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In Automatics the effeciency totally depends upon the driving style. Two of my friends have purchased XTA, one of them was getting about 9 in city and 16 on highway, he drives in 80 to 100 range.
When I pointed out that he's keeping transmission engaged at stoplights, and not shifting to N he said it doesn't make a difference. I said just reset your MID and check for a few 100 kms. A week later he said that effeciency in city traffic now is 11, and the surge when throttled hard is better. Highway mileage is still 16 as before.
If you know the effecient way to use an AT a larger engined car with a 6 speed or more AT has negligible difference in fuel effeciency.
Two points to follow. First shift to N when you stop. Second be gentle on the throttle until you are in 3rd. This allows the torque converter to lock up in 3rd at as low as 30kph, and gives you a positive and more effecient drive.

Rahul

Question for XT/XTA owners: As the front seats have airbags, what have you done for seat covers? I am afraid the leather seats might cause sweating issues.

Seat covers cannot be put in a car with side airbags.

The faux leather material is top notch and is sourced from a Mercedes vendor. No sweating issues.

Visited Aadya Motors, Bangalore yesterday for a test drive, specially wanted to test the driving characteristics of Hexa Manual. The showroom representative, Mr. Hameed was very kind to show us all the features of the new Hexa. Later, they got a XT 4X4 vehicle for test drive. The test drive vehicle had completed more than 15k on the ODO. Came out with mixed impressions.

Test Drive experience:

• Adjusted the front seat according to my height. Being around 5'6 height, the center armrest was of no use for me as I had to slide the seat forward.

• Steering was adjusted to the lowest position which gave a great view of the road ahead. Frontal view was excellent giving the driver a commanding look.

• Clutch had a bit long travel however felt relatively light. Came to a standstill and tried to get the car moving in 2nd gear, no problems at all. Slotting gears from 3rd to 6th was pretty smooth. One thing I observed was, if you shift the gears with a slightly lighter pressure on the gear lever, the gear-shifting is surprisingly smoother with a lot less effort :thumbs up

• Slotting 1st and 2nd gears was pretty hard initially. Even vibrations were felt on the gear lever and ABC pedals. The TATA rep. said that the vehicle is not been serviced or general checkup has not been done for 15k kms and hence its pretty hard. He said its definitely better on a new car. However, got used to the gear shifts after 10-15 minutes of use.

• Drove on single lane roads within traffic and divided highway stretches. Steering is heavy at crawling speeds but gets lighter as you pick up speed. Maneuvering the car through traffic is quite manageable. Infact, the commanding position helps to get along in dense traffic with smaller cars giving way when they see this beast in their mirror. :)
  On the highway, at around 100 kmph, steering felt pretty light while changing lanes. Stability was rock solid. You don't feel the weight of the car at highway speeds.

• Stopped once to take a U-turn. Had to take a three point turn and the steering does feel heavier due to the steering setup.

• Braking was sufficiently good and brought this behemoth to a stop in a pretty decent time.

• Suspension of the car was put to test on broken roads. The car glided over them all. Due to heavy rain, had some water logging on service Roads. The car handled deep potholes without any fuss. Higher Ground clearance also helps in ensuring not scraping the bottom in hugh potholes.

• Braking was sufficiently good and brought this behemoth to a stop in a pretty decent time.

• Wifey and kid were chilling in the back seat. They tested by sitting in 2nd row and 3rd row. Found very comfortable in both rows. AC cooling is extremely good in the rear seats along with lesser body roll in corners.

Finally, 45 minutes of thorough test drive, we arrived back at the showroom. The TATA rep. confirmed that they can provide dealer-end discount of 8k and corporate discount of 3k on the Hexa this month.

Now, I am confused between the manual and the Automatic. My drive involves 50-50% of city and highway use. The Manual XM model is around 1.33 lacs cheaper than the XMA Automatic variant. But more importantly, I am worried about the less fuel efficiency and higher maintainence cost in the Automatic.

Below is the pricelist:

Less fuel efficiency is understandable but automatic is very comfortable to drive in city. I have XTA and can vouch for the same. I am in NCR, but I know that traffic is even worse in Bangalore. In time to come, automatics will be the more popular choice.
Why do you think that maintenance of automatic will be higher?

Thanks for the inputs, Abhishek. Yes, the Automatic will be definitely a breeze in stop-go traffic. I believe, fuel efficiency is slightly less, if not very less. I guess, the Automatic is better to drive with a light foot to extract maximum FE. Higher maintenance of the Automatic is what the Tata rep. told me compared to manual. (not sure how much this is true).

Also request some feedback from current owners of the Manual variant, especially with the gearbox and clutch behavior so far. What is the FE returned in city as well as on highway?

Shifts are pretty hard in first two gears but smoothens down considerably after driving a few thousand kilometres.
Also, arm rest is useful in highways when your shifting between 4, 5 and 6. Maybe that's because of the lever's right-most position in 5 and 6.
However, nothing beats the driveability of an automatic Hexa even across different segments!
It shouldn't be a tough decision as it all ends up on your personal driving preferences.
Speaking of mileage, my XT 4X2 has returned 13.5kmpl for 5500kms with 60% highway and 40% city driving.

I got mine installed at the showroom pre delivery. Concord motors (south ex) charged me 16000 with a 10% discount on all the accessories I opted for, so got it for an effective price of 14600. Recommend you go for it. My folks also find it easier to get in and out of the vehicle using these. Cheers!

Like someone pointed out a few posts back, FE in an automatic vary vastly with driving style. Once you get a hold of the car (accustomed to the gearbox - understand its shift points etc), you can easily attain 2 digit FE even in Bangalore. After gaining some momentum, if you take your foot off the accelerator, observe that the RPM drops to idle and it stays there till you throttle it again. This is not the case in the manual - unless you keep shifting to neutral again and again. Shifting to N while at a signal is something that saves a lot of fuel!

Coming to the highway, 100kmph in 6th cog is around 1800 rpm - which is slightly less than the manual counterpart in the same gear and FE can be a good 15-16 while cruising on this side of 100 kmph. End of the day even if you consider a 15% difference in FE - it translates to about 60p/km which I feel is worth considering the convenience factor! (overall FE of 13 kmpl considered for calculation with 75% city and 25% highway for XM/XT variant)

Manuals and city traffic do not make a good combination and clutch life is severely reduced because of the frequent start stop traffic we encounter on a daily basis. This makes the manual more expensive to maintain than the auto considering a clutch overhaul at 40-60K kms depending on the usage!

Also, given the increasing demand for automatics in the SUV/Xover or even MPV segment today , the resale for XMA/XTA is likely to be on the higher side compared to its manual sibling!

I own a XTA and my odo mileage till date for 6700 km is around 11.3 and its 50-50 drive in highway and city. Highway if you drive around 95 then you can easily get 15 and local city traffic its around 10. This number is decent considering its weight and power. I think Auto is demand of the hour in city as traffic is increasing so I don't mind little compromise on FE compared to convenience I get.

One day the automatic gearbox will also require an overhaul. While the clutch replacement is relatively straightforward I doubt TASS's ability to handle a complex third party gearbox. God forbid if you require a gearbox change, I remember reading somewhere in this thread itself that it costs more than an entry level hatch. People who want to keep their cars for long time may want to think about that.

Future we don't know but at the moment manuals have more resale value across segments all other things remaining equal.

Talking About Averages, this is what XE is returning with 70% City and 30% Highway drive in the 700 odd Kms that she has done.

I have not gone beyond 70 KMPH during the run in period.

You sure have babied the beast. That was some smooth driving skills. clap: Maruti here we come. 18kmpl average over a range of 500 odd kms.

Thanks a lot, GreenmachinE.

Yup, I do baby all my drives, the manuals usually say 1500-2000 kms of running in, I go well over that, I keep the running period of a minimum 5000 kms.

Even once the running in period is over, I religiously follow the idling rule and drive aggressively only once the optimum driving temperatures are obtained.

That's awesome mileage, I must say! clap:

I also wanted to know, do u feel the absence of the 6th gear in the XE variant. I understand that since you have not gone above 70 kmph, its pretty difficult to comment now. Also, do you feel any sore points in this variant. Any modifications that you carried out since the purchase. Please throw some light.

The On-road price of XE is mouth-watering (specially post GST) and it is definitely NOT bare-bones in feature list, so I may consider this in my shortlisting.