How we ended up owning an Innova Hycross; Wrapped 30,000 km in 1 year

We are getting a fuel efficiency of around 16-18 Kmpl in the city and similar or less on highways.

BHPian car_guy1998 recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Completed a year of ownership with our Hycross this Sunday (28/07/2024).

Background:

We used to own a Type 2 2011 Innova VX, which was bought pre-owned in 2016 when the odo was at 75k Kms and sold it off in 2022 after adding 1.2L Kms on the odo (1.96L kms when we sold it off). Apart from Innova, we have a 2014 Honda City iDTEC, bought pre-owned again in the year 2017. We felt the need for a second car as the Innova felt too large as our only vehicle and the Honda City has run 1.88L Kms till date (out of which we have driven 1.53L Kms to date) and we might replace it with an EV or Petrol AT soon as it has completed 10 years of age recently and since we have this car for almost 7 years, which we never imagined as we keep our cars for 5 years or less, but this is an exception due to economic reasons.

We were happy with both our cars until the AT bug had hit us and moreover, our usage with Innova was getting reduced off late due to Covid and in the meantime, our Honda City was driven more than our Innova due to FE it gives when compared to our Innova (gives no less than 18 Kmpl when compared to 8-9 Kmpl, which the Innova used to give). A few months later, we decided to bid goodbye to our Innova and with my plans to move abroad (which I eventually did last year), the first thing I thought is to make my dad sell off the Innova and get a Diesel AT C-SUV like Seltos or Creta as they sufficed our needs for a family of 3 (more on that later).

Requirements:

Has to be Diesel since our running is around 3000 Kms a month and can extend to 4000 Kms a month. Diesel was the main preference until Hybrid came into the picture

Has to be AT since most of the usage will be in city limits though dad was okay with getting an MT (he still drives our 2014 Honda City Diesel even after getting the Hycross) since he is chauffeured most of the time but after being persuaded by his friends, who bought AT vehicles, myself and our chauffeur, he said yes to AT as he will also be driving the car whenever I and our chauffeur is not around

It should be a 7 seater (dad's choice) though I was more keen on getting a 5 seater since we are a family of 3 and we barely travel together

Budget- We had started with 22L and ended up extending by 10L more

Cars considered:

1. Kia Seltos Diesel AT
2. Hyundai Creta Diesel AT
3. Mahindra XUV700 Diesel AT
4. Mahindra Scorpio-N Diesel AT
5. Toyota Hyryder Hybrid
6. Toyota Innova Crysta Diesel AT/MT

While in use, I had considered Endeavour and Fortuner along with Crysta 2.8 AT but ruled out later as dad wasn't okay with getting a used car anymore (our last 3 car purchases were used hence was keen on new this time).

Didn't consider Tatas due to horror stories and Dad wasn't okay with spending 30L on a Tata even though I like their designs.

Initially, booked the Seltos D AT and was supposed to get delivered but had to drop due to personal reasons and in the meanwhile, dad had heard about Toyota launching Innova in Hybrid guise, which made him seal the decision and I persuaded him to get Scorpio-N or XUV700 Diesel AT (though I liked Scorpio-N more) instead of Hycross as I wasn't keen on having a Toyota again as I wanted something unique this time in the sea of Innovas and Fortuners, which most of my dad's friends own but dad didn't pay heed to this as he wanted only Innova and nothing else. Even today, I curse him the same but can't do anything. Maybe, during our next purchase, where I'm planning to replace our City next year, will consider getting a Seltos D AT or Scorpio-N D AT but dad is keen on having an EV this time.

Pros:

• The car is quite comfortable and spacious in all 3 rows, which justifies the "Innova" tag. In fact, Hycross is on par with OG Innova in terms of 3rd row comfort if not better and way better than Innova Crysta IMO, which made my dad get this one over Crysta
• The interior looks modern and well designed, one of the best designs in an Innova
• Ride quality is so excellent that it can it can tackle the bad roads easily and while travelling, I felt like as if I'm travelling in a Volvo bus
• Has enough power on tap though the engine has bit lag but manageable
• The engine is too silent that no one can hear the sound and people, who sat in our car, thought it's an EV at first
• Drives like a car in the city due to being built on Monocoque FWD chassis and easier to drive due to its light steering and in fact, its way easier to drive than its predecessors and our 2014 Honda City
• Gives an amazing FE of 16-18 Kmpl in city traffic (main reason for buying this car) while on highways, it gives similar or less due to cruising at the speeds of 100+ Kmph.
• Gets all needed features even for base variant, which is VX (Auto Headlamps, Push Button Start, Auto Fold ORVMs, Apple Carplay/Android Auto though wired, Alloys, TPMS, 360 degree camera) but missed out on 6 airbags, which got introduced just few days after purchasing the vehicle, though gets all safety features like ESP, TC, Auto Hold

Cons:

• Though the interior design looks good, at the same time, the plastic quality is very bad for a 30+L car, which isn't acceptable and switches in the car are made of cheap quality, due to which the ORVM adjustment knob came off on its own within a year of ownership. Had to replace it along with ORVM foldable mirror switch (it comes simultaneously in Hycross it seems as per my SA), which costed me Rs.2500. In fact, the quality of the interior is not as durable as Crysta and Fortuner
• The headlights is not that sufficient for late night driving even with the fogs on. This is the common problem in all Toyotas including Fortuner but unfortunately, it's a sealed unit and can't upgrade to better lights though we can manage with this setup for now
• The HU is so laggy that I had to reset it for multiple times and the CarPlay disconnected randomly. And, it misses out on Wireless CarPlay/Android Auto though I had done a Jugaad by getting Carlinkit for our car
• Could hear some tak tak kinda sound while turning the car to the right and later came to know that it's a driveshaft issue, which is the common issue faced by other Hycross owners. Hope, Toyota will recall for fixing this issue soon

Dealership experience:

Had booked this car on 28th March 2023 at Harsha Toyota, LB Nagar, giving the booking amount of Rs.50,000. Almost a month after booking the car, we were offered a car but couldn't go ahead with it due to some reasons. In fact, after booking the car with Harsha Toyota, one of my dad's friends had insisted us to look for cars at Mody Toyota as well (the same guy, who used to run Ford dealership before and the same group runs Skoda, VW, BYD and Honda apart from Toyota) as he bought his Hycross from that dealership just after its launch IIRC. Then, finally, in the month of July, we were offered a car and we went ahead with our finances and did PDI four days prior to car delivery and during PDI, the car had run just 6 Kms and was manufactured in the end of June and our came with E20 Fuel sticker.

Service visits till date:

First 2 services were done at Harsha Toyota and in that, I had given the 1st service while 2nd service, i.e, 10k Kms service, was given by our chauffeur as I was out of country. From 3rd service, we had moved to Mody Toyota, which was a newly opened one (their 3rd branch in Hyderabad) and was very near to our house though Harsha Toyota is also within our vicinity but decided to give at Mody Toyota as it was new and less crowded (Harsha Toyota is filled with overflow of vehicles, which made us give at Mody Toyota even though dad insisted to give the car Harsha Toyota).

And, the last we got our car serviced was in the month of May just after coming back from Kerala trip at 31,885 Kms at Mody Toyota

Till date, service costs are reasonable for this car

Milestones:

The first 1000 Kms were done just after 10 days of its purchase and completed 2000 Kms on the odo same week itself as we had a trip to Srisailam.

10,000 Kms had come up in mid-Nov while 20,000 Kms had come up in mid-Feb and 30,000 Kms had come up in mid-May. BTW, this very milestone was achieved during our Kerala trip.

Incidents happened to date:

When our chauffeur was coming back home, a Chhapri Thar driver, who was also drunk, hit the car from behind and that Thar guy didn't even stop and zoomed ahead, which resulted in dent on the trunk. This happened just after 10 days of purchase and was heartbroken seeing this. Later, my dad got it fixed without claiming the insurance at Harsha Toyota itself for Rs.8000 after a month and a half of this incident

Another incident was when I was going to bring some groceries, I by mistakenly hit the car to the divider at the speed of 40-50 Kmph on a deserted road, which is behind our gated community and that road is used by newbie drivers, resulting in damage of front left suspension as well as wheel rim and tyre

Luckily, no major damage or scratch to the exterior or to the front bumper, which is surprising to me as well as to my dad and chauffeur or else, it'd have costed a bomb.

And, I immediately got an alert from the Toyota app stating that a collision has happened.

This incident had happened just a week after Kerala trip and getting it serviced. The damage costed us Rs.1,10,000, where Rs.1L were paid by the insurance and we had to pay just Rs.10,000 from our pocket.

FE figures:

As I said above, we are getting around 16-18 Kmpl in city traffic while on highways, we are getting similar or less mileage. I got 16 Kmpl overall during my trip to Kerala and I got 17.5 Kmpl (T2T) once when the car was new.

Overall, fuel costs are reasonable that we had spent Rs.15,000 (not joking) in total during our trip to Kerala, where we did 2000 Kms in total. If it was Fortuner or Endeavour or Crysta, it'd have costed more than that.

Would we buy this car again? Absolute YES, would get one eyes closed albeit in ZX(O) as we tend to keep this car for more than 5 years and has all modern features. We regretted not getting this variant as bookings were stopped at the time we booked ours and or at least VX(O) variant as it has all bells and whistles like factory fitted fog lamps, wireless CarPlay/Android Auto. This variant was launched just few days after booking the VX variant and was almost decided to change the variant to VX(O) but since we needed the car soon, we had to get the VX variant with 2 airbags. And, another regret was not waiting for VX with 6 airbags, which was added just after few days of purchase of ours.

My dad had almost decided to trade in this car for top variant or at least for VX(O) variant just for 6 airbags as he cares a lot about safety.

Overall, this car has impressed us a lot apart from the driveshaft issue and interior quality, which my dad doesn't care much about it.

After travelling in our car, a few of my friends had started considered getting this car due to the comfort it offered and FE even for a bigger car.

In fact, a friend of mine, who owns a 2020 Endeavour, was so impressed with the comfort that he wanted to get one retaining his Endeavour.

That's all for now!

Check out BHPian comments for more insights and information.