Indian Autos blog

Our reader Koushal Ghokle, who earlier tipped us on the E350′s whereabouts in Pune, now sends us proof of Tata testing the single cab Xenon on the very same roads. Spotted on the Pune bypass road, this car was doing speeds in excess of 100kph with its loading area filled with cans.

At present, Tata Motors sells the Xenon XT in India, which is the dual cab version. Tata had displayed the single cab version at the Delhi Expo last year.

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Skoda’s new city car would be based on the parent company VW’s Up! platform. The new car might be named “Popular.”

The Popular is aimed at developing parts of the world where there is an ever lasting demand for small and economical cars. The city-runabout would make its first appearance in 2012, and we’ve dug up evidence proposing its Indian connection a while ago.

Skoda is looking to establish itself as a compact car maker. It does have SUVs and grand sedans in the line-up, but its plans going into the future insists there will be more budget than frills and flair. There’s the bigger hatchback that will slot inbetween the Fabia and the Octavia and plans to make a low-cost Octavia for India and other Asian countries.

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With a lot of difficulty, I have read the translated version of teknikensvarld, a Swedish car magazine and this is how the story goes

What is the VW Up!?

The VW Up! is a concept which was shown to crowds at the Frankfurt Motor Show back in 2007. Similar to the Tata Nano, the VW Up! has its engine driving the rear axle and is placed under the rear seat.

Why did it spark our interest?

Simple. VW announced it will build the Up! in India back in 2007. A target price of around $7,500 was announced and it would compete with the smaller hatchbacks, such as the Hyundai Santro, Maruti Alto and the Chevrolet Spark in India. It was also rumored back then that VW would team up with Bajaj to see the concept through to an Indian production line.

What’s the latest information on the VW Up!?

An official announcement has arrived from VW that it will use Bratislava as a production centre for its Up! family of city cars from 2011 onwards. Bratislava is in the country of Slovak, the former borders Austria and Hungary.

The 2010 VW Polo was revealed at the Geneva Motor Show last month. It was one of the highly anticipated cars of 2009 given its long standing tradition of serving families with comfort, frugality and reliability.

Indians are new to the VW brand as they recently set shop in India and sell limited cars namely the Toureg, Jetta and Passat. We are rather fond of Skoda and recognize them for their Octavia and Laura, which have found heaps of buyers.

A renewed VW Polo hatchback and a sedan based on the Polo will roll out of VW’s Chakan Plant in Pune in 2010. VW’s Chakan plant will start functioning in April, producing sister compan Skoda’s Fabia, a year before original intentions. The underlying structures of the Skoda Fabia will be used to make the Polo and Polo sedan.

The 2nd edition of BAJA SAE INDIA will be held from Jan 30th to Feb 2nd at NATRAX (National Automobile Test Tracks) facility of NATRIP (National Automotive Testing R&D infrastructure project) in Peethampur, Indore. There is a dedicated facility and a separate dirt Motocross track where the ultimate Endurance Race takes place. (Very similar to Le-Mans with 58 buggies but lasts only 4 hours!).

The best part is that, IAB will feature all the teams taking part in the competition and the main event itself.

“Baja SAE India consists of competitions that simulate real-world engineering challenges. Students as a team are tasked to design, build, test, promote and race an off-road vehicle that will survive the severe punishment of rough terrain.

The vehicle must be safe, easily transported, easily maintained and fun to drive. The objective of the competition is to provide SAE student members with a challenge that mirrors the steps involved in introducing a new product into the Marketplace”.

Head of Tata Motors’ engineering department, Nagbhushan, said that Tata Motors has sent ‘Release Candidate Test Mules’ of its one-lakh car – The Nano from its Pantnagar plant to three cities DehraDun, Almora and Ranikhet in the state of Uttarakhand, where its test run would be conducted for a day or two – in order to check the cars road ability and to implement vital updates to the cars dynamics.

Linea is a C plus segment sedan, was launched internationally in May 2007 in Istanbul, after which it met with great success in all markets worldwide. An elegantly functional car, with a strong Italian imprint, it will be equipped with features found in higher segment cars.