[mobike008]

Originally Posted by auto_enthusiast

Hi,How was your trip to Mahabaleshwar

I don't know whether you spotted my car or not but we crossed each other at Mapro garden and then again on the way to Wai on saturday. I was in my 'yellow board' grey Aspire.

LOL! You caught me on my whirlwind vacation trip. I must have certainly spotted you as I never miss seeing an Aspire on the road since they are such a rarity

Actually, on the contrary this trip, I saw many Aspires/Figo on the road and it was nice to see people buying this pocket rocket

Btw, While returning a BHPian from Mumbai (Orange Figo) came over when I stopped for tea at Akkalkot and he mentioned he follows my thread and even spotted me on Friday when he was driving to Hyderabad. If that BHPian is reading this post, please reply here as I could not get your handle name clearly when we met

It was a great day trip to Mahabaleshwar with Fellow Mod. Totally enjoyed the trip

While returning we noted there was an accident on ghat and the cars where lined up for nearly 3-4kms and we luckily were right at a point on ghat where it went up into the mountains and we took that route to discover some amazing adventure style roads and breathtaking views of a lake

We drove through some crazy roads to connect back into Wai. Were you stuck in the traffic jam?

Originally Posted by auto_enthusiast

And how has your Blue Bombardier performed during the whole trip?

Very boring! Not many cars were able to keep up with it

That diversion took us to this beautiful stretch

[auto_enthusiast]

Originally Posted by mobike008

While returning we noted there was an accident on ghat and the cars where lined up for nearly 3-4kms and we luckily were right at a point on ghat where it went up into the mountains and we took that route to discover some amazing adventure style roads and breathtaking views of a lake

We drove through some crazy roads to connect back into Wai. Were you stuck in the traffic jam?



Very boring! Not many cars were able to keep up with it

That diversion took us to this beautiful stretch

Luckily, we also took the right turn and drove through that amazing road and crossed you when you took a halt at this beautiful place. Actually we were short of time or else I would have also halted at the lake and met you in person too

[mobike008]

I have been meaning to share a few pictures of my trip to Pune and Mahabaleshwar but as usual work keeps things too busy. It was certainly a whirlwind trip but, my family is used to such trips and they totally enjoyed it. Total trip was ~ 1500kms so that makes it an average of roughly 500kms per day over the long weekend.

Lived some great memories of my college days in Pune and had planned a day trip to Mahabaleshwar with family of fellow Mod-Noopster who hired a self driving T-Fort for the day trip and we started in morning at 8:00am and spent a lovely day checking out some points, having lunch at Mapro garden and then luckily reaching the Table Point in Panchgani just before sunset to find some glorious views around with a windy condition to the point that it was chilly

Drove back the same night to Pune and spent a lovely evening over an excellent dinner and conversations at Noopster's home and highlight of the return trip was the detour that we took due to an accident on ghat and came across some breathtaking landscape and also the sunset was extraordinary with sky filled with beautiful hues of pink color

Here are some pictures of our day trip to Mahabaleshwar-Incidentally I had visited Mahabaleshwar last year around the same time on my motorcycle (that was an even crazy trip-1450kms in 48 hours).

Details of my Motorcycle ride to Mahabaleshwar is here :

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/superb...ml#post3994715

P.S: Please excuse the quality as all are iPhone 6+ pictures

[mobike008]

I have completed 33,000kms-Updated the title of thread on the Blue Bombardier.

It continues to run like a dream and there is nothing exciting (in terms of break-downs or such to share here )

Touchwood !

I have been hardly using the car as my daily running is <10kms and most of the mile munching happens on my motorcycle during weekends

Just came across these couple of snaps taken with my DSLR camera from my last trip (Mahabaleshwar)

[Varun_HexaGuy]

Hi sir,
Congratulations on your milestone with the Aspire. The 1.5 TDCI engine under the hood is a gem and I can totally relate to the miles you've munched. Secondly, how are you finding the service offered by the Mody Ford, Old Bowenpally outlet? I'm asking this question in particular because I feel that the quality of service offered by Mody Ford is declining day-by-day. My '10 Figo TDCI went for the 60,000 kms service at their place sometime in April and they kept my car for three days and the work done by them on my car was shoddy at its best. They replaced 2 struts i.e the strut on the front right and rear left because my car started to scrape at even at smallest of the smallest speed-breakers. Even after the replacement, I can feel that even after the replacement, I can feel the potholes crashing into the cabin which isn't a good sign. Add to that the car was subjected to abuse and thanks to this, my rear bumper has a big black scratch and the dealership used their dealership sticker to cover the scratch. After it came from the service, I somehow didn't like the sticker's placement and removed it. Later I see this scratch .

Secondly, the spare quality is a rip-off. In my other visit to the Ford Dealership at Bidar, KA, they replaced the Alternator belt of the car (which was less than a year ago) and during my recent service, when it was subjected to inspection, they advised me to replace the alternator belt. This comes as a jolt to me and my dad because this was replaced 6 months ago itself. Later, they agreed to replace it under warranty after showing the invoice. So much for the famed American Quality which is under a decline.

On the flipside though, the car has aged well and the car has been very reliable and was very much comparable to the Japs I'm terms of reliability and in my 6+ years of ownership, I claimed the warranty only once and that is a testament of the car and we are fully satisfied with our Figo and add to the dynamics of the car, they keep my dad happy and acquainted with the Figo.

Hope you have a smooth ownership with your aspire.

Varun

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by Varun_HexaGuy

Hi sir,
Congratulations on your milestone with the Aspire. The 1.5 TDCI engine under the hood is a gem and I can totally relate to the miles you've munched. Secondly, how are you finding the service offered by the Mody Ford, Old Bowenpally outlet? I'm asking this question in particular because I feel that the quality of service offered by Mody Ford is declining day-by-day. My '10 Figo TDCI went for the 60,000 kms service at their place sometime in April and they kept my car for three days and the work done by them on my car was shoddy at its best. They replaced 2 struts i.e the strut on the front right and rear left because my car started to scrape at even at smallest of the smallest speed-breakers. Even after the replacement, I can feel that even after the replacement

Thanks Varun for your nice words

Firstly, let me share my service background

1000kms
10,000kms
20,000kms

All above service, I didnt bother much and Mody Ford guy came home and picked up the car and delivered it back to me. I normally dont do that but, I normally run busy at work and didn't have the time to go sit with them

30,000kms service

I decided to go to Old Bowenpally outlet (same one you are referring above) and I had a wonderful experience which I shared in this thread in detail.

AC cabin, continous supply of coffee and they allowed me on the floor to watch them change my car's brake pads and people were found knowledgable etc

In short, my experience with Mody Ford is good until now

Coming to your suspension work. I think it is your fault as such major works should never be given at ASC (that is my personal beilef) there are plenty of good garages outside who can do it at fraction of cost and better

Originally Posted by Varun_HexaGuy

Secondly, the spare quality is a rip-off. In my other visit to the Ford Dealership at Bidar, KA, they replaced the Alternator belt of the car (which was less than a year ago) and during my recent service, when it was subjected to inspection

Yet again. I think you did not inspect the replacement component before getting satisfied at Bidar Dealership. I always make the ASC show me replacement parts and carry it back with me and throw them in trash personally to satisfy myself they indeed changed the components..LOL!

Originally Posted by Varun_HexaGuy

On the flipside though, the car has aged well and the car has been very reliable and was very much comparable to the Japs I'm terms of reliability and in my 6+ years of ownership, I claimed the warranty only once and that is a testament of the car and we are fully satisfied with our Figo and add to the dynamics of the car, they keep my dad happy and acquainted with the Figo.

Good to know that. I plan to keep this car for a long time (at least 1,00,000 kms) as I normally change cars at 60,000kms mark. That can give an indication how much I love driving this little pocket rocket.

It's like they say in Indian style "Total Paisa Vasool car" (Value for Money)

P.S : A close pal was fed up of his top-end XUV 500 as it was a pain to drive around in city. He drove my car and instantly fell in love with it. Selling the XUV500 and replacing it with an Aspire. Can you believe that?

[mobike008]

It's been a while that I did a long drive trip in the Blue Bombardier as it gets used mostly for my daily 6km office run and about 50kms over the weekend as most of the long trips are enjoyed on the Dark Knight

A few BHPi'ans met for dinner like we usually meet every other weekend and we all expressed our urge to drive and since my motorcycle was out of action (Waiting for it's chain and sprocket to arrive from USA), I decided to make full use of this lull period and enjoy this long drive

After contemplating a few destinations, we honed down on Gandikota. Plan was to first visit Belum Caves which is supposed to be the 2nd best caves in India (1st being in Cheerapunji in Meghalaya) and continue ahead to Gandikota which as you may know is considered as one of the wonders in India. It is also popularly known as the "Grand Canyon of India".

Lucifer1881 is a great organizer and our book-keeper, once the plan was finalized he swiftly booked the hotel at AP Tourism Haritha which was an excellent property at very reasonable price (INR 1235/Night for an AC Room). And, the icing on the cake was it was situated just 1-km away from the Fort and Gandikota Canyon so a perfect location to spend the night

Gandikota from Hyderabad was about 350kms away and with a slight deviation for Belum caves it was around 380kms. BHP'ians (Mobike008, Lucifer1880 and Rajesh.Rawal) on a bright sunny Saturday morning in our respective cars Aspire, Elantra and Celerio AT started our journey at 6:30am towards the Bangalore highway.

We stopped for an hour long excellent breakfast at Food Pyramid which was 130kms away. Post breakfast, we made good headway until Belum caves which we reached around noon and by this time the weather was little humid and hot.

All of us went inside this ~3km long cave and were amazed to see this beatiful caves which was well maintained ( I was in Malaysia last month and visited the Batu caves which was insipid in comparison to these caves) and as we go deeper inside you start getting breathing issues due to the low ceiling and tight enclosures despite they keep specific areas where there is an outlet from the ceiling for fresh air blown in for us to gulp in that oxygen

After spending an hour in the caves, We decided to grab a quick bite in the canteen outside as it was way past lunch time. Lunch was below average and we just ate some indistinguishable rice items and finally restarted our journey towards Gandikota which we reached around 4:00pm. We quickly freshened up and headed to the Canyons. We perfectly timed our visit as it was 5:30pm and weather had become grey and cloudy. We trekked over the rocks and boulders to the edge were we can see some fantastic views of the canyon. We stayed there much into darkness wherein we flew some kite/lanterns on the gorge. It was a wonderful sight to see them light up and fly away from us in that darkness under the moon. Finally, as it was pitch dark, we used our phone torches we headed back to the hotel around 8:30pm

After an enjoyable evening at the hotel premises with us enjoying a great dinner (hand delivered by a local due to the contact from one of our group) and it was pouring most of the night heavily cooling down the weather. After that enjoyable evening, we finally called it a night around midnight with a plan to get up at 6:00am and go back to the canyons.

As planned, a few of us re-visited the canyons and it was even better during early morning since the weather had really cooled down due to rains in the night and views were super-gorgeous

After breakfast, we checked out of the hotel around 9:00am and spend some time on the mountains to get a close view of the windmills before heading back towards Hyderabad to reach home earlier than what we envisioned at around 7:00pm despite taking a longer route via. Gooty marking an end to ~850kms run over the weekend.

Our lunch stop at Gooty was memorable as it was the best meal of this trip. It was in a small, clean and well maintained dhaba specializing in the cuisine of the region. Spicy Rayalseema food (Rayalseema Chicken Curry, Egg Burji, Roti, Jeera Rice, Dal Tadka washed down with some amazing Sweet Lime Juice) that made our eyes water and smoke come out of our ears but, our hands continued to reach out for more of it

Now to some quick pointers about the performance of the Aspire (Sorry about the overload of Blue Bombardier pics, it's been a while so I thought of sharing all except a few...LOL!)

It crossed 35,000kms mark during this trip and as is tradition I could not take a picture of it as i was busy enjoying it on the highway and realized after nearly 20kms (Even though I know it was reaching this figure at least 50kms before)

It performed flawlessly as always and left almost every car behind including the much powerful Elantra Petrol which is 127 BHP engine wherein we indulged in a lot of friendly banter with Lucifer1881 and only time he went ahead was at toll booth due to him having a fastTag on his car

On the return drive, there was a brand new C220D which was also no match to the Aspire (Nope, I'm not boasting just presenting the real facts)

To summarize, Aspire being from a much lower segment can really give a stiff competition to many higher-segment vehicles purely due to it's excellent dynamics, powerful engine and it's fun to drive factor

[sriharsha_m87]

TS07ES3417, driving towards kokapet circle on ORR service road at 10:15 AM today.

After looking at the team-bhp sticker, initially I thought it was one of those fake sticker hooligans. But this particular shade and team-bhp stickers I kept thinking it shouldn't be you. Opened this thread and viola.

Didn't expect such rash driving from a team bhp mod on a narrow service road.
Even the speed at which you took the turn towards Wipro road below the flyover.
Wish I had a dash cam!

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by sriharsha_m87

TS07ES3417, driving towards kokapet circle on ORR service road at 10:15 AM today.

After looking at the team-bhp sticker, initially I thought it was one of those fake sticker hooligans. But this particular shade and team-bhp stickers I kept thinking it shouldn't be you. Opened this thread and viola.

Didn't expect such rash driving from a team bhp mod on a narrow service road.
Even the speed at which you took the turn towards Wipro road below the flyover.
Wish I had a dash cam!

Thanks for the concern and post.

I normally drive very sanely but, I was terribly late for a customer meeting and couldn't afford to miss it at any cost

Will be careful hereon

[mobike008]

I have completed 37,500 kms and Aspire runs flawlessly as always..

An impromptu trip of 1450kms in 2 days (Saturday & Sunday) happened over the last weekend to Vizag and Annavaram

After a real long time, I got some decent FE on the highway of 18kmpl

P.S: I see some discussions on other thread on bonnet being hot for some Aspire owners. I specifically checked the temperature of the bonnet immediately stopping for dinner after a continuous drive of 5 hours on Sunday (3:00pm-8:00pm).

I'm glad to report the bonnet was almost ice cold

P.S 2 : Will be shortly moving this thread to long term ownership section

[mobike008]

It's been a real long while that I have updated this thread as there was nothing substantial to talk about the car as it's doing quite well with zero issues

My usage is not much these days as I'm normally travelling or riding my motorcycle more than the car. On that note, here is a travelogue of our recent motorcycle ride

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...ml#post4318859

Well, I had about a month ago got the Blue Bombardier a wax and interior treatment by a local professional called through the app "Urban Clap"

They did a fairly good job for a car that was in tatters. Let me share the pictures to do the talking

Blue Bombardier in a tattered condition







The work they carried out for the car left it in a tasteful condition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MFUjMWcqKc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6jXYjJdnus

P.S: Blue Bombardier is just 500kms shy from touching 40,000kms which I dont think will complete in December 2017 as I am travelling on vacation from next week so will request update on what needs to be checked for this important service which I'm planning in January 2018

[Blow Horn Ok]

The car surely looks clean and shiny. How much they charged for the treatment? The leather should be treated by a good leather conditioner after such cleaning regime.

[Varun_HexaGuy]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Well, I had about a month ago got the Blue Bombardier a wax and interior treatment by a local professional called through the app "Urban Clap"

They did a fairly good job for a car that was in tatters. Let me share the pictures to do the talking

Blue Bombardier in a tattered condition

P.S: Blue Bombardier is just 500kms shy from touching 40,000kms which I dont think will complete in December 2017 as I am travelling on vacation from next week so will request update on what needs to be checked for this important service which I'm planning in January 2018

Hi sir,
What all products do they use for the cleaning and detailing. Just a bit curious because these people only charge 1800 for the exterior and interior detailing which is damn cheap when you compare it to the likes of the 3M, etc.

Even I'm planning to get it done for my Hexa as I'm not finding any time to get it detailed elsewhere. So this is for the time being.

Oh yes, congratulations well in advance for touching the 40k milestone (I know there's some time for it but still)

Varun

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by Blow Horn Ok

The car surely looks clean and shiny. How much they charged for the treatment? The leather should be treated by a good leather conditioner after such cleaning regime.

Yes. Car looks shiny and new after this treatment and stays on for at-least 3 months where you just need to maintain with a wipe or clean and a wash. I get this treatment done typically once in 3-4 months. Usually, it's the latter due to time constraints

Besides above, I also get a foam wash done around 30-45 days time-frame and this makes the beautiful blue of the car really stands out

And, our watchman cleans the car every day (He does a really shoddy job of it, btw)

Originally Posted by Varun_HexaGuy

Hi sir,What all products do they use for the cleaning and detailing. Just a bit curious because these people only charge 1800 for the exterior and interior detailing which is damn cheap when you compare it to the likes of the 3M, etc.

Even I'm planning to get it done for my Hexa as I'm not finding any time to get it detailed elsewhere. So this is for the time being.

Oh yes, congratulations well in advance for touching the 40k milestone (I know there's some time for it but still)Varun

Thanks for your wishes for 40K kms. I was planning a roadtrip for my vacation but, decided against it as too many road trips has tired me out and this vacation is more of a relaxed one so this magic number will come up sometime next month

I also run quite busy at work and have absolutely no time to visit any place for anything for the car or bike. Hence, I use this app to call people home and they work on it while i work on my work

I dont remember the products they use (once they even used 3M products) as each time different people come and they use different products but, all of them are branded ones

I usually negotiate and get my bike also done at the same time and I believe pay 1800 bucks for both jobs (there is a video of them buffing the bike too which I will spare you from watching..LOL)

But, a couple of pics of my bike after they did the job...Not bad..huh?

[chiranjitp]

After being inspired by you I too converted our Ecosport to an actual titanuim + variant. The '+' was recovered from a Maruti Suzuki VDI+ emblem.

Originally Posted by mobike008

Thanks Guys. I had a quick chat with Viddy and he mentioned that all 90/100 from popular brands are good quality and I can't go wrong with any of them. So I was presented with 4 choices (pic below) and a good quality Phillips relay and wiring harness

Choose the Hella 90w/100W and now it remains to be tested.

I too upgraded the headlights to 100/90 bulb using a relay kit. The only problem faced during installation was that we had to make a hole in the rubber cover & seal the area after installation with a tape so that dust doesn't go inside the headlight assembly. I guess Aspire has a similar type of arrangement. What did your installer do?