[chiranjitp]

Let me try to give my perspective on this subject. I have been living with discontinued cars for the last 5 years & counting. I bought a 2001 Zen VXi in 2016, sold her in 2018, did around 25k km in that car. Next came a 2006 Swift ZXi in 2018, that car is still with me & have done around 22k km.

I haven't yet faced any issue regarding parts, whatever parts I needed was easily available. Even reliability has been very good, haven't yet had a breakdown (touchwood). What helped was that both these cars were from Maruti & were high sellers of their time.

Here's my thread on these 2 cars: https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/test-...wned-cars.html (My experience with cheap pre-owned cars)

01 Zen VXi & 06 Swift ZXi:

[OctYFAN]

Owning a discontinued model can be a pain. The main issue I've had with my X-Trail is parts support. There's almost none from Nissan and I have to buy stuff like belts gaskets and plastic hoses etc from Delhi. Heck even air filters and fuel filters have to be brought from there.

It is relative though. For example, a good seller like for example my Octavia, I can still get spares in my city (they are expensive though).

I guess it all comes down to how successful the car was when it was in production. At the end of the day, what matters is happiness and I am happy with my odd-ball X-Trail.

Cheers
OctYFAN

[swiftnfurious]

Yes & No. Off-late, we have very competent garages in most cities, so maintenance is not a major issue for many models. Parts can be imported for global models, so that's taken care too.

However, the time & effort one needs to spend sometimes can go really high and can be a frustrating affair.

I had the Palio 1.6 GTX for about 5 years. It was completely restored by the previous passionate owner. However, the replacements kept on cropping. And then the confidence on the vehicle starts going down. I was able to find good mechanics in Chennai, Mumbai and Kottayam (my home town). But the peace of mind you have with a new vehicle is different, if it's not too old - you know the complete history of the vehicle, out & out.

I currently own the B299 Global Fiesta and have been enjoying the run. Relatively newer model (5 years Vs 11 years on the Palio, first owner Vs 7th owner for Palio etc). The best part is, Ford still supports and services the Fiesta, parts are relatively easily procured in Chennai etc.

PS : If at all anyone picks up a discontinued model, I'd strongly suggest to pick up only solid, reliable models. That way, you'll spend lesser on maintenance and garage visits.

[amit_purohit20]

Owning a discontinued model and the related pain of maintaining the car depends upon various things viz:-

1) How many numbers of that particular car has sold in India? If it was sold in good numbers probability of getting spare parts is high.
2) Which brand the car belongs, example Duster was sold in quite decent numbers but getting the spare parts from free market is a pain especially if you decide to get the car serviced through FNG. Even if you service the car in authorized show room you might still struggle for parts. Some brands are better at taking care of this problem especially Japanese and Korean brands, the reason might be they sell in high numbers and their approach towards customer satisfaction or probably they better understand their responsibility towards their customers and how it affects their brand image in long run.
3) Some brands suck at spare parts logistics as a part of the company policy and they do not focus much on easy and cheap availability of spare parts and service. Maruti, Tata, Hyundai are better than other brands, I feel so.
4) Service network also decides how easily or how fast the part would be available to the customer. Generally the probability of getting spare parts from a company with a huge sales and service network is more.

[chinmaypillay]

Interesting topic and perspectives. I would say I would go for a discontinued car depending on various parameters.

- Company
If its a Maruti I would go for it eyes closed, nothing to see.
But if you ask for brands like Opel, etc I would hesitate and check if I have so much time to devote. In brands like Hyundai, I have noticed the cost of ownership rises greatly as years go. Its like they want you to dispose and upgrade to their new cars. Except for older gems like Santro Xing, I wouldn't touch Hyundai for this very reason.

- Sharing of platform
This is actually an advantage since most of the cars share common platform and engines, spare availability will be good for mechanicals and other important parts.

- Sales numbers
If the car has sold well during its run, then spares will not be an issue mostly.

- International models:
For cars like Laura, I would go ahead with it since spares can be procured abroad and mostly its a straight fit. Corolla and other similar cars I wouldn't mind.

- Reliability
The car is reliable and only requires proper servicing time to time, I am all for it. For these, I can afford to wait for some time on spares. Ford Figo, Fiesta would easily come on this.

Other criteria?
Over the counter (OTC) availability would also be an important since I would definitely service the car in a friendly FNG. If I am looking for older cars, I would try to avoid the ones which has too many electronics, since it would be a pain.
Older Mahindra with lot of tech and gizmos? No way.
Tata? Tata bye bye.
Honda/Toyota with electronics? I would be willing to take the jump.
Maruti? They anyways have spartan features, so not much issues to complain of. Will go for it surely

Now, the main issue with respect to older cars is when you want to procure not so frequent spares. Like door trims, Ac Vents, etc the ones which are not frequently bought unlike the mechanicals.

Other advantage which many would not like is if the car was popular with the taxi crowd. I have a xylo and it does irritate that some assume its a taxi automatically. But on the ownership side, I am assured since there are so many taxis around, spares will be present for a long time. Taxi owners are known to run their cars to the ground and keep it for a long time, so this is kind of a relief. Verito/Logan and Etios would also be a good bet in these cases.

[Chhanda Das]

Originally Posted by GTO

Couple of thoughts from my end, as I end up in this situation frequently due to how long I keep my cars.

- As long as the model was popular in India or worldwide, you will never have a problem with its maintenance. Popularity means there is enough labour + parts support in the after-market. But God help you if you end up with a flopped car.

- 90% of cars sold today will offer you acceptable to good levels of reliability up to 200,000 km easily if maintained well.

- You need a very competent independent garage. I own a niche 2-door Jeep model that is 24 years old and was discontinued 2 decades ago. But owning it is a breeze because of two exceptional indies I know.

- Stick to a model with promise, abandon the one that doesn't have a future. Don't throw good money after bad - know when to cut your losses. As an example, you will still see 2007 Toyota Camrys running well on our roads. But the 1st-gen Skoda Superb sold in India? RIP.

My thoughts exactly. I used to own a 1986 petrol Mark 4 Ambassador in North East India but it was getting increasingly difficult to get spares for it there and hence I sold it in 2005. If I had been in Kolkata as I do now, maybe I would not have had to sell it since it is still fairly common even today to see Ambassadors on the road here. I still miss that car

[drift87]

IMO, two things define the ease of owning a discontinued car

• How long the car has been made available in the local geography

• Whether it shares its underpinnings with cars made available globally

In India, I can think of the VAG group cars that falls into these categories. A competent FNG in consonance with reasonable technical knowledge of cars you own would definitely help in making this a blissful experience.

[Bibendum90949]

Originally Posted by Rahul Bhalgat

Even after buying, our specific model may be discontinued is a few years. But that doesn't usually affect the spares, service and reliability.

This is quite true. I own an Omni and a Gypsy too. Both are discontinued models technically, but servicing them or parts availability will never be a problem, being a Maruti. Same can't be said about other brands.

Besides, some of the cars mentioned in the opening post can be bought if it isn't your primary car in the garage. One should be ready to wait out for parts for such cars. Sourcing parts from across the world isn't that difficult in these days and times. As I write this, my friend's Mini cooper S has been sitting in a garage since a month waiting for parts to arrive. It's a sacrifice one has to make to own a legendary car like a Pajero or an old Honda city.

[anjan_c2007]

I agree with your genuine concern, unease and anxiety with the newer generation of discontinued cars. In fact, that appears to be the undisputed reason for the almost total disappearance of most of the newer cars launched in the liberalisation era, that were ultimately discontinued. Hardly any Opel Astra, Corsa/SAIL, Daewoo Cielo, Matiz, Ford Escort, Rover Montego, PAL Peugeot 309/309 GLD and even the Fiat Uno/ Palio and so on are sighted. The whole GM portfolio of present survivors will also soon disappear within the next decade. Today’s cars are complexly manufactured and require precise spares from the manufacturer/ OE supplier and skill by the mechanics to maintain. The spares disappear as soon as the car numbers dwindle and not everybody takes up the initiative to import these.

In the older times, we could see survivors for decades together. For instance CKD assembly the Dodge Kingsway was discontinued in 1957 by Premier Automobiles Ltd, but the car remained on the roads till the early 1980’s in fine fettle, in many cases as a VIP car. I have seen Mr Vasantrao Naik, then Chief Minister of Maharashtra, using a Dodge Kingsway in the mid 1970’s, as his official car. That’s because it was repairable and spares were still accessible from the extra stock dealers had. And the lurking fear that there is no suitable replacement, lured owners to the old stately car. Imports of newer cars were tough or even impossible to come by and the most worthy replacement was an Ambassador. Similar is the case of many, many older cars imported till 1956-57, during the era when free imports were allowed by the government. Numerous examples survived doing duties till the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, despite the respective companies having closed shop totally in India. The motley mix of car makes used by the Bombay taxi trade till the late 1970’s is a good example. There was no Amazon, Boodmo or EBay then.

Our Ambassador is a great survivor through the past six plus decades and Mark Tully’s (ex- BBC correspondent in India, now settled in India) musings on the Ambassador are humorous. Though the older breed of mechanics who are able to repair this iconic car is dwindling swiftly in the present generation, these still survive and the car lugs on. Most of the present day mechanics are better conversant with the newer generation cars.

Mr Mark Tully from June 2014 in Open Magazine :-

That brings me to another advantage the Ambassador has—her simplicity. Mechanics were ubiquitous because repairing an Ambassador didn’t require elaborate training or expensive equipment. I am told that you need to be computer- savvy to repair a modern car. But then I am also told that unlike the Ambassador they don’t break down.

Driving myself at night in Haryana, a hazardous venture at the best of times, I have experienced the hardiness of the Ambassador and the ingenuity of the mechanics who kept them on the road. The Ambassador’s lights were never her strong point. In their low candle-power beam, I failed to see a tractor with no lights ahead of me and rammed into it with an almighty clang. I got out of the car and was amazed that in spite of a massive dent in the front of the car, the engine was still running. I opened the bonnet and found the fan had crushed the radiator. Undaunted, the gallant vehicle got me to the nearest mechanic. He cleaved the radiator and fan apart with a crowbar, apologised for not having the equipment to weld the radiator, and assured me that the haldi—turmeric— he had laced the water with would gum up enough leaks to get me to the nearest town. It did. In that town, the welder repaired what I thought was my beyond-repair radiator. When I got home, all that was left was deciding when to call in another professional who’d done very well off my Ambassadors, the denter and painter.

To read Mark Tully's full article, please use this link:-

https://openthemagazine.com/essays/o...our-first-car/

The newer cars discontinued due to the MNC manufacturer closing shop in India during recent decades need to be avoided, unless the owner is patient enough to access a good mechanic/ workshop, order spares from abroad, pay for it as required and wait for arrival of the package. And if preferred as a buy despite these odds, their usage needs to be restricted for city roads only. These may not be preferred for long drives.

[govindasrani]

I'm often in this situation since we drive the wheels off our cars and presently have 2 out of 4 cars that fall within this bucket, with the 3rd soon to go in as well. The most important thing is to have a good independent garage who can fix your car. Normal spares like filters/ brake pads, etc are available for most models and some of the more complex stuff can be sourced from overseas/ Delhi if you know the right people. Ultimately it comes down to how well that model has sold and how easily are parts are available. Here's what I deal with.

1) Cedia - filters are easily available but other spares are getting tough - car is presently used only as a city run-about. No highway runs.

2) Santro Xing - In its 17th year will probably last 10 more with great spares availability and multitude of mechanics who can service it.

3) XUV5OO - To be discontinued soon - but I expect Mahindra to continue providing good support for at least a decade more given how well this car has done in the last 10 years.

All in all - driving discontinued cars has not been too much of a problem.

[Neversaygbye]

As someone who has owned and maintained three discontinued cars over the last 20 years or so (including my current cars), it does not give me any pleasure to say that in most cases (2 out of 3) maintaining one is a pain after it is discontinued.

My Matiz was discontinued because Daewoo went bust and GM in their infinite wisdom did not buy the India entity. Also, the brilliant folks that they were, instead of relaunching it under the same name (which had huge postive sentiment and brand recall associated with it), they chose to rename the car as the Spark after making cosmetic changes and putting in a new less frugal engine under the hood, which meant that most parts could not be cross shopped between the two cars. I had a harrowing time between 2006 and 2011 in terms of maintaining the Matiz. Prior to that parts were easily available although they were becoming increasingly costly, but in the last 5 years of ownership I had to make do with cannibalized parts or local replacements which were not as reliable. End result - frequent breakdowns. The car spent more time at the service centre than on the road in the last two years of ownership. The only reason I still held on to it was because I simply LOVED the car and also my usage was limited, so I could live with the inconvenience to some extent.

Coming to my next car the Beat, who would have thought that Chevy would go the Daewoo way in India considering that 10 years back the Beat was a popular model and even featured in Transformers movies? Well, I never guessed. The car is still with us but as it is a dual car with LPG kit, there are problems. For one, I cannot run the car on LPG any more as the kit needs to be overhauled and no one in any FNG I have consulted in Calcutta knows how to do it. The two remaining ASCs in the city are into daylight robbery in the name of service and i find it hard to justify spending a ton of money on a car that is used very sparingly as the beater car. As I speak, the car has been at the FNG for a week now and they are still unable to diagnose why there is knocking in lower gears while driving. I suppose I will have to go back to the ASCs after all, and I am dreading the bill that I will get to see. So no luck with this car either.

The exception to this rule is my current primary ride, the Vista, which despite being a discontinued model and being more than 8 years old, is a breeze to run and maintain. Parts and service are easily available with all the ASCs and are reasonably priced (I spent about 1800 bucks to get the windshield replaced at my ASC - after claiming insurance). Also, almost everything is available on Boodmo or in the car component shops across the city. Considering the low cost of regular maintenance (approx 6k a year) I get it serviced at the ASC and I have found all 3 major ASCs - T C Motors, Dulichand and K B Motors equally good and responsive. The service manager in Dulichand is an old hand from the days when they were a Chevy service centre, so we go back a long way and that helps, plus my Service Advisor in T C Motors is also incredibly knowledgeable and helpful, and helps me maintain the car in top condition. I hope this lasts for the next few years since I intend to keep this car as long as I can, especially as there is every possibility that our next car will be an EV.

So to summarize, I have been unlucky with the ownership and maintenance of two of the three discontinued cars I have or had, but in both the cases the trouble started when the company wound down its operations in India. I just hope that the same fate does not befall Tata, since I have now got a bad reputation that whatever car I buy gets discontinued within a few years or the manufacturer winds up. From that perspective, I suppose it makes sense to buy popular models within the first two years of launch, from a popular company (top 5 in India) esspecially if the plan is to keep the car for a long time.

[SamitMukherjee]

Owning a discontinued car- No problem as long as the car is in good shape or the manufacturer exists.

All the cars we own are discontinued now.

Our first car Daewoo Matiz (2000 make)- Love this car
As long as it is mechanically fit, no issues. For body work and regular maintenance, we have a trusted FNG in Guwahati who takes care. For spare parts, we are sourcing from Chennai.

Other two cars Ritz and Santro Xing are also discontinued, but being popular models spare parts are easily available. Only con is, with time price of spare parts have gone up.

[arpirocks]

I have a mixed perspective on this based on my experience:

• Driving an old car with a discontinued model - (maybe) OK
• Driving an old car with a discontinued brand - Not Good

We had owned Chevrolet Beat since 2012 and around 2017 GM decided to exit the Indian market. They did promise continued support for the existing cars but my experience has not been so good for many reasons.

Service & Repairs

• Many times parts were not readily available in the service centers and the lead time to procure was too high. Some of the parts were not manufactured in India and as per one of the RM - it is always not economical to get a few parts imported if the demand is very low.
• There was always lean staffing on their authorized service centers
• My confidence level was not always 100% while driving the car - I was not sure if any major repair would be possible in the long term OR how much time it might take

Resale value

• When we decided to sell our car (very well maintained), we struggled to find buyers.
• The general mentality of folks was that they didn't want to invest in a car whose brand is no longer in the market.
• I got a couple of offers from folks who wanted the car just to learn driving and then sell it off. Again, the price offered was peanuts!
• Even the brands like Cars24/Olx were not willing to pay more than 50k
• My friend managed to sell his 8-year-old Maturi A-Star for 1.10L

We have quite a few cars in the family that are discontinued (Santro First Gen, Honda City 1st gen, etc.) and in general, there are no such issues with these cars in general use. There is general degradation in the quality, performance, etc. but nothing which would raise questions on the general driveability and support of the cars.

This is the last pic of my car before I gave it away...

[silverado]

Tata Nano was discontinued not long back, but getting some parts takes time.
Door locking mechanism and Front brake kit both took 5 days to procure, all the while car was idle in workshop.

Service Labour has gone up by huge margin, which i guess is also the case with all the cars.

[fulcrum29]

I too own and drive a 2003 model Toyota Corolla. Not only does it have bullet proof reliability, the Toyota service centers have no shortage of parts and they are available at reasonable rates too. Even unconventional parts like the full rear bumper were replaced and painted without an issue or much delay. Don't know about other companies but Toyota is quite good in this regard, even though this model was bought by me 18 years ago, it was facelifted 16 years ago and discontinued 14 years ago