[AutoIndian]

Forgot to ask you one question in my earlier post. You have done extensive night driving in your XUV and that too on the stdrive ats set-up of your XUV. Do the factory fitted lamps give sufficient illumination at night on unknown roads, which enables you to drivecat decent speeds (80-100 kmph) even in pitch darkness?

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

I too wish these tools remain as sparkling as ever and you won't ever have to use them on your XUV.

Thanks, AutoIndian.

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

Do the factory fitted lamps give sufficient illumination at night on unknown roads, which enables you to drivecat decent speeds (80-100 kmph) even in pitch darkness?

Yes. The stock projector low beams are adequate for intra city driving. For highway driving, I switch on the highbeams - which get lit along with the projector low beams - and fog lamps every now and then depending upon the traffic, which ensure clear visibility even on the pitch dark roads. The stock combination of highbeams+projector low beams+fog lamps elicit immediate response from the dazzling big brothers comprising all bus drivers and some truckers - most of the interstate national permit truckers are gentlemen, btw - who come in the opposite direction, to dip their powerful combination lamps. So, I am fully satisfied with the stock, factory-fitted headlamps and fog lamps.

Purple Cheetah brought us safely and comfortably to our Chennai Royapettah home at 4:30 am today. We had left Bangalore Basaveswara Nagar home at 10:45 pm last night amidst heavy rain. We had its company upto Arcot bypass. Purple Cheetah's wipers were working overtime non-stop till there. Thanks to the continuous showers of varying intensity, I maintained a speed of 80 kmph in cruise control mode. Thanks to 80 kmph speed, Purple Cheetah recorded its best ever fuel efficiency of 18 kmpl.

[falconion]

Originally Posted by J.Ravi

Purple Cheetah brought us safely and comfortably to our Chennai Royapettah home at 4:30 am today. We had left Bangalore Basaveswara Nagar home at 10:45 pm last night amidst heavy rain. We had its company upto Arcot bypass. Purple Cheetah's wipers were working overtime non-stop till there. Thanks to the continuous showers of varying intensity, I maintained a speed of 80 kmph in cruise control mode. Thanks to 80 kmph speed, Purple Cheetah recorded its best ever fuel efficiency of 18 kmpl.

Attachment 1303307

18 kmpl is amazing for this beast on a Highway. And this fuel efficiency is achieved while the AC is turned on.

Originally Posted by falconion

18 kmpl is amazing for this beast on a Highway.

Thanks, falconion. Purple Cheetah's previous record was 17.9 kmpl. Now, it beats its own record!

And this fuel efficiency is achieved while the AC is turned on.

Yes. ACC was set at 24 deg C; two people on board; lot of luggage; ESP was always on; the non-stop drive was from home to home without any break.

[S_U_N]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

Forgot to ask you one question in my earlier post. You have done extensive night driving in your XUV and that too on the stdrive ats set-up of your XUV. Do the factory fitted lamps give sufficient illumination at night on unknown roads, which enables you to drivecat decent speeds (80-100 kmph) even in pitch darkness?

While J.Ravi has much more experience with the XUV, I am just back from a 1000 KM drive of which I drove around 200 KM and some of that was after sunset.
The output from the XUV's projectors is identical to the output from the after-market (retrofit) projectors with 35W bulbs.

I was told that XUV has either "Made in China" - which are problematic or "Made in Thailand" -which are better, headlamps.

The low beam (projectors) were disappointing. Tata Nano's stock low beam headlamp will beat this any day.
The high beam is good - but oncoming glare will still come.

[AutoIndian]

Originally Posted by S_U_N

The output from the XUV's projectors is identical to the output from the after-market (retrofit) projectors with 35W bulbs.

I was told that XUV has either "Made in China" - which are problematic or "Made in Thailand" -which are better, headlamps.

The low beam (projectors) were disappointing. Tata Nano's stock low beam headlamp will beat this any day.
The high beam is good - but oncoming glare will still come.

Thank you for those inputs. Do you think fitting the HIDs in projectors of XUV will give sufficient illumination from low beam? One of our fellow BHPIan, Gurudutt has tried HIDs on his XUV and seems to be very satisfied with the throw of low beam.

[S_U_N]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

Thank you for those inputs. Do you think fitting the HIDs in projectors of XUV will give sufficient illumination from low beam? One of our fellow BHPIan, Gurudutt has tried HIDs on his XUV and seems to be very satisfied with the throw of low beam.

So, the XUV does not use HID's for the projectors?

[nitinralli]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

Thank you for those inputs. Do you think fitting the HIDs in projectors of XUV will give sufficient illumination from low beam? One of our fellow BHPIan, Gurudutt has tried HIDs on his XUV and seems to be very satisfied with the throw of low beam.

Just my 2 cents here.

I have driven my XUV from past 3 years with Odo at 51K. I too feel that the low beam is inadequate however, if you think of it, you generally use low beam in city where you have street lights,other cars/bike lights etc making it convenient to drive. And when you go out on highways, where unfortunately most of the Indian highways are not lit properly, you tend to use High beams, where XUV high beams are real good. So i dont think personally that spending around 10-12K just on low beam HID's would make that much of a difference. Not to forget that XUV headlight are not easy to access and are vulnerable to bulbs going kaput now and then.

So its your choice

Originally Posted by S_U_N

So, the XUV does not use HID's for the projectors?

No. It just have projector low beams with standard halogen bulbs in it.

[rahul_kej]

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

Do the factory fitted lamps give sufficient illumination at night on unknown roads, which enables you to drivecat decent speeds (80-100 kmph) even in pitch darkness?

One can opt for osram night breaker plus or philips xtreme vision h7 55w bulbs for low beam projectors. It's a straight plug and play and doesn't require any relay. It should improve the lighting surely.

[adu]

Originally Posted by J.Ravi

The central bezel compartment's lid cannot be closed with USB memory stick inserted into the USB port as it protrudes out preventing the closure. Perhaps, the XUV 500 design team intended this as a feature. I have to buy a cable-connector so that I can close the lid.

Attachment 1208576

Ravi, I faced the same issue with the smallest USB stick that I had and then found this on FlipKart. It is a 8 GB stick and with this inserted, the lid fully closes. Got delivery within a day.

http://www.flipkart.com/sandisk-cz-1...CDHKXHJ2WRSGHT

Originally Posted by adu

It is a 8 GB stick and with this inserted, the lid fully closes.

I too bought a couple of tiny 8 GB pen-drives, a few months back. Thanks, adu.

Purple Cheetah left Chennai Royapettah home at 10:30 pm last night; reached Bangalore Basaveswara Nagar home at 4:35 am today via Chittoor and Kolar without any stop inbetween.



The fuel efficiency was less at 14.5 kmpl, thanks to heavy volume of truck traffic upto Walajah and foggy weather with varying intensity from Chittoor to Hosakote.

Just a few minutes back, I renewed online Purple Cheetah's comprehensive insurance with Royal Sundaram for one more year starting from 27 December 2014, costing ₹ 16,741 including 50% no-claim bonus [NCB], which is about ₹ 3 k less than the one quoted by my present insurer, Oriental Insurance.

I researched 4 insurers, viz., Royal Sundaram, Bajaj Allianz, National and Oriental and found that Royal Sundaram was the best. Bajaj Allianz online renewal did not allow me to select more than 20% NCB as Purple Cheetah is just one year old. It asked me to contact their customer care for anything more than 20% NCB. When I contacted the customer care and explained to them about transferring 50% NCB from my erstwhile Linea to Purple Cheetah, I was asked to send a scanned copy of the previous policy and RC for giving a quote. No such issues with Royal Sundaram, which readily accepted the details fed by me in their online renewal form. Not only that. A Royal Sundaram customer care staff called me immediately and answered all my queries to my satisfaction. He assured me that I need not send any scanned copy online for a quote. They would download the details from my previous insurer later. As soon as I paid through my credit card, I received the certificate of insurance and policy schedule in pdf in my email.

The icing on the cake was, I will be getting My TVS RSA for one year free of cost. Now, I can choose a RSA between Mahindra and MyTVS in case of any emergency!

[cosmopolitan]

Wow that's a great news. Please make sure that your IDV s not less than 15% of the previous year IDV