserve light kicks in at 2) :(.

Never to worry about the fuel. Just make a mental note of the bar and also the odo reading. usually you will get the car back with 1-2kms driven not more. And, they will never take the risk of flicking a few litres of fuel.

Originally Posted by spadix

While they have (paid) pick-up and drop, I don't want to let their drivers drive the car if I'm physically able to pick up and drop the car on my own. The service center isn't too far from home anyway.

I am surprised. Chevrolet picks up and drops the car FREE of charge.

KUN service station is open 24 hours from Mon-Saturday. Sunday its 10am to 5pm.

Even my service station is around 1km from home. So i like giving them the car personally and "walk" back home

[spadix]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Why even that much? My bill for 1st service was Rs.0

I am surprised. Chevrolet picks up and drops the car FREE of charge.

Errm, does the 'Honda' name ring a bell?

Originally Posted by mobike008

Even i was enquired with this offer. But, i politely declined and not even asked the cost of underbody coat work.

Yeah it's a peace of mind thing. We never got this done on the 800. Even on the Indigo I think this was done only recently (after 4 years and 57k kms). I'm debating whether to just call him up and cancel it, but the two or three instances of fjording through deep water near my place have installed this keeda in my mind.

Originally Posted by mobike008

Never to worry about the fuel. Just make a mental note of the bar and also the odo reading. usually you will get the car back with 1-2kms driven not more. And, they will never take the risk of flicking a few litres of fuel.

Maruti used to rip off half of whatever's available. In one unfortunate instance I had to give them the car with its tank nearly full and they (Mithra in Madhapur) dutifully returned the car to me with the needle showing exactly half :(.

Anyway, I made a mental note + physical one on the job card.

Originally Posted by mobike008

KUN service station is open 24 hours from Mon-Saturday. Sunday its 10am to 5pm.

Even my service station is around 1km from home. So i like giving them the car personally and "walk" back home

That's brilliant, man! Pride Service is 9:30 am to 6:30 pm Mon-Sat and Sun off. Even the Saturdays are only 1st and 3rd or something (or is that the Sundays?). Delivery time is 7:00 pm.

The service center is like 6.5 kms from my place. Walkable, but not in this monsoon and with this kind of traffic (with no pedestrian walkways to save you).

Regards,
spadix

[spadix]

I just called up the service center and the guy who took my vehicle in confirmed that the under-body rust coating is a 3M job.

Earlier in the day he said I'll get a dedicated receipt and now he denies saying anything of that sort. When I asked him how I can enforce warranty he said their computer records will be enough for that.

When I got 3M detailing done for my bike a long time back I got a dedicated receipt with the 3M logo/icon, so there's really something fishy going on here.

I think I'll just call them up again and decline the under-body job. If I need to I'll get it done by a 3M dealer instead.

Seems like I'm going to have a fun time with Pride Honda service in the days and years to come :(.

Regards,
spadix

[mkc15]

Originally Posted by spadix

The expected cost for consumables is around INR 150 to 175.

The guy also wanted to know if I was interested in getting under-body rust protection. It costs INR 3800 + tax and comes with 5 year dealer warranty, which I felt wasn't too bad for the price. I didn't ask if this is 3M or some other brand. I'll call him up and find out.

Hey spadix, catching up with your thread. CONGRATS on your BQ. Mine also came to around Rs.150 for first service (straight 2 weeks from delivery) ~120 for nitrogen and ~40 for wiper liquid, IIRC.

Regarding underbody coating, I also initially thought its not required as it comes pre-done. While taking delivery after 3rd service, I noticed that Honda is cost-cutting by coating only the joints. So decided to get it done. I'll be getting it done in the next service. I was told its around 4K (3M job), don't remember the exact figure though.