Motoring 2.0: July 2008

Mahindra's much awaited Two Wheeler (Kinetic) Ride

Today Mr.Anand Mahindra,Vice Chairman and Managing Director of Mahindra Group made a much awaited announcement, the acquisition of Pune based Kinetic Motors Company Ltd.It was an end of much spread rumors and unofficial talks in industry circle.Mahindra spends a sum of 110Cr ores for this acquisition.

This acquisition will be a win-win situation for all parties. Kinetic's recent years performance was not that commendable. The ailing firm couldn't succeed in launching a good model after Kinetic Honda.Meanwhile their old pals HMSI making good success in same field.

Mahindras were watching two wheeler segment carefully and looking for a entry into this lucrative market. By this acquisition Mahindra gets access to the supplier and distribution of two wheeler segment. Mahindras had taken over an engine design house in Italy recently, definitely they can make many technological improvement in existing Kinetic Motors product ranges. We can expect many more in pipe line,just wait and watch [Source Mahindra.com]

Tata Nano Booking Started?

Those who read this title will be curious enough to read the full story. Even we were also eager to rush to the website www.tatanano1.com. If you Google ?Tata Nano?, in the first page itself above website will catch your attention. Once you enter the website you can see it is flooded with the details available in the media.

The first impression of the website itself gave us a red signal. When went into the other pages our doubt got more strong. There is a page ?book now? will give you impression that Tata Motors has officially started the booking of Nano. The form asks for personal contact details.

Please enquire about the genuineness of the website before you furnish the details. Here you can view the official Tata Nano website.
And if you need further details please drop your queries here.
We Think Tata Motors should definitely look into such issues.

Nano?s local rivals booting up ?

?Nano? the ace from Tata Motors was the big buzz of world automobiles industry in 2008. Amidst of speculations nano launched in Jan-2008 at ninth auto expo, New Delhi. Barely three months two Indian business houses unveiled their low cost car business plans.

The first to announce low cost electric car was Gujrat based Ajanta Industries. Ajanta group is banking upon their strong R&D set up and supplier base. Ajanta is planning to launch a car with cost tag well below 1lakh.

Another Gujarat based firm Field Marshal Group announced their small car plan. Field Marshal is in talks with their counterpart for technology.
Not only Tata will be concerned by these plans other players like Maini group, Hero group may also be eagerly watching the developments.

Beat The Fuel Price With Koolpool

Majority of us will blame government for for repeated fuel price hike.There may be many external factors which force government to hike the price.Here we are explaining you how a team of responsible citizens in Mumbai beats the fuel price. The Koolpool - A Ride sharing concept - was set up by Mr.Joshua D’Souza in 2003 and since then it became a success.

The concept of Koolpool was brain child of Mr.Joshua D’Souza and got a complete form when entrepreneurs Ashok Datar and Chetan Temkar joined him.Koolpool definitely attacking the most serious problem - vehicle population in the city.

Here you can read how the Koolpool works.

But the home page of their website says right now only 764 members have been enrolled.While comparing the traffic figures in Mumbai city it is not even the tip of iceberg. We hope the travellers will definitely look into this alternative and take benefit of this pool service.[Source:-Koolpool]

Fiat Blue&MeTM = Music + Mobile on Move?

The Italian automobile major Fiat is lining up its products to re-enter Indian market. The second innings partner of Fiat SPA in no other than Tata. Both Tata and Fiat leveraging on other?s capability. Tatas have a very strong infrastructure support and Fiat is posses great designing capabilities.

Fiat already finalized two models for India, Fiat 500 and Bravo. Both the models expecting to hit Indian market within few months. One different design feature in both above model is ?Blue&MeTM?, which is a combination of mobile and music application. Fiat developed this technology with the help of one and one only Microsoft. With Blue&MeTM one can play music in different digital format including MP3/WMA/WAV and plug in a USB drive too.

Next you can interface up to five mobile phone with this music system, but at a time you can use only one mobile(which was used last). To add the glamour the owner can feed mobile phone book and dial/receive call by just saying the name without taking your hand from steering. This is a one time activity . Making/receiving a call is possible through a Bluetooth device. Blue&MeTM capable of reading SMSs for you .What else you need?

Heard lot about innovation from Fiat and Microsoft, but we believe a doubt might have born in your mind. The Motor Vehicle Rule says mobiles even with hands free will attract bitter fine. If you are a music freak and ready to pay some extra bucks(only if police stops you) be ready to enjoy Blue&MeTM.So how to come out of this jungle? Only Fiat can say Source
tata-fiat

Unclutter Your Car

Have you ever felt that your car is filled with unwanted things?. Here is your solution. Blogger Sue Brenner of unclutterer.com gives you excellent solution for this problem. We are summarizing the tips into a ?three bags system?.

She suggests keep three bags, name one as "Does Not Belong Here." Second as "Give Away/Return," and label the third one, "Storage." I am sure that you will see all items in your car falling in these three bags. Now you can decide the place of first bag either dust bin or your home.

The benefits of keeping your car is explained by she very well. The blogger Gina Trapani of lifehacker adds one more advantage of keeping unwanted things away from your car. She recalls that her bottle opener become a sludge hammer when she met with an accident.

unclutterer.com [Via lifehacker,Image motortrend ]

Tata Nano Kins In Pipe Line

Ratan Tata's Yesterday's annual general body address was quiet interesting.He gave a much awaited official update about Nano.The launch strategy and further game plan. The key parameter of Indian driver - fuel efficiency - of Nano is 23 Km/ltr as per Ratan. He laughed off the claims that Nano will worsten the traffic chaos in Indian road.

He hinted about a all new plan, the electric variant of Nano being developed in association with a Norwegian firm. We believe that firm may be Think who introduced electric cars in North American markets.The electric variant of Nano has been named 'Echo'. Here we have displayed a concept car (OX) displayed by Th!nk this year.

Further Mr.Tata talked about the development of highly fuel efficient Nano being developed in Thailand.Seems Tata Motors is now a became a very happening place!! [Picture Courtsey think]

It's End Of General Motors Era?

Today Newyork Times reported the growth story of Toyota, Japan in worldwide vehicle sales. It outperformed arch rival General Motors by a margin of nearly eight lakhs.The 77 Year old General Motors record found shaking in first quarter too.

The U.S major facing serious troubles in its home turf as well as abroad. The american domestic market doesnot shows the hint of recovery. Hope you remember General Motors recently announced the closure of its four SUV plants in U.S. and plans of Hummer sell off.

Read the full story here [Picture Courtesy caradvice.com.au ]

Mahindra Describes Tata's JLR Takeover as India's Pride

After long speculations TATA acquired Jaguar and Land Rover(JLR). The contestants for the JLR were apparently Indian born Mahindra and Mahindra and Tata Motors. Due to the strategic reasons finally Mahindras pulled back from the race.That opened the way to Tata's take over of legendary JLR.

This week Mahindra and Mahindra's corporate blog mahindrauniverse spotted a post 'A single swallow does not an Indian summer make'. The blog speaks about the scenario before and after the takeover.

Its quiet interesting to see the type of sportsmanship is being seen between two rival companies. The author describes the act as India's victory and explains how Tata could finish the take over.

Book A Test Ride Of All New Thunder Bird twin Spark 2008

All Bullet fans must have noticed the happening launch of all new Thunder Bird twin spark 2008.Royal Enfield has kept the basic structure of old generation Thunder Bird untouched.

Thunder Bird Twinspark 2008 comes with much refined aesthetics,power,torque. On top of that the erognomics also improved significantly. So now I feel you will be looking for a chance to ride one. Here you can learn about ThunderBird

India's First Online Truck Bazar From eBay

Have you ever imagined a prospective truck owner going to cyber cafe to select a used truck? Probably 'NO' but time turned it to YES.Last week one of the pioneers in online shopping eBay made it possible by launching their online truck bazar.

The site trucks.ebay shows eBay has very ambitious plans. If you had a glance of the website you might have noticed that approximately 1050 used trucks already available for purchase. All indian manufacturers are present in the store. The list includes trucks,tempos,three wheelers,construction equipments etc.

eBay website has been desinged in very user friendly manner including option to use regional langauges. Good news for used trucks sellers and buyers.

Car Door That Disappear

Today morning I stumbled upon a forwarded mail from my collegue with a title " Door that Disappear", initially the title gave me a impression of any funny mail from third party hosted sites. But to my surprise the video features the working of retractable doors from Jatech LLC, California.

I visited the site disappearing-car-door.com in the search of more details, It gave sufficient details about the retractable car doors including the history of the company and its development process. Here I am adding some snaps that explains how this revolutionary door system works. The devoleper of this door claims approx, 4Million hits around the world recorded in their website .

The manufactures asserts that this can be incorporated in all types of vehicles (car, truck, coupe, convertible, vans, hatch backs) in 2,3,4,5 door combinations. The website lists many minor and major advantages out of which we are listing some of them relevant

1. Very suitable for a physically handicapped driver.
2. It requires less parking spaces compared to normal doors.
3. Wont harm others while opening of the swing out doors.
4. Better safety by monitoring the door operation and status(close/open)

Hope down the line we may be able to operate the door at a push button control. [Thank You Sunil]

Electric (Toy) Car From The Big Daddy

If you think its a toy car then excuse me you are wrong. This is a masterpiece from one of the Big Three , none less than Chrysler Corp. This small wonder named GEM has been produced by Global Electric Motors[gemcar] a part of Chrysler Corporation of US. The maker of GEM claims many environmental friendly benefits.

GEM car was introduced for low speed application more for merry driving enthusiasts. The vehicle comes with completely electric powered. The Gem comes with all features that an average cars must have. What is more Chrysler gives 12/24 months limited warranty. This car requires a 110VAC plug point for charging and each charging cycles requires approximately 8:00Hours.

Heared a lot about the little wonder like Tata Nano ? now the bitter reality the cars are only availabe in US . To learn more

Visit gemcar today!

Pic Credit

A Blue Toothed Lock For Your Car

Today canadiancontent.com reported a very ambitious project by four grooming engineers from Coimbtore,Tamilnadu,India. Four students of Tamilnadu Engineering College,Coimbatore developed an anti-theft device based on Bluetooth technology.

The device has been designed to immobilize the car within the Bluetooth range probably five meters. If an intruder try to move the car this device automatically shuts down the engine and switch on the burglar alarm. What more you need the device will help you to catch the burglar by locking the doors of the cars.

The total cost of the project was Rs.3000, which can be brought down while launching this device in mass scale. Now the inventors of this unnamed device planning to protect the intellectual property right of this device.

Hope this effort will definitely a good news for car owners. Link canadiancontent.com

Electric Vehicles a sudden battery discharges?

In a span of three years we seen introduction of many electric vehicles in different segments. The mass scale debutant was Reva from M/s Maini Group of Bangalore(Till then Maini was active player in battery operated material handling equipments). After a short break we seen an active show from different electric two wheeler manufacturers from different part of India. Spectators received the electric locomotives with much enthusiasm. But none of them could impress the customer much. At present we have manufacturers ranging from Hero Motors (Hero Honda Motors Group) to Electrotherm( Manufactures of induction furnaces for industrial applications) of Gujarat.

Two wheeler market maintained a two digit growth rate but electric powered two wheelers couldn?t follow the same story. What went wrong? How to find the root cause? Its difficult to answer this question so easily we can narrate some possible reasons behind the sudden rupture of electric vehicle bubble,

1. Except Hero Motors no other manufactures have core domain experience, remember that Hero Motors key strength is in petrol powered vehicles
2. Launch of multiple models from different manufactures caused a flood in a market which is not prepared. We saw approximately 25 models in the last 2 years.
3. Poor sales, service network of new entrant in this field.
4. Suitability of the product is not accepted by customers due to bad products selection.
5. Lack of infrastructure support like charging points, spare parts availability, and lack of service personnel.

Do remember that electric vehicles come with many interesting features like low operating costs, no need of registration and insurance, easy to operate and eco friendly to some extend. Manufacturers like Maini and Electrotherm had announced launch of further models in different segment like city transport buses, two wheelers, but still they are in pipe line. The delay in new launches is a worry point of Eco friendly vehicle spectator. We hope the manufactures are working hard to resolve the short comings happened in past and will come out with hot selling vehicles soon.

Sumo Grande is Here

Its really interesting to see that all automobile manufacturers delivering their promises made in 9th Auto Expo. Now it is Tata?s turn they launched their all new Sumo Grande. Grande didn?t attract much media attention as its precedor people?s car Nano. No doubt team Grande has done a commendable job by totally redesigning the Sumo Victa into a new avtar.

Sumo Grande have already launched across India last week and we have already spot many Grandes on field, that shows the Grande has made a strong entry in the market. It is worth to note the positioning of Grande having priced around Rs.7 lakh, carrying a utility vehicle image it enters the SUV segment. Sumo Grande is available in three variants. By adding Grande into product wagon Tata clearly wants to make a strong dent in Mahindra?s UV and SUV segment dominance.

Grande is available in many vibrant and eye catching colours. The front grill has been modified very thoughtfully. The usage of curves in the bumpers, bonnet and rear pillars has improved the styling a lot. The tail lamp and indicator unit has been set a new bench mark in UV/SUV segment. Grande sports very superior interiors and the seating arrangement also has undergone a root level modification.

Grande comes with three row seat arrangement, the second row angle can be adjusted for a comfortable sleep. Sumo has been powered by the same engine which Victa holds. Tata claims the turning radius of Grande is 5.25mtr which is comparable to a small car. The steering wheel, driver seat also can be adjusted to an ergonomic driving position.

A Frog To Watch Your Fuel Pond...!

Bored of monitoring the fuel efficiency of your car? There is a solution for you. Here is your help, check out fuelfrog.com and create an account its very simple. Creating account is a very simple procedure it won?t make more than one min.

Now the monitoring part, after the login to your account you have to start entering the kilometers covered, quantity of fuel filled and cost of fuel. This is bit cumbersome for Indian drivers as ?fuelfrog? is mainly designed for western countries. The quantity of fuel to be fed as gallons. But its quiet simple just divide the figure in liters by 4 to be precise 3.8.

Even though the data entry requires some minutes it will help you in calculating the fuel efficiency trend of your precious metal. This is particularly helpful to monitor the performance of different brand of fuels.

So join fuelfrog.com and keep an eye on your fuel cost.

Fiat 500 - Fiat 'Big Small Car' Launched

The Fiat 500, the relaunch of 'Cinquencento' designed by Dante Giocosa before 50year happened in India,on 17th July.The launching was done in a glittering ceremony at Mumbai.
The development of this wonder machine is quiet interesting as the price of the machine. The drowning Fiat launched a website www.fiat500.com and invited suggestions from onlookers.Millions of suggestions poured in,the ideas spread from the car design to advertisement campaign.
Now bit about the machines, it is powered by 1242cc,1368cc and 1248cc petrol and diesel engine.The 500 can be customized to approximately 50000 different varieties. The 500 is packed with full accessories include Bluetooth and Me.The tragedy is its quite over prized for Indian market, it come with a price tag of Rs.1500000.
[Source:- rediff ,Picture Credit:- paultan]

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