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Bought a used Ford Figo TDCi; Likes, dislikes & ownership experience

21st October 2024, 17:34 by Rahul Nagaraj

Driving around 80 km/h, gives you the best fuel efficiency around 25km/l.

BHPian hesoyam_007 recently shared this with other enthusiasts:

Namaste BHPians,

I hope you all are in good health. I, with great joy, writing my initial ownership experience of my pre-owned 2017 registered Ford Figo TDCi. I am a fairly new member of this forum and avidly read new posts almost every day. This is my first post on this forum, so please pardon any mistakes that I may make within this post. I want to thank the good people of this forum from whom I learn so much from the experiences of fellow members available on this forum.

About myself

I would not call myself a very big of a car nerd but I just like the technology that is put into making a car, everything working together at once with such an accuracy is truly exciting. I am a software engineer by profession and an electronics nerd too. I usually work on hobby projects involving Arduino, raspberry pi, etc. Back then when I was just a kid, my father owned first a Maruti Omni and then a Tata Spacio for a business that he owned. Both of them were preowned and were just the barebones without even an AC but I always loved travelling in those two vehicles. My father had to shut his business down for some reasons. If my memory serves me right, Omni was sold and Spacio was scraped. For the last 5 years, there was no vehicle at my village home where my parents and grandfather live.

My first Car

After covid, I and my college friend who lives with me in Noida since we both started our jobs thought of getting a car. Since I got a new R15 V3, it was decided that my friend will be getting the car. So, we got a 2011 Ford Figo petrol duratech for a very low price. Although that turned out to be a not so good financial decision as the car still acts up with a lot of money spent. We both did not know about cars much, the excitement of getting a car let us just buy it without any inspection. A car is a car, it was running so it must be okay. Both me and my friend learned to drive on the Figo and it has given us memories that we can cherish for years. I learned to drive on it, got my driving license with it, partied with it, went on dates with it and the list goes on. After a year, there was an ick to get something for myself which led me to search for something. After much deliberation and trying to find a good car, I got a well-maintained 2013 VW Polo 1.2 MPI with 62000km on the odo. The ownership was not really fuss free as I had to shell out some money for the head overhaul after around 6 months of owning it. Since there was no vehicle at home and increasing old age of my grandfather and health issues of my mother, the Polo is at my village currently. I have both the positives and negatives to share for it but I want to keep it short and for the Ford Figo TDCi. Total of three cars, all from Olx. I know it is cumbersome with sleepless nights but I always got a good deal at the end.

The Ford Figo TDCi Trendline

Since I was now used to the comfort and practicality of a car, I was now in the market for another car. My family would not have allowed me to get a new car so the obvious choice for me to look at the preowned market. It is a daunting task to search OLX for a good deal but I like challenges. My search criteria were limited to individual sellers only as the dealers markup the prices a lot. My budget was tight and my preferred choice was either a hatchback or a sedan. For a brief period, I was interested in a neatly maintained black Honda Accord 2011 for a price of 2 Lakh only but that got sold out before I could even visit it for test drive. I wanted it just for the sake of it, no practicality involved. After that I met up few sellers, a one who was selling a red polo(I know!), a guy selling a Ford Figo TDCi, a Honda amaze to name a few. These deals did not see any fruitful middle ground on the price. The Figo was the most exorbitant. I was distraught but did not lose hope and waited and waited until I received a message from another Figo seller.

This was the 2nd cherry red Figo TDCi seller whom I had dropped a message a while back but he did not reply back. This reply was a sigh of relief. This was the one with 1 Lakh+ kms on the odo and was a stage 1+ remapped by Wolf Moto. We talked and he told me he was out of station and will let me know once he is in Delhi. He was back in Delhi after some 10 days and we made a plan to meet. I went to meet and drove the car and struggled with the clutch when I tried to accelerate but got it right the second time. Drove for some time with the guy and his mother. I came to know that the car was his father's and he unfortunately died in March this year and the son was going for his masters in some 20 days. He told me a lot about his lawyer father and his love for cars and bikes (he also had a KTM RC 390 to sell). His father did also get some additional accessories installed like LED headlights, reverse camera and auto IRVM. I inspected the car, nothing in detail to be honest but checked for rusting and engine bay condition. Everything looked alright. I quoted my price and he asked me he will check with his family once. After some back and forth, he agreed to the price I quoted.

Since I had issues procuring some of my documents, the transfer process got delayed. During this time, he was nervous partly due to a deal with a complete stranger and what if I back out. So, he asked me for some advance payment, I gladly complied and sent 30k via UPI and assured him that I will not back out. A deal is a deal. Once my documents were sorted, I and my friend went to collect the car. To our unfortunate luck, the guy who was to help us in the transfer did not open his shop that day. We enquired in the neighbouring shops if anyone else can help us. Luckily there was another guy that did help us and he charged some 700 Rs which in my opinion is alright the urgency we were in. The total transfer cost came close to 1500 Rs. The Parivahan website was slow because of Sunday probably, so the payment did not go through. He told us to leave and he will do it later in the night and will call us around 10 PM. Rightly, I got the payment link and made the payment. After about 20 days, I am the official owner now and the RC is also delivered!

Coming to the car, I have driven it close to 1500 km in a month. I love the car and how quickly it picks up the speed once you cross 2000 RPM. I did struggle with the clutch for first few days, probably it has to do with a diesel or being ford? Also, the gear switch between 1st and 2nd gears is a bit notchy and sometimes I get it wrong. The 1st gear is too short and 2nd is a little too powerful. I sometimes think there is a gear missing between these two, haha . I have also achieved some good top speed on the beloved Yamuna expressway on my way to Agra. These are the speeds that I did not even think of if the car is capable of. But it handled those pretty well only to brush the ego of a Virtus owner. He also did pretty well. I am not sure if this was possible due to it being Wolf'd or just the natural character. I like the third gear the most. I can just floor the car with it and keep driving. Talking about FE, I have a heavy foot and as a result my city FE revolves around 15 and on highways somewhere around 20kmpl(conservative driving) and 17kmpl(spirited driving). Driving around 80kmph, gives you the best FE around 25kmpl. These are odo figures and I have not measured it tank-to-tank. I'll be adding thg some pictures of the car at the end of the post.
Below is a short list of my likes and dislikes about the car so far.

Dislikes first:

1. Car's NVH levels are not the best, though the engine is quite for a diesel there is noise that creeps in. Nothing that a volume increase can not help but it is there.
2. Driving dynamics could have been better. I maybe over analyzing and comparing it with the polo.
3. Boot space, a joke of a boot space.
4. The initial gears are jerky. Clutch issue?
5. No telescopic steering and seat height adjustment, possibly available in higher variants?

Likes:

1. The comfortable seats. The long rides don’t make you feel tired.
2. Speakers are good, I am not sure if they are stock.
3. The diesel experience on highways, I like the way engine pulls and pulls.
4. Fuel economy is good if I drive it with light foot.
5. Ample amount of legroom for front and back seats. A trade off to less boot space. It is said, you can only have one good thing.

Below are few upgrades that I have done so far.
1. An android head unit
2. A bass tube and a DIY bass control knob

I will add another post for the above two upgrades and there are some other upgrades I will be doing in a year or two. This post is now quite long.
So I'll thank you all for reading about my experience. Do let me know if you have any questions.