Indian Autos blog

Tata Motors has two roofless versions of the Tata Nano doing rounds inside Tata’s Sanand factory. The two Nano’s with their roofs chopped are used to ferry visitors at the Sanand plant.

The ‘yellow’ and ‘silver’ roofless Nanos have side stickering and sidesteps (we wonder why), which don’t really make a difference. The hub caps on the cars looks good too. The seats sport rich pitch black covers.

The Tata Nano’s roof, B- and C-pillars have been chopped off completely; as the Nano is a mix between a body-on-frame and Monocoque design, the removal of the roof would affect the rigidity of the frame greatly, as long as the base frame is untouched.

Would Tata Nano launch the world’s cheapest convertible? Highly unlikely. We think the Nano convertible’s chances in India are slim, even if its prospects are exciting (would be easy to get out in case of a fire! ).

This roofless Nano you see here will join the family of roofless Indigos and Wingers used to ferry guests around Tata’s plants.

Click here to see Indian Autos Blog’s exclusive renderings of the Tata Nano Convertible

Car Wale is reporting that Skoda India has postponed the launch of the Laura RS in India. The vehicle has been showcased in three important auto shows over the last two and a half years (Auto Expo 08, 10, Autocar Performance show 2010) and captured many people’s imagination.

The Laura RS, according to them, will go on sale only in the first quarter of 2011, possibly in the month of March. The vehicle in question will be equipped with a 2.0-liter turbocharged petrol engine capable of churning out 200bhp.

Two other Skoda models would make their debuts during the festive season of 2010. The Skoda Yeti, which we’ve given you a preview of, is set to step into the battlefield in September and the Fabia facelift is expected during October.

The Bajaj-Renault ULC planned for India in the next couple of years, could be branded as Dacia for certain European markets, a Swedish website suggests.

The Swedish website “vi bilagare” reports the Dacia ULC will be a direct competitor for the Tata Nano and will head to Europe in 2013. The European Dacia ULC could cost under 5,000 Euros. For less than 5,000 Euros, features such as electric windows, cd player and power locks won’t feature on the vehicle.

Interestingly, Dacia is also working on another small car dubbed by the European media as “Dacia City.” This is an urban runabout, measuring 3.5 metres and uses the Nissan Micra’s 1.2-liter petrol engine. It will have four seats and four doors, and many of the Logan’s components will be used in building this automobile.

We don’t look for a connection between the ULC and City, but Renault could re-brand Dacia products for India. This activity could start with Duster and many future Dacia vehicles can be bought in India as Renaults. Would the Dacia city, with familiar Logan underpinnings, be built in India in the future?

Mahindra and Mahindra, after tasting success in selling its utility vehicles in the urban market, may soon foray into the small car business, reports NDTV Profit. Mahindra is planning to invest around Rs. 1000 crore to expand its automobile business into the small car segment.

The small car segment contributes to over 70% of the passenger cars sold in India. Mahindra may be just planning to spoil the exploits of Maruti, Tata and Hyundai, who are the main players in this segment.

The new small cars, internally codenamed S101, S102 and S103, would be completely built on an all new platform. These small cars could be priced between Rs 2 lakhs to 5 lakhs. Mahindra is planning to introduce these small cars by 2013-14.

According to sources, Mahindra and Mahindra has roped in the renowned Italian design studio, Stile Bertone, to design the looks of the car. This comes as a huge relief to us, as we wouldn’t have the strength to tolerate seeing a small car penned by Mahindra’s in-house designers.

Stile Bertone helped Mahindra with the preliminary design of the Xylo.

Mahindra would mainly be targeting its arch rival Tata Motors, which is doing extremely well in the small car segment.

Mahindra is all set to enter the compact car segment with its mini-Xylo SUV soon, which is currently being tested. The response to this car might have a considerable effect on the Mahindra’s small car approach. Mahindra could also develop a new range of small, frugal petrol and diesel engines for the new small cars.

With Mahindra taking over Maini , can we also expect Mahindra badged electric cars, as Mahindra usually utilizes all the possible options when it comes to making automobiles?

Chevrolet has built a special edition of its new Spark (Beat) to be used as a pace car during World Touring Car Championship races this year.

The WTCC Spark comes with a 1.4-liter petrol engine which is turbocharged producing 140 horsepower! The addition of just 200cc and a turbo enables the Spark pace car to give 60hp more than the Indian spec Beat.

The turbocharged WTCC Chevrolet Spark will make debut at the Zolder event in Belgium on June 19-20.

click through for press release

Indian Autos Blog brings you this before anyone else

Mitsubishi Motors today confirmed that the highly anticipated Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 10 will be launched in India during the second week of July. Over the last two and a half years, the Lancer Evo has made news on every major newspaper, magazine, TV Channel and online portal in India.

Mitsubishi India official -

We will launch the Mitsubishi Lancer Evo in India during the second week of July. This will be the latest generation Lancer Evo FQ300 which is one of the expensive variants, currently selling globally.

The tenth generation Mitsubishi FQ-300 has a turbocharged 2.0-liter in-line 4-cylinder engine that can deliver 300PS of power at 6500 rpm and 407 N·m torque at 3500 rpm. The exact power and torque figures for the Evo could be altered as Mitsubishi would have tuned its ECU to work with Indian fuel quality (read lower quality, often adulterated).

Mitsubishi has finally decided to set the Lancer Evo free in India, and we’re extremely excited to say the least. We would know the price and technical specifications of the vehicle only on the day of the launch. Stick on to the pages of IAB for more information regarding the vehicle.

The development of the Tata Nano Europa is underway and Tata would be launching the Nano Europa by 2012-13. It is official that the Nano Europa will come with a petrol variant, followed by an electric version.

The gasoline engine in the Tata Nano Europa could be a sub-1 liter 3-cylinder engine coaxing out 45bhp. Married to a 5-speed manual transmission, it is capable of returning 24 kilometers to a liter. This engine would produce CO2 emissions of less than 100 gm/km and in the process passing strict Euro 5 emission norms.

The Tata Nano Europa EV is also going to be launched alongside the petrol variant. The Nano Europa EV would come with an electric motor capable of producing 55bhp and achieving a top speed of 120kmph.

The range of the Nano Europa EV is said to be a very respectable 150 kilometers on one full charge. Charging time for the batteries is around 6 hours. The Nano EV would is certainly heading to Spain.

The million dollar question is: would Tata upgrade or modify the Indian Tata Nano when the Nano Europa is fully developed? Would the Indian Nano get more refined powertrains? If Tata doesn’t offer additional options and refinement, then the Nano and the Europa would become totally different cars which looking similar.

Though the cost of the Nano Europa is almost double the Nano, differences between the cars are huge – the Europa is way safer and gets more capable engines and transmissions.

The Tata Nano is a low cost car and we can’t complain much about quality issues. But when it comes to the car’s reliability (that is the longevity of the car), rattling noises, brake lock-ups and the finer details, it leaves a lot to be desired from the Nano.

Tata Motors would have a chance to correct these glitches in the Indian Nano when the Nano Europa is ready, but if Tata chooses to ignore them, we will have to wait for the Tata Nano Mark II to see a better Nano, just like how the Indica and Sumo Grande panned out.

The Tata Nano would certainly be cheap, but not all that value-for-money.

Mitsubishi is planning to bring about some radical change in the Evo 11, which will hit markets in the few years. The switch comes in the form a diesel-electric powertrain to keep it in the race as the diesel electric combo will help fight emission standards and economy impacts.

Autocar UK claims in a meeting held in Japan last month, Mitsubishi talked itself out of the petrol-hybrid option along with it went the concept of basing it on the PX-MiEV SUV concept’s platform.

The diesel engine brings along with it a whole lot of hope – The combined torque of the electric motor and the diesel engine could catapult the Evo 11 to 60mph from standstill in well under 5 seconds, yet maintain the co2 emissions in the sub 200gm/km, well within the asking rate.

The revised version of the Evo’s four-wheel drive system, S-AWC, which integrates steering, braking and traction control should make the car even better to drive.

The diesel-hybrid is an expensive option, but what the pundits say is diesel is yet to catch up in some important markets where the Evo has a huge presence, and this gamble to avoid being impacted by emission standards, could end Mitsubishi up in a fatal head-on collision with something even more catastrophic.