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Audi Q3 arrives in 2012 BMW X1-sized SUV offering from Audi revealed at the Shanghai Motor Show
Mid-2012 launch planned for Audi’s smallest SUV, the new VW Tiguan-platform based Q3 in India. Audi bills the Q3 as the sportiest small SUV on the market . Q5’s 2.0-litre petrol and diesel engines likely to power the Q3 in India
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he domestic market is flooded with compact SUVs. You have the Honda CR-V, the Chevy Captiva, Skoda’s Yeti, the Toyota Fortuner, the Endeavour from Ford and more recently the smash hit BMW X1. Audi has now announced it will be crashing the party with its baby SUV, the new Q3 by mid 2012. Audi has one of the most comprehensive model line-ups of all the German manufacturers and the Q3 is its third SUV, following the massive Q7 and more moderately sized Q5. Audi’s expectations from the Q3 will be high given the excellent response its SUVs
have received in India from the start, to the point where the brand image sometimes feels SUV-skewed in the Indian market. Being based on the Volkwagen Tiguan platform, the Q3 is a small SUV, but this is a slightly larger platform than many of its peers. This should result in the Q3 having more spacious interiors than the X1. In typical Audi tradition, the Q3’s looks are a derivative from its larger siblings - very much son of Q5 and grandson of Q7 - and considering we Indians love the Q7, this car will quite probably be a success as well. However it has a lower, swoopier stance which ends in a sharply raked rear hatch.
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New Verna-cular Hyundai’s all-new Verna petrol and diesel have arrived Words Halley Prabhakar Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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he year was 1998 and Hyundai had just launched its first car, the Santro. After reading OVERDRIVE’s first ever small car comparison test where the Santro was chosen as the winner, I convinced my dad to buy the car and everybody at home immediately fell in love the hatchback. Just like us, many other families went on to own Hyundai’s. The Korean manufacturer followed up with several other launches and soon became the second largest manufacturer in India. One of the other cars launched then was the C-segment car, the Accent. The car went on to contribute strongly to Hyundai’s success in India. Today almost 13 years later I am driving the fourth generation Accent or the Verna as it’s called in India. In every other segment except for the hatchbacks, radical change has been constant for Hyundai, which you will sample when the car arrives at dealerships this May. Hyundai is not known to make attractive cars but the new Verna is a striking exception. The company’s fluidic sculpture design language makes its debut here in India on the Verna marking a comprehensive design shift and to great effect at that. The car carries forward the futuristic design from the Hyundai RB concept shown at the 2010 Moscow International Motor Show and happily, very little has changed in the production car. The hexagonal grille along with upswept headlamps and Lshaped fog lamps give it a very sporty and premium appearance. The coupe-like profile sets it apart from its rivals while the shoulder line is well defined like in the i20 but is more angular and flows from the front bumper to the rear tail lamp. Complementing the shoulder line is a smaller crease that runs across the lower part of the doors, giving the sides of the car a lot of character. Sixteen-inch alloys are standard
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on the top-of-the-line variants and fill the wheel arches substantially. The high tailgate is sharply reminiscent of the older car while the integrated spoiler like top lip is unique to the segment and adds a couple of inches to the height of the tailgate. India spec Vernas get a twin exhaust tip to go with the sporty design and it blends well with the bumper. On closer scrutiny, the sharp styling is backed up by even shut lines, good panel fit and finish levels as well. The new Verna has transformed radically from the previous generation model which in its time may have been stylish without much longevity. The new Verna is a much more stylish and well proportioned car. It is definitely one of the best looking C-segment cars in the country and this will be its strongest USP. The spacious interiors offer generous leg, shoulder and head room both front and rear. For a car that targets the City and the Vento, the Verna certainly feels roomy but by how much begs a comparison test. Driver seat height and steering wheel rake and reach can be adjusted manually to enhance the space proposition. The interior design also follows the fluidic sculpture mantra with the centre console flowing all the way to the centre armrest. The steering wheel is borrowed from the i20 and goes well with the dashboard layout. The beige and dark brown interior scheme has been specially developed for the Indian model while the brushed aluminum inserts in the armrests and centre console as seen in the international model has been replaced by faux wood for India. In my opinion the 1.6-litre variants should have had the brushed aluminum inserts instead of faux wood. Leather upholstery is standard in the top-of-the-line variant with lesser variants getting fabric upholstery. A push button ignition has been offered for the first time in a C-segment car and adds to the sporty feel.
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Light my fire Under Scandinavian finesse, the Volvo S60 hides fiery soul Words Bertrand D’souza Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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hen Sirish drove the S60 D5 variant he was more eager to drive the T6 petrol version of the same car. He predicted it to be a sub 7-second car and well if only we’d paid more attention to him, we’d have been betting millions on the World Cup. Still the IPL is on and it’s keeping Sirish busy because yes, the Volvo S60 T6 sped past 100kmph in 6.94 seconds. That’s a very quick figure to post for a car that looks like it does not have a hint of aggression in it. The general consensus on the S60 has been very positive, Sirish found it to be a very likeable car with all the right ingredients to make you go wow much after you’ve got over staring at the beautifully sculpted exteriors. And I’ve been suitably impressed with the way she rides and handles,
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not to mention I’ve loved spending every minute inside that gorgeous cabin. BMW, Mercedes and even Audi need to study the page where it shows how Volvo designs interiors to feel elegant and inviting with fewer, neater and clearly identifiable elements. But enough has been said on almost every aspect of the S60 and I’m here to tell you just how the petrol engine feels. The T6 petrol isn’t new to Indian consumers. We recently experienced it in the XC60 but in a slightly lower state of tune. For the S60, the T6 which is a turbocharged engine, internally designated the B6304T, displaces 2953cc with an undersquare bore-stroke (82x93.2mm) configuration and a compression ratio of 9.3. The design of this engine permits it to have a high amount of torque available at low rpm so you get 440Nm of max torque at just 2100rpm.
The max torque holds fort all the way till 4200rpm, giving it ample driveability at low speeds. Max power is upped to 304PS and that comes at 5600rpm. So on paper the S60 T6 is clearly the most powerful sedan in its segment by a clear margin. The T6 then is nothing short of a firecracker. Acceleration is strong and lets the S60 build up momentum rapidly. There isn’t turbo lag and power delivery is linear and seamless accompanied by an exhaust note that can only be described as lilting. It isn’t an aggressive note, it’s not going to scare any cows off the road but yes, step on the gas and you do hear the power of those six cylinders hammering away as that exhaust note rises emphatically. What makes it all the more pleasing to drive is that the engine responses are instant, almost sports car like, and this dy-
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Still around!
The Indica, finally, gets a common-rail diesel engine Words Halley Prabhakar Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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ndicas are ubiquitous in India. You see them everywhere and being used by every one from city folks to taxi operators, more by the latter these days. It has been Tata Motors’ bread and butter for over a decade and even now sells alongside the newer generation Indica Vista which uses Fiat’s 1.3-litre Multijet/ Quadrajet diesel. The Indica though still makes do with the older generation 1.4 diesel with which it was launched, of course with continuous improvements including the addition of a turbocharger. And now, to keep pace with the times there’s a further upgrade - out goes indirect injection and in comes common-rail diesel injection, DICOR in Tata Motor speak. Does the new engine make a difference in the Indica eV2?
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ENGINE While the old IDI engine continues in the Indica, sold in markets where BS IV emission norms haven’t yet come into force, other markets get the DICOR powerplant. The 1396cc mill is the same CR4 common-rail diesel that does duty in the Indigo CS and produces 70PS of power at 4000rpm and 140Nm of torque at 1800rpm. This is a welcome boost in power from the 58.5PS that the old IDI engine used to make - an impressive and much-needed 32 per cent increase. It’s not just the power outputs that have gone up, the engine is now more responsive as well as refined compared to the old engine. However it still has some way to go to match the refinement of Tata’s own Quadrajet diesel in the Vista.
Turbo lag though is an issue being more pronounced than in other diesels and it’s only once it is spinning above 2000rpm that the Indica starts to move. This is particularly noticeable during overtaking which requires going down one or two gears. And that’s when you realise that the gearbox can also trace its roots to the birth of the Indica. It no longer is as bad as stirring a pot of wet mud but the throws are still too long and there isn’t too much in the way of slickness to its operation. Auto Drive Assist is a unique feature in the eV2 which works like an automatic hill hold function ensuring the car won’t roll back as you release the clutch on an uphill section. It works rather well and negates the use of the handbrake while making those steep uphill
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Evoque-lution of a species! Range Rover’s Evoque is a small firecracker Words Bertrand D’souza
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ot many concept vehicles have made it to production in nearly the same guise as those that wow showgoers. So when first shown as the Land Rover LRX at the North American International Auto Show, most people assumed that this was purely a figment of some designer’s imagination. What many were not prepared for was that Land Rover committed the LRX project to production changing just a few scraps (and crucially re-badging it to Range Rover) resulting in what we now know as the Evoque. Positioned to take on the BMW X1 as well as the forthcoming Audi Q3, the Evoque is Range Rover’s smallest SUV yet. It is billed as a coupe utility vehicle and not an SUV, quite like BMW’s sports activity vehicle. The definitions for these are thin but essentially what they do point out is an elevated driving character within a vehicle that has the good bits of a coupe rolled into an SUV. But where the dynamics and engine options are quite impressive on paper, what is most impressive is Range Rover’s design and style take on what the next generation of SUV should look and feel like both from the outside and inside. The Evoque as I mentioned is a cross between a coupe and an SUV, and while it immediately provokes debate on just how much space a coupe-like form provides inside the cabin due to that low slung roof, let me assure you that for the average Indian body size and weight, it’s enough. Yet there is a sense of claustrophobia because the glass areas by which I mean the windows and not the optional panoramic sunroof are small. The sense of claustrophobia is not eased much by the sunroof either, whose benefit to spaciousness is only apparent when you leave the overhead curtain open in which case it gets relatively hotter inside the cabin. The cabin is otherwise well appointed to seat four passengers with all the modern amenities that one could wish for in a luxury SUV. What’s new to the Evoque is an 8-inch touch screen with audio/video and satellite navigation controls all placed on a dashboard that looks more mature and handsome than the conventional Range Rover yet integrates several traditional features such MAY 2011 overdrive
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Now in 3D We consider all the angles to pick the best D-segment car. Is it the Superb, Accord or new Passat? Words Sirish Chandran Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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Fight plan
Garware Motors opens Hyosung’s second innings with the GT650R. We take the V-twin sportsbike out for a full road test Words Shubhabrata Marmar Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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whip around the corner paying no heed to the bumpy road or to the fact that 140kmph is maybe a little too quick for the road. And then I realise that the road dips sharply down into a bridge, swings a sharp right immediately afterwards and there’s a long straight stretch coming. I brake as hard as I can up to the crest, and then feel the imposing mass of the GT650R get completely airborne. A moment of silence and then the bike crashes down on the road with an almighty thud. Even as the chassis settles, I have no choice but to bring every ounce of strength to the handlebar, pushing hard to make the Hyosung turn sharply right. I certainly don’t want to be calling the chaps at Garware Motors to say I couldn’t make the corner, right? The motorcycle responds slowly and once
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I am confident of the line and the grip from the Bridgestone Battlax tyres, I nail the throttle again, allowing the Hyosung to surge forth once more back up to high speed. The new Hyosung GT650R can be ridden like this, but it requires enormous amounts of effort, very high concentration and many, many times, it’s sheer rider will power rather than chassis ability that carries your through. But let’s start at the beginning. The Hyosung GT650R’s tubular twin-spar chassis is now pretty old. It was the same platform that spawned the GT250R, the bike we know as the Comet. The Comet felt large for a 250 and the GT650R, unfortunately, also feels a little bit too large for what is substantially a budget 650 in most markets abroad. The V-twin motor was originally carburetted and this one now features fuel injection.
The four-valves-per-cylinder DOHC V-twin is based on the same architecture as Suzuki’s effortless and well liked SV650 V-twin. The 90degree V-twin features water-cooling and is mated to a 6-speed transmission. All told, the package makes an impressive sounding 73.7PS at 9000rpm and 60.9Nm is the peak torque, arriving at a relatively high 7500rpm. But it is a V-twin, which usually means strong torque, and in the 90-degree configuration, good primary balance and consequently less vibration related issues. In the real world, however, this does not compute. In feel, the sound of the engine is loud at idle and it has the thrum we associate with twins alright. But when the revs come up as you ride, the sound turns thrashy more than evocative. Then you also notice that the engine feels rough to use and past 6,000rpm, our test bike coughed up
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OD Rating Price ` 4,60,000 ex-showroom estimated
+ Price + Performance + Wide seat - Weight refinement - Engine - Brakes
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Hyosung st7
Fat kid
Is the Hyosung ST7 the poor man’s Fat Boy? Words Martin Alva Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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urists may argue that this is not a thoroughbred cruiser. The original cruisers versus posers duel has raged for decades and now it has reached Indian shores. The Americans have always laid claim to having invented cruisers, quite deservingly, but the Japanese haven’t been far behind and at times have beaten the Yanks at their own game. However, the motorcycle in the spotlight here is neither American, nor Japanese but the new kid on the block Korean which makes this motorcycle a very interesting proposition, and will help me understand the Korean take on the whole cruiser building business. It’s been raining imports for the past couple of years and the trend is set to continue. Since 2008 a slew of big motorcycles has entered our market beginning with the Japanese and the Italians and then American cult brand Harley-Davidson with its whole product portfolio. In spite of all these imports, the Indian enthusiast has no access to affordable motorcycles. Harley-Davidson is the only manufacturer to have gone the CKD route for its 883SL and 883 Iron models and has priced them very attractively of late. The latest entrant, Korea’s Hyosung has now joined battle along with Garware Motors and fired its first salvo with its GT650R and ST7. Shumi’s taking on the GT650, while my task is to assess the ST7.
Design and Styling Chrome, chrome and more chrome and a bit of colour is what greets me at first sight. The
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ST7 seems to be inspired by the Harley-Davidson Fat Boy models with their heavy, chrome laden front ends, the wide 120mm front tyre, chunky profile and well proportioned rear. It’s Hyosung’s take on the classic cruiser (the Hyosung GV650 being more of a modern cruiser) and looks like it has got it spot-on. The seating position is perfect for Indian of average height but could prove to be a pain in the lower back for six-foot plus users. The footpegs could have been better, like the flat footboards on the Yamaha Enticer. A heel and toe pedal could have also enhanced the comfort levels both on the highway and in the city. The wide handlebar position is a bit uncomfortable in the cut and thrust of city traffic but it’s very comfortable on the highway. The tank mounted instrumentation cluster provides all the necessary information - speed, time and includes two trip meters, digital fuel gauge and warning and indicator lights and has a white backlight that looks upmarket. Hyosung has lavished large amounts of chrome on the engine too which bumps up the ST7’s visual appeal. Twin slash cut exhaust pipes look macho but are so close to the rear right footpeg that a pillion rider is prone to step on them. The ST7 certainly plays the role of a classic cruiser very well in terms of visuals and leaves nothing to complain about on the styling front. However, quality leaves a bit to be desired. The tank on our test bike vibrated excessively which could be due to a loose nut, the horn refused to work at times and the headlight bulb fused on the highway at night, which was a nightmare.
Ride and Handling The ST7 is souncomfortably soft that it wallows big time while cornering at high speeds and the light front end doesn’t inspire confidence either. The ST7’s suspensions, which is a 41mm telescopic suspension up front and oil filled coil spring shock absorbers, bottom out over large bumps at high speeds even when I was riding solo. Sure, soft suspension is quintessentially a cruiser trait but the ST7 could be a bit stiffer without compromising its excellent ride quality. No, spirited riding is not its forte, rather it is a sofa on wheels for low and slow riding. In a straight line it feels very well composed and that is because of its long wheelbase that is 11mm more than the Fat Boy and the overall length is a full 73.6mm longer than the Fat Boy. If you pitch it against its closest Harley-Davidson rival, price wise, the 883 Super Low, the ST7 is a whole 143mm longer in terms of wheelbase and a phenomenal 281mm longer in terms of overall length. The ST7, being a low motorcycle (seat height being a low 690mm) gives a reassuring feeling of a low centre of gravity which adds to its straight line stability and it also means that it is a good motorcycle to buy even if you are a short ride or a first time rider who might think that the ST7 might be too heavy to handle. It weighs in at 229kg dry and that isn’t a lot considering it’s a full-blown cruiser. The braking, handled by the single 300mm disc and the four-piston caliper up front and the 270mm two-piston caliper at the rear, requires significant amount of effort to grind the ST7 to a halt from high speeds. The bite is not that effective and the feel is lacking, espe-
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OD Rating Price ` 5.4 lakh ex-showroom Pune
+ Classic cruiser looks + Price + Lots of Chrome - Quality refinement - Engine - Brand image
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Aston Ma rt i n v8 Va ntag e
Style guru It may be compact but is a supercar nonetheless Words Bertrand D’souza
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he V8 Vantage Roadster is 80 kilos heavier than the coupe and the only reason I thought that was a good place to start was because I knew I’d go overboard with the way she looks. I could have started off saying that the Vantage is the smallest supercar that Aston Martin has ever manufactured. Parked in my friend Rahul Divekar’s driveway in Hunslow a suburb of London, the Vantage is small enough to
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snuggle in comfortably yet its aura is so immense there just isn’t enough space left for another car to share the box next to it. And then there is another reason I started off with its weight. Almost every other critic or reviewer in the world began from almost that point, its weight. As if being 80 kilos heavier made any difference at all to the way it looks. The Vantage Roadster isn’t a woman going through menopause, concerned with the pounds piling up around her waist and an
increasing lack of libido. For all practical purposes those 80 kilos are in a place you’d never lay your eyes upon, unless you were an absolute idiot and went and crashed it so horribly the underbody would get exposed. There, is where most of those 80 kilos have gone and sat. That weight however isn’t fat, it’s hard unrelenting muscle to offset the reduction in stiffness due to the lack of a roof. If this were the Vantage coupe, the aluminum roof
would be an integral component adding stiffness and enhancing stability. So without the roof the only place Aston Martin’s engineers could find the much needed stiffness was in the body. The undertrays have thus gotten stronger. They are made of thicker aluminium and are attached at more points for further stiffness with stronger cross beams placed right behind the dashboard. Even the sills and the cross panels at the front and rear have been strengthened and
the body panels also act as structural members unlike the coupe where these are just aerodynamic bits. So what you get is an incredibly rigid car that feels taut and shudder free. And while I didn’t really get to push the Vantage hard around the sleepy little stud farm peppered hamlet of Godalming, the fearsome exhaust note of the Vantage’s V8 was loud enough to neuter the stallions cantering in their paddocks. And that exhaust note is specifically
tuned to match the dynamism and pace of the Vantage. It’s a unique tone, easy at low revs but crisp and loud above 3000rpm and you won’t find anything like it on any other Aston Martin. This note begins at the Vantage’s V8 engine which is faintly based on the Jaguar AJ-V8 architecture, though in present guise it has received several upgrades focused at improving performance compared to the older Vantage. The engine capacity has inMAY 2011 overdrive
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Good enough to be a four-door supercar? Words Bertrand D’souza Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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f you had to put four seats in a car wouldn’t you make sure four full sized adults would fit in those seats? It’s an obvious fact. Yet it almost seems like the Aston Martin Rapide then is a half hearted effort. The half that has heart is sensational, the other half are those rear seats. But then I don’t think even Aston Martin firmly believes that the Rapide is a proper four-seater. It has stated that the Rapide is first and foremost a sports car, and that it has four doors is an added bonus. It goes on to add in its press release, “With the Rapide, the entire family can enjoy their Aston Martin together
in unison.” That should mean mum, dad and two kids, no? Not mum, dad, uncle Joe and aunt Susan! But let’s put aside the doubts of where you’re going to park your bum for now. The Rapide by itself is an extraordinary car that is so achingly gorgeous, it’s hard to find words to express how violently heads turn and fingers point at it when it drives up to me. At six in the morning at the Worli seaface, only cantankerous old men with myopia fail to stare, not their wives who’re sensible enough to wear their glasses and therefore can and do stare. The laughter club’s jaws drop
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KTM duk e 1 25
Young love KTM introduces their first Indian-made motorcycle in Europe, the 125 Duke Words Ian ‘Iggy’ Grainger
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maller capacity bikes have just started to make a bit of a comeback in Europe. For a while the slowly enforced death of the two-stroke engine meant buyers were left with functional but ever so boring four stroke commuters. Bikes like the Honda CBF125 (that’s the Indian Stunner FI) for instance, perfect for commuting on but not likely to inspire a new generation of rider. For excitement we need something a little bit different from a well proven manufacturer. Four strokes do of course have a place. They are reliable and economical but they will never produce the same kind of excite-
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ment as a similar capacity two-stroke. The peaky power delivery, aroma and narrow power bands are as addictive to me now as they ever have been. Thankfully though manufacturers have started to realise that the way forward is to design bikes that will appeal to riders of all ages, no matter what engine lies beneath the bodywork. Style is everything. Sportsbikes have traditionally been a way to tempt riders on to two wheels and there are plenty of tasty looking, fine handling small capacity bikes in the class, like the Yamaha YZF-R125, Rieju RS-3 125 and the Kawasaki Ninja 250 but times are changing and practicality is starting to feature on a bike
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ET I OS YAT RA
Plain sailing Crossing from North to South on Legs 3 and 4 of the OVERDRIVE Etios Yatra
Words Shubhabrata Marmar, Halley Prabhakar Photography Gaurav S Thombre, Shamik Banerjee
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haracter actors are hardly ever known for their good looks. They are lauded for the skills that make an actor, an actor. The Etios is like that. Its looks aren’t going to turn heads, but in every single other area you can think of, this is a smashingly good car. And now that I have driven the car nearly 450km at a stretch, I can say that with more confidence - no small feat given how impressive the car proved at our track test. And don’t take my word for it, Karun Chandhok and Gaurav Gill agreed with me on this. Maybe that should be, I agreed with them... We left Delhi at 5am and were well into UP by the time the sun came out and joined the party. And it didn’t have it all its way, persistent but intermittent fog dogged our steps until we stopped for breakfast. Thankfully, you don’t need signs to know that you have reached Mathura. You first see the Super Krishna Apartments and then Ultra Radha Housing coming up on the outskirts and you just know you’re in the holy town. We grabbed a mac or two near the refinery and then we were on the road again. The road had been a bit chaotic but during the foggy bits, our slower speeds brought home that fact that driven normally - all testers tend to go a bit quicker using more of the engine than most other drivers - the Etios is a remarkably quiet car with a gutsy but effortless petrol under its hood. So much torque is delivered so easily that you almost never look for a gearshift to overtake. This oasis of peace is very welcome when you’re dealing with traffic coming at you, trying to t-bone you at every possible intersection. Which seems to be the mark of UP.
We planned to cross an immense swathe of UP on the first day, hitting up Allahabad for the night, a nearly 700km day trip. It can be trying to cover such a distance with this perpetual chaos but an effortless car goes a long way and that the Etios does rather well. Like the engine, ride quality is another strength that held up well on the few broken stretches as well as on the rutted sections. The latter would haunt us clear across Bihar forcing the Etios to absorb a remarkable pounding while I pushed it to try and reach everywhere earlier than planned, never easy when a TV camera person in the car perpetually wants you to slow down for a shot, stop for a shot or go back for a shot. We rolled into Allahabad in the dark, having fought the final 30km of two-lane highway - the G-Quad passes the city at a distance. The hour and a half it took us to find our way to Sardar Patel Road (shopping and hotel central) made us appreciate all the four-lane cruising we’d not given a second thought to in the past 12-odd hours. Thank the lord for GPS on the phone. My Mobile Maps app led us with nary a wrong turn and Yatrik Niwas turned out to be a super-hospitable hotel to spend a few hours in bed - obsessive that I am, I’d planned another 5am start. I loaded the bags into the Etios’ boot six times until the camera man was happy and then we crossed some pretty broken, or under construction (same difference) roads back out to the highway. Back on the twolane, a gorgeous highway sunrise waited for us. Having taken the requisite pictures, we were humming along smoothly again. No one noticed this right till the end, but the Etios cabin is spacious and comfortable over long stints to the point where you take
Shumi updates the Etios yatra live blog
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Seven eighths! Shumi’s cryptic headline simply means he’s testing all seven eighth-litre bikes in India Words Shubhabrata Marmar Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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was just reading the 125cc test we did in July 2006 and I have to say that this one feels like a cover version more than a remix. The Gladiator from Yamaha that won the test has now become the sportier looking SS125 or the more ‘normal’ looking YBR that’s in the pics. Big change? Alloy wheels. Similarly the Suzuki Zeus has been in the parlour and now emerges as the Slingshot bearing just the bare-bones tuning needed to meet current norms plus new styling. Shine? Powertrain’s now black, buddy. Stunner? Is the new bike, it wasn’t around then and now holds up the sporty end of the game based firmly on the Shine, but with an extra cog and altered gearing. The TVS Victor is the sole bike that was comprehensively re-
placed. The Flame was awesome to ride first time out but the loss of the second plug has dulled the sheen. The dual spark Flame is back but the motorcycles history isn’t helping its showroom appeal. The Hero Honda Glamour soldiers on as usual bearing nothing more than fresh stickering. And sigh of relief, the current package is a lot more subdued than the original. Finally Bajaj’s Discover 125 DTSi prompts this test with its relaunch. It shares nothing but body parts with the original Disco that claims credit for creating the 125cc space way back when. This one shares the mono-tube frame that started out on the XCD. The engine, now billed DTS-i like the Pulsar actually is based, once more, on the XCD’s DTS-SI engine, a lighter, more fuel efficient unit. Both engine
and frame are just like the ones the 100 and 150cc siblings use. The question is, will the arrival of the Bajaj challenge the likes of the Honda Shine, the largest selling 125 today? Bajaj is hoping that the 125 bridges the gap between the successful 150 and the superhit 100 and also replicates the latter’s runaway sales as the company pushes towards three lakh unit sales per month. This isn’t easy for the simplest of reasons - there are no duds in this test that you can dismiss easily. Buy any of the seven and you’re doing all right. The question is which is the best, though.
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The spy who shoots cars A peek into the world of automotive spy photography Words Halley Prabhakar Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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ou’ve seen them, right? Blacked-out, stickered-up cars that look rough and tatty but essentially formless, peering back at you from grainy pics in a magazine or on a website, usually bearing either a large exclusive tag or an equally large copyright. No manufacturer wants its forthcoming products exposed before they’re ready to meet the public. The automotive spy photographer takes it upon himself to capture these very cars and motorcycles on the street during the testing phase. The cladding, the stickering and lately fake bodywork are all there to camouflage the vehicle and once again, it is up to the photographer to find and work around the deception. To learn more, we spent a day with Rohit Chandrasekharan, who has earlier sent us a whole slew of spy pics and then recently joined the editorial team. What he told us straight away is that it isn’t easy and that it is a hard life. Rohit is based out of Pune which is blessed with a whole lot of car manufacturers. Having developed an interest early, he started to notice these test cars on the roads about town and then started photographing them. Photoshopping the cladding or stickers off to reveal what lay beneath was the logical next step. When OVERDRIVE published an exclusive picture sent by Rohit, it cemented his interest in the whole business and confirmed his knack for finding and snapping vehicles in testing. His passion for automotive design only helped. Gaurav and I met Rohit outside the Tata Motors plant at 6am. Rohit is on the trail of a Tata Safari prototype that’s been doing the rounds. Catching the prototypes isn’t easy, of course, but some idea of normal test schedules helps, as does an idea of where these prototypes usually go for testing. Over the years, Rohit has made a list of locations the prototypes frequent. But he warns that the window of opportunity is mere seconds and you must be ready to snap the pic in split seconds, ideally catching front, side and rear shots to be able to piece together an artist’s impression of the
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Prototypes mostly go out of the factory early in the morning for testing. We were out early as well and headed straight to the factory area to catch the vehicle
The easiest places to get a perfect still of a prototype is at traffic signals or at fuel stations situated close to the company of the vehicle. These pictures help piece together an artist’s impression of the car
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Truck or treat The Mahindra Navistar symbolises the Indian CV’s coming of age Words Martin Alva Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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he growth of the commercial vehicle industry is staggering enough to jolt you out of your socks. In the heavy duty truck segment alone 16-tonne plus) which constitutes a very small number of the overall market, sales have shown a strong 40 per cent growth. Meanwhile the scope to grow even larger is driving manufacturers to develop and manufacture more contemporary equipment. But why contemporary when an age old formula has worked for decades? Well, in 2001 Volvo entered the market and showed the way forward by introducing its range of commercial vehicles. What Volvo clearly indicated was that better equipment guaranteed higher profits for everyone. Each of the tractor-trailers it offered could do the job of two equivalent competitive vehicles thereby consuming lesser fuel, was more reliable
with lesser downtime and best of all offered stress free environments to drivers thanks to state-of-the-art cabins with proper sleeping areas, power steering, power windows, ABS, air conditioning, comfortable seats and entertainment systems. In fact, and I’d like to delve a bit deeper here, truck drivers have a miserable time in their cabins. If you had to sit on a seat which had nylon cords wound around it for support and bare basic forms of cushioning, (most often tattered rags stitched together) and had to drive one of those overloaded monstrosities without power steering for hours on end and yet never made your target destinations in time because of some breakdown or the other, I bet even you’d be swigging the hard stuff down neat to relieve the physical ache at any and all hours. Eventually things would get messy and unsafe. So better interior comfort along with all
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Track tornado Suzuki strikes back with its 2011 GSX-R600 Words Harriet Ridley
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very few years a manufacturer brings out a new model that sets new class standards. In the Supersport category, Honda ruled the roost until 2006 with its CBR600RR. Then Yamaha introduced the new YZF-R6 packed with new technology, including fly-by-wire throttle and slipper clutch. It was an instant success on the race tracks and in the sales charts. Well, it’s happened all over again, this time with Suzuki’s 2011 GSX-R600. The baby GSX-R has been celebrated as the hooligan
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of the supersport class since its 1997 launch. It owes its reputation to a lightweight chassis propelled by a screaming rev-monster of an engine. The GSX-R600 has been regularly overhauled over the years to keep up with rapidly developing technology. Still, it had been suffering of late, lagging behind the fierce competition in a class increasingly dominated by race technology. The problem was simple; the GSX-R600 had become too soft. The front forks bottomed out as soon as you touched the brake lever, it wallowed through corners and the
engine felt wheezy at low revs even for a production supersport. The mighty GSX-R was even beginning to feel like – shock, horror – an all-rounder with its relatively spacious chassis, upright riding position and bungy hooks under the seat, instead of the aggressive and sharp racetrack refugee it was born to be. If you’re hankering after a comfortable road bike, then step away from the supersport 600 category. But Suzuki has launched an offensive with its latest 2011 GSX-R600. And the new GSX-R may well be on the verge of blowing the com-
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Stunt punk-eys The world’s best freestyle motorcycle rider, Chris Pfeiffer teaches the cream of Indian stunters how it’s done Words Shubhabrata Marmar Photography Gaurav S Thombre
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