At Delhi Yamaha showcased two of its models which are likely to be launched in the third week of February if reports are to be believed. Though these two are no R15s or FZs but one of them isn’t pretty bad. The SZ looks promising to play the role of a tone downed conventional Yamaha for the commute kinds. With a 150cc engine from the FZ range the bike is quite punch packed as far as power is concerned. It would be retailed around Rs. 60,000 on road which would make it cheaper than its rivals Pulsar 150 and Unicorn by 5000 rupees. As far as I can find the only reason for the lesser price is the absence of front disc brakes. If the SZ would get the mileage figures right it would put Yamaha into the numbers game.
The YBR is the Yamaha of the recent past, from when Yamaha made bikes like Alba and G5. Honestly compared to the G5 YBR is pretty dull. One would think given Yamaha’s current trend it might as well add a bit of life to the G5 to make a commute Yamaha like YBR, but no.
Though The Auto Expo closed down a week back we aren’t done with it.
Fiat showcased two new variants of it Honda City rival Linea. One is a turbocharged variant of its current 1.4L petrol engine. This car is called the Linea T-Jet and is expected to make it to the showrooms by March this year. The T-Jet would have 20 more PS of power at 110ps compared to the current turbo-less Petrol engine.
The second Linea is more significant in terms of new technology. This Linea is called Dualogic which means the logic behind this car is double fold as the Linea Dualogic could be driven in both manual and automatic modes. This is no conventional automatic gear box, the technology behind is so smart that it is not just 10% more fuel efficient than any other automatic gearbox it is 3-5% more fuel efficient than any other manual gear box of this capacity. The Dualogic and T-Jet were spotted sporting 16” inch alloys.
Since Maruti didn’t have any new facelifts of its existing models as it has already launched various BS-4 compliant models, it decided to show what modifications you could do with your current Maruti. I for one was awestruck by the potential of these hatchbacks and I wonder why modification stereo types exist.
Let’s start off with the Swift which is the most modification friendly car in India. Auto Expo saw two of these one a very usual modified Swift in Red with white stripes and a pretty good body kit which you can live with, the other had outrageous Alien machine sort of modification. Modifications were done on the interior as well, with dashboard material and colors changed and Stock seats were replaced with very comfortable old school sports coupe kind of ones.
The best modified cheap car award (if there was one) has to go to the Alto Xcite. Selling at 22,000units a month, it is definitely the most lovable cheap car in India. With that Maruti could have called it a day but no. Maruti has given the Alto a new avatar for the Expo. What we have here is the reincarnation of 70’s best looking hot hatchs. I am even tempted to call it the DB5 of cheap cars. This amazing blend of paint job and red blue racing stripes running down the sides is hugely responsible for the outcome. The 70’s style alloy wheels and tire threads seal the deal. This package wins me over completely.
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If you are the kind who takes the road less travelled M&M had all the machines you would dream for at the Auto Expo. But what if you just need a scooter to get you around, no biggie M&M had them too. M&M even had the light and the Heavy commercial Vehicle segment covered. Lets take one at a time and start with the Scorpios and Xylos. Click through for complete details on the Xylo Celebration Edition, Xylo Modified, Scorpio Special Edition and the mystery Scorpio.
Since Mahindra’s 2 wheeler wing hasn’t named these two we are calling it Mahindra’s Performance bike and Scooter concept.
Performance bike:
It is quite astonishing that this bike with a 125cc engine produces 53hp of power. To gain a little perspective the Pulsar 220 which is the fastest bike made in India with an engine capacity of 218cc produces 22hp. The 125cc Honda Stunner just produces 11.3hp. So this concept produces 5 times more power than what is expected out of it. Mahindra claims that this will hit a top speed of 245kmph which makes it the fastest 125cc bike in the world surpassing the Aprilla RS125 which has a maximum speed of 177kmph. These claims are so humongous it makes me think that M2W might be lying but if they aren’t they have defied all laws of physics!
Scooter Concept
This on the other hand is more realistic. With a 2-stroke, ya it’s a 2-stroke 124cc engine with 8hp it is quite conceivable. The Weight of this scooter is 105kgs and the 2-stroke performance shows in the 120kmph top speed. I am sure it can achieve the claimed top speed but would it keep me safe from plummeting into my own death at 120kmph?
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The Show stealer for M&M at the 2010 Delhi Auto Expo without a shallow of double was Thar. This according to Mahindra is an Indian take on the iconic Jeep CJ series and frankly I am blown away from what M&M has done with it. With its naked muscle it convinces that it can take up any terrain and the specs sure confirm it.
It has a 5-speed gear box and a transfer case for switching it to 4-wheel drive. On top of this it has a 2-speed gear reduction which bring the lowest gear ratio to 277.48:1, this means the wheels rotate only once for every 277.48 rotation of the crankshaft which provides the brute torque for pulling anything or pushing through any terrain.
The Thar displayed at Delhi is left hand drive and what we hear from Anand Mahindra’s Twitter page is that they are working on a right hand drive for India. Hope Mahindra drops the Thar in Thar Desert soon.
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