Oil exploration
The government is scared of raising diesel prices to full where they would achieve parity with petrol prices at the very least. And on that simple to grasp concept rests the sales success of diesel cars in India.
January 05, 2011 / 17:05 IST
The government is scared of raising diesel prices to full where they would achieve parity with petrol prices at the very least. And on that simple to grasp concept rests the sales success of diesel cars in India. Weve tried for years to convince you, dear reader, that only the big mileage drivers among you will save any money buying diesels. It hasnt stopped you so far and I will admit that in daily use, you do feel like the diesel is actually cheaper to run. Could that be the reason why the Ventos diesel engine is already marked as the volume leader in our minds?
The car enters a rather strange segment - all the cars in it have been around for a while and only the Hyundai Verna Transform is anywhere close to fresh thanks to its recent face-lift and suffixing. Can the stretched and booted Polo, the Vento beat these cars, then?
Styling and designLet us start from the bottom. The Verna maybe new, but its also the least good to look at. The busy front end looks like a mildly aggressive mish-mash and the rest of the car looks a little bland. Fit and build levels are good but the materials on the interior look very cheap. As a wag quipped, The fake wood trim looks more fake than wood. It isnt a long term problem, though - just look at the sassy new Verna replacement in Motoring News.The Fiesta looked nice when it was new. Now it looks familiar. It still has a nicely sporty interior but having said that, I think the car needs a refresh and pronto.The Linea is a debate. Sirish thinks it looks great while I say it has some of the classic design we associate with Italy but it doesnt look as good as the Punto, for instance. Inside, the impact of the neat interior scheme is diminished by cheap feeling silver plastic and some extremely awkward feature placements - just try plugging a USB stick while in the drivers seat.The Volkswagen then is a breath of fresh air in many ways. The exterior wears the sleek look of the new Volkswagen family and the stretching of the Polo platform and the booting of the car has been executed neatly. Theres an elegance of proportion and a sleekness of line that none of the other cars here possess. It isnt flashy but it stands out clearly. I like that. Inside, similarly, theres a lot of Polo playing going on, but like all German cars, the materials feel good to the touch and the attention to detail is unequalled. As you will see, had Volkswagen widened up the car a bit, the Vento would have been an evenmote emphatic winner. But as is, its still an easy pick among these four cars for looks, cabin layout and finish.
__PAGEBREAK__Engines and performance Just like in the other areas in this comparison, theres two sets of cars here. Slow ones and fast ones. In pure engine performance, the Hyundai is known to have a bonkers engine. Its a bit slow when you are off-boost but then the turbo spools up and plants a well-aimed boot into your backside. This can make driving a matter of careful gearshifting but the Verna is huge fun. It is also the quickest car here to 60 and 100kmph - 10.6 seconds a very respectable time - and it edges out the Vento by a 1.1 seconds and the Linea and the Fiesta by a whopping five and seven seconds to 100kmph.But dont write the Vento off. The 105PS 1.6-litre turbo-common-rail-diesel packs 250Nm between 1500 and 2500rpm and uses that to great advantage. Theres far, far less turbo lag than in the Hyundai and the Vento proves to be an eager, no-shifts-needed kind of car. Theres so much torque on offer than you often find yourself trying to shift to sixth gear. The Hyundai is quicker, but the Volkswagen is actually far easier to drive in the city and at highway speeds.The Fiesta diesel not only loses 200cc to the Vento engine, but for instance, its an older engine which makes just 68PS and 150Nm of torque. So while its frugal and all that, performance isnt its forte. Its also not the most refined of engines here, with in-cabin noise intrusion audible at higher revs when youre trying to push along.The Linea diesel uses the 90PS version of the 1.3-litre Multijet engine Fiat is so famous for. However, despite respectable numbers from a significantly smaller engine - 209Nm of the torque - the gearing isnt fully set up for Indian conditions and driving fast in the Linea isnt as exciting as the spec sheet suggests it would be.All the cars, though return roughly the same economy, about 15kmpl overall, with the Linea leading at 15.9kmpl and the Vento at the back with 14.8kmpl.
Ride, handling and braking Perhaps the most focused car here is the Hyundai. It wants so clearly to be a great city car. But dont dismiss it - role focus has benefits. The most obvious of these is the soft ride quality. The Verna will absorb the worst of urban roads very neatly. There isnt much feel from the light steering so cornering hard is not much fun but swiftly making a lane change in clogged traffic or parking maneuvers takes no effort at all.__PAGEBREAK__Its a dead heat between the Linea and the Fiesta. The Ford is billed as a drivers car with the petrol engine. The diesel is more famous for being easy with the stinky stuff. That said, the residual goodness of the chassis is hard to miss. Ride quality is also pretty good. The Lineas stand-out feature, as we have said before is the great dynamic balance. Ride over bad roads is strong while in corners the car feels good, if slightly let down by the powertrain.Enter the Vento. The first time I drove it, I was expecting a good, fast car. But it surprised me despite. Not only is the heavy, deliberate and robust ride quality very much in evidence, I was surprised at how good the handling is as well. Its easy to conclude that the Vento will beat the pants off all the other cars on a mountain road no matter how bad the surface is. What the handling and ride wont do, the most eager engine in this lot easily will.
Features and spaceIn terms of interior space, the Vento would have benefited from a slight widening of the cabin. As weve said before the Polo cabin is cramped for three at the rear and the Vento is no different. The cabin is longer, though, and that does bring more knee room to the car. You do sense that theres a lack of elbow and shoulder space in the Volkswagen thanks to the width. None of the cars fare too badly on space though with the Fiesta, Linea and the Verna all offering good interior space - five in all of these cars is a bit of squeeze, just more so in the Vento. The Ventos other irritant is the side of the centre console that is way too close to the clutch pedal and restricts space when you try to find a comfortable place for the left leg.On the features front, the cars seem evenly matched at first glance. There are some strange omissions though. The Verna and the Vento, for instance, do not offer an aux port on any model. What Im saying is that despite minor differences, there isnt enough difference in the feature loading of the various trim specs for it to be a decision making factor. It is sad that the airbags and ABS are not more central to the trim features, though. I would have liked it if Volkswagen had taken the next step and made both crucial safety technologies standard on the Vento.
__PAGEBREAK__VerdictThe Ford Fiesta and the Fiat Linea are the cheaper cars here. They have smaller engines and generally cost roughly ` 1 lakh less than the equivalent models on the Verna or the Vento. However, in this case, you get what you pay for. There are clear areas where the Verna and the Vento do so much better - and performance is only the headline section of that story. To the extent that Id be happy to suggest you spend the extra ` 1 lakh and get one of the two.Of the Verna and the Vento, the prices and the specs are nearly evenly matched, but a close look at the specs suggests that the Verna is roughly ` 25,000 cheaper than the Vento - both manufacturers offer two models each, with the Hyundai adding a third option of an automatic gearbox at ` 9.66 lakh, roughly ` 70,000 more than its equi-trim manual transmission sibling, the Verna SX.What it comes down to, then, is should you be spending the extra ` 25,000 on the Vento or not. Which is an easy question to answer. The Vento is clearly the most superior car here on practically every front save for interior room when five people are in the car, a rear seat back thats a bit too upright, an elbow rest for the driver (on the Highline) which intrudes when you flip the thing up and the missing aux port. It sounds like cribbing but my point is that these are the five obvious issues with the car, and unless you regularly travel five up, you can see that theyre minor niggles.The rest of the car almost redefines the segment. It feels expensive, robust, well put together and the design has a nicely understated elegance to it as well. Further, the powertrain is superb, offering refinement, performance as well great fuel economy. Its a quiet, effortless diesel no matter which part of the cabin you reside in. And finally, the dynamics package is already very well done, a little more feel from the steering would turn the Ventro into a proper
enthusiast-mobile. Which, when you look at the big entry-level diesel sedan picture is a small revolution.
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