Team-BHP - The "I Booked my Car" Thread

Quote:

Originally Posted by yosbert (Post 3358069)

Congrats for the new car! A couple of questions.
- Did you test drive the Grand i10 also?
- Are you ok with the rear seat ride comfort of i20 (as compared to i10 Grand)?

I was happily waiting for my Grand i10 booking to materialize, until I noticed that i20 in its topmost version comes with 6 airbags and EBD (and a whole gamut of other blings). Immediately fell for that, but the deal breaker for me are
- Rear seat ride quality
- Almost same power as Grand i10 with +200 kilos of weight.

No I have not yet driven the Grand I10. I found the rear seat sitting comfort in both the I 20 and Grand I 10 to be quite good. We do know that the I20 is bigger though. Saying that, in our use case scenario the usage of the rear seats will be relatively less because for the most part the car will transport only 2 persons and their luggage.
I did not go for the Grand I10 because it is smaller overall than the I20 and only one variant comes with Airbags and ABS and all the rest of it.
Even I would have liked to go with the I20 Asta with Options but as I said, the wait period was too long. Also, we don't need a sun roof. While the 6 Airbags would have been great, we did not like the fact that even that car only has rear drum brakes. And it had no ESP.
These were irritants, and hence we chose the Asta 1.2 Petrol I20 with 2 airbags, ABS, EBD and all the rest of the bells and whistles.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shankar.balan (Post 3358102)

These were irritants, and hence we chose the Asta 1.2 Petrol I20 with 2 airbags, ABS, EBD and all the rest of the bells and whistles.

Congrats on a great choice! I've always thought that the i20 is a good car. Some of my colleagues have i20s - diesel not petrol. Spacious with a surprisingly large boot not forgetting all the bells and whistles.:)
Just curious - how come you never checked out the AT Polo?

Quote:

Originally Posted by wilful (Post 3358260)

The VW Polo is just too low in terms of seating position and too small, in comparison to the I20. Why, the I20 is almost as long as my Yeti!
While the Polo AT may have been nice, it is severely limited in terms of features. Importantly, the rear seat does not have a split-fold as far as I am aware. This severely limits the load carrying capacity and flexibility of luggage space available, which I do not like.

Car for car, the Fabia is a better car than the Polo and in our case, the I20 pipped the Fabia itself to the post! The I 20 won hands down based on absolutely sheer merit.:)

So we drove my Dad's I 20 today since we are on a quick visit to Madras.
Here is a short bit of feedback.

Its a very comfortable car. Nice and spacious. Easy to use in the City. All the bells and whistles like reverse camera etc are extremely useful indeed, given our terrible traffic.
Excellent dynamics, great feel inside except that it does not have those soft touch plastics. The electronics are clean and work well.
We are quite satisfied with the OEM Music system and speakers though we do know there are far better options available in the market.
The gears feels nice and comfortable, and the gearbox is much more responsive than the "woolly" gearbox of the Tata Indica.
The engine's torque and power delivery is just ok. I find the petrol 1.2 quite underpowered when you really want to "send it". I guess Im biased because Im coming in straight from my Yeti which is an absolute beast in terms of acceleration.
But this I20 is oh so soft and comfy to drive, that it really feels like heaven after than old Indica!
I think it is the correct choice for my mid-senior parents - no doubt about it at all.
Tomorrow we shall take it for a slightly longer drive on (hopefully) empty roads! Then I shall place a further update here!

Cheers!

Make : Fiat
Model : Lenia
Variant : Emotion
Fuel : Diesel
Booking Date : 24-Jan-2014
Color : Bossa Nova White
Expected Delivery Date : Got the delivery today
Dealer & City : Vecto Motors, Bangalore
On Road Price: 10.25L(This is a 2013 make, hence a huge discount)

Quote:

Originally Posted by arun_josie (Post 3359903)

Congrats Arun on the new purchase. I thought you would stick with Maruti. How was this decision made?

Quote:

Originally Posted by arun_josie (Post 3359903)

Congratulations on buying what I believe to be one of the best C segment cars out there :thumbs up I like how you have not compromised and gone in for the Emotion variant. I read somewhere that the lower end variants of Fiats don't' have the same front impact beams of the emotion variants so you should be in an extremely safe car now :)

Cheers!

Quote:

Originally Posted by aneezan (Post 3362893)

Congrats Arun on the new purchase. I thought you would stick with Maruti. How was this decision made?

Thanks aneezan! Yes, I would have preferred Maruti, but SX4 is heavily overpriced and my wife was not interested in Ertiga after a couple of test drives. Finally ,it was between Fiesta Classic Vs Linea. I will update more info in my ownership thread but, it may take some time.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RavenAvi (Post 3353457)

Congratulations!!

Any particular reason for going for the Celerio over the current bestseller, the Grand i10, besides Maruti-Suzuki's peace-of-mind A.S.S.? Or is it because the Grand i10's AT doesn't carry basic safety equipment such as ABS + Airbags?

Waiting eagerly to see a detailed pictorial review from you soon, my friend.

Thanks. The Grand i10 was more expensive so had to compromise. Would have loved the safety features but no Xxi in auto. Getting delivery on Saturday. Actually car is ready for registration on Monday but I'm travelling.

It was an impulse decision. I was actually looking for bigger segment sedans and my choice were, VW Jetta/Octavia (New).

Was bowled over by Octavia, but disappointed by its irrational pricing. Jetta was not inspiring. While driving back, we took a Lavelle road and just then saw curious customers looking at new City parked outside. This was an impromptu stop to check the car.

Took a TD, was happy with the vehicle and it's response. Ofcourse it wasn't as great as Octavia, but it was VFM which came along with Honda badge of reliability.

I met the salesman from whom I wanted to know if there were any discounts and how soon can the delivery be done.

There were 0 discounts (Not even a Corporate discount) and I was promised a delivery by March 1st week, 2014.

That's when I just paid the booking amount and left. To my surprise, its been couple of weeks and the rep calls me to update the current status of the booked car.

Make : Honda
Model : City D-TEC
Variant : VMT (without sunroof, Chrome handles and leather seats)
Fuel : Diesel
Booking Date : 2-Feb-2014
Color : Silver
Expected Delivery Date : March 1st Week, 2014
Dealer & City : Dakshin Honda, Bangalore
On Road Price: 13.15L

Make : VW
Model : Vento Tsi
Variant : N/A
Fuel : Petrol
Booking Date : 15-Dec-13
Color : Shadow Blue
Expected Delivery Date : Feb End
Dealer & City : VW Mountroad, Chennai.
On Road Price: c INR 12.5 Lakhs.

My requirement was an AT and budget upto c INR 16 lakhs. During my research I was surprised that between 12 to 19 there is no good AT car at all. Isn't that a big gap that someone could fill by launching a few variants. Say a Vento 1.4 Tsi with DRLs, Bi Xenons, auto foldable ORVMs, rear parking camera etc?

I almost stretched my budget to 23 ( :D more punched a big hole in it) and had decided on the octavia but then the stock market volatility in Jan reminded to be prudent. As a trader i got to look at the downside first lol: