[hvkumar]

What can sometimes be worse than the workmanship and spares shortage problems at the AScs can be those irritating follow-up phone calls a week later from girls who don;t know the difference between a bus and a SUV enquiring whether your vehicle is running fine! And for some inexplicable reason, the AScs have "hospitality" managers whose role is unclear to me since I find the standards of post-service work (billing, payment) terrible even by PSU standards. On an average, in Global Gallarie, supposed to be one of M&M's best dealers, it takes anywhere between 1-1.5 hours to "chase" and steer the job card to the billing and payment stage after work gets completed.

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

Let me report a wierd call I received on Monday from someone called Sashank (9820110353) claiming to be from M&M enquiring solicitously about the issue about the "duplicate" clutch plates that I had written about above in this Forum. He wanted to know what happened and agreed with me that it was unacceptable and that he will make enquiries and revert within Tuesday evening. He said he will give my car a "check up" (HA HA!). I suspect it to be a hoax call from someone in the dealership Global Gallarie itself because I have heard that they "fix" complaints so that their overall rating does not get affected. The fact that I have not heard form them further reinforces my suspicion. M&M surely is one of the worst of the car companies in India. Needless to say, I have nothing to gain from chasing this guy so I have not called him up after that, although I saved the mobile number he called from.

Repeat call at last and email too - yes, that was a M&M man all right. They have apparently verified and say that the parts used are genuine. Moreover, they offered to have everything checked if I want.

Good work, Mahindra, some relief. Thank you, friends in the forum.

[dr_anurag]

I have a mhawk vlx 4X4 about 6 months new. A month back I noticed body vibration at about the 2200 rpm mark. Since the other cars I drive are petrol driven, I assumed this to be a diesel car thing. Three days back I started the car only to find the power steering and power brakes not working. Parked it and called the helpline number and the service GM at ASC, Bhopal. The GM at Win-win auto immediately diagnosed the issue as that of a broken fanbelt. He also asked me to check if the battery light was glowing. Sure enough it was and the fanbelt had come off. The helpline guy responded too and kept track of the problem.
2 guys came over from the ASC and muscled on the fanbelt. The GM insisted they bring the car over so that he could see why this happened. They delivered it the same evening finding nothing unusual.
Now that vibration has gone. I am not sure what really happened. The promptness of the ASC and the helpline impressed me.

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by dr_anurag

I have a mhawk vlx 4X4 about 6 months new. A month back I noticed body vibration at about the 2200 rpm mark. Since the other cars I drive are petrol driven, I assumed this to be a diesel car thing. Three days back I started the car only to find the power steering and power brakes not working. Parked it and called the helpline number and the service GM at ASC, Bhopal. The GM at Win-win auto immediately diagnosed the issue as that of a broken fanbelt. He also asked me to check if the battery light was glowing. Sure enough it was and the fanbelt had come off. The helpline guy responded too and kept track of the problem.
2 guys came over from the ASC and muscled on the fanbelt. The GM insisted they bring the car over so that he could see why this happened. They delivered it the same evening finding nothing unusual.
Now that vibration has gone. I am not sure what really happened. The promptness of the ASC and the helpline impressed me.

Very unusual for a fan belt to break so early in its life. It is good for at least 60,000-90,000 kms. Normally, belts don't break although the bearings can fail if they are very old (90,000 kms+), but in this case it looks like the belt has broken. Whichever may be the case, this cannot be normal failure, seems to indicate either that the belt got damaged somehow (unlikely!) or there is some quality issue in the belt or bearings itself.

Were the bearings also changed?

I am intrigued why the power steering also failed. The main fan belt is linked to engine cooling fan, brake booster and alternator - and hence, battery light will glow if the fan belt comes off or breaks - but at least in my old Scorpio, power steering is run by a separate belt - is the m-Hawk different?

[dr_anurag]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

Very unusual for a fan belt to break so early in its life. It is good for at least 60,000-90,000 kms. Normally, belts don't break although the bearings can fail if they are very old (90,000 kms+), but in this case it looks like the belt has broken. Whichever may be the case, this cannot be normal failure, seems to indicate either that the belt got damaged somehow (unlikely!) or there is some quality issue in the belt or bearings itself.

Were the bearings also changed?

I am intrigued why the power steering also failed. The main fan belt is linked to engine cooling fan, brake booster and alternator - and hence, battery light will glow if the fan belt comes off or breaks - but at least in my old Scorpio, power steering is run by a separate belt - is the m-Hawk different?

The fan belt did not break but had come off. Nothing was changed. Only the belt was put on again.

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by dr_anurag

The fan belt did not break but had come off. Nothing was changed. Only the belt was put on again.

The last type it happened to my Scorpio, the bearings had seized and the belt popped off because of that. Very dangerous situation to be in - no brakes, no cooling and no battery charging. It took me 30 minutes to drive 6 kms in the middle of the night because of the overheating and lack of brakes.

[kaushik_s]

Hi All,
One more issue, basically the continuation of the water in Fuel issue. The indicator came up again recently and stayed. I took the car to service station and this time there were lots of water in the filter(almost half a cup of water it seems). They've asked me to get the whole fuel tank cleaned before refuelling as this might cause some problem to the CRDI system and if that happens I would even won't be able to claim warranty. I'm planning to take the car this Tuesday/Wednesday to the service center to get it done. I want to know is this such a big problem as told to me by the SA? And I'm really worried that if I have to keep on taking the vehicle for this kind of maintenance regularly. I mean, how would I know that which fuel bunk doesn't have water in their diesel (this time it was Shell near HP office).

[chaunfa]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

Repeat call at last and email too - yes, that was a M&M man all right. They have apparently verified and say that the parts used are genuine. Moreover, they offered to have everything checked if I want.

Good work, Mahindra, some relief. Thank you, friends in the forum.

Seems like they are really trying. Hopefully things will get better. My Bolero CRDE has now got a strange tippity tappity noise, when I switch the ac on after starting the engine. Oh the guy who had been careless with my work was coincidentally on a 20 day leave, when I visited the showroom again.
From my knowledge (gained in another lifetime ) it seemed like he was given a mandatory vacation without pay.
Looks like I need to call the cr person again. Otherwise the jeep is fine.

[anjan_c2007]

The running foot board of the Scorpio is the most prone to get dirty during monsoons and otherwise too! I found the best device to cleanse the foot board. Its a mini-broom and cost me just Rs 15/-.



I have a plastic brush but feel more convenient to use this one on a dry surface- dry footboard.

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by anjan_c2007

The running foot board of the Scorpio is the most prone to get dirty during monsoons and otherwise too!

...it is also prone to breakage in tough parts! Mine are already battered from drives to places like Ladakh!

[m_upreti]

I had a spate of incidents with my VLX last month. First some one / something hit the windshield hard enough to leave it chisled and within a couple of days there were cobwebs stretching thru the entire the glass.

The replacement cost me 14K odd Rs. with 9K being picked by the insurance company (Bajaj Allianz). They paid only 50% for the rain sensor and some consumables.

The experience with both the dealership (G3 Motors) and the insurance company was good. The survey was done in less than 24 hours of reporting and the glass was arranged with a speed I never saw things work with M&M dealers and the car was delivered the next day.

There was however a slight delay in getting the claims as the surveryer went down with typhoid, but still I got it in about 10 days.

Next was the rear right tyre which got gashed against some thing (probably an iron rod) between Panvel and Kharghar where lot of construction is in progress. The side wall got damaged and cost me 350 Rs in repairs and an advise to use it as a spare.

[gd1418]

Unless the belt is really loose, it doesn't come off just like that. If you notice, it is a grooved belt and except for the idler bearings the other pulleys too are grooved. Did the SA tell you why this happened?

Originally Posted by dr_anurag

The fan belt did not break but had come off. Nothing was changed. Only the belt was put on again.

[SS-Traveller]

Has anyone else faced this issue on his vehicle?

Originally Posted by SS-Traveller

A peculiar issue (I wouldn't say it was a problem except when it happened the first two times) with the Tyre Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) was that it would get triggered and start beeping if we were crossing a stretch of water or snow at crawling pace. There seemed to be a sudden drop of 3-5 psi in any random tyre on the TPMS readout (say, from 31 to 27 psi), and off would start the beep-beep-beep-beep. The first couple of times, I got down to check the offending tyre, and found nothing wrong.

Then it gradually dawned on me that the chilled water and resultant rapid cooling down of the air inside the tyre made the TPMS read a sudden loss of air pressure - and the pressure reading would return to normal and the alert light would go out once we proceeded for a km or two.

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by gd1418

Unless the belt is really loose, it doesn't come off just like that. If you notice, it is a grooved belt and except for the idler bearings the other pulleys too are grooved. Did the SA tell you why this happened?

The last time a belt came off in my SCorpio - and the only time it did - the pulley bearings had failed. I think you better get to the bottom of why the belt came off, and replace the pulley bearings if found deficient.

[m_upreti]

Originally Posted by SS-Traveller

Has anyone else faced this issue on his vehicle?

Not exactly this issue, but once the TPMS suddenly started beeping and flashing red. Switched off checked the tyre(s), no issues, no drop in pressure on the reading. It went on for a few kms. then stopped.

And once on an actual puncture the TPMS response was the one which saved the tyre as the pressure loss initially was very slow but the moment I stopped the tyre went flat in less than a mt.