S. Muralidhar

I travel 80 km everyday commuting to and from office. The route is quite bumpy and many stretches of the road are bad. I currently own a Maruti Alto LX. While I get very good mileage (15 kmpl with the air-conditioner on and about 16.5 kmpl without the AC), I find the drive quality very uncomfortable in the Alto. The legroom is cramped and this results in knee pain, especially after a long drive. The seats too are very stiff and do not provide any relief to the back. I wish to upgrade to a better car which offers good mileage, has effective braking, is safe, provides a little higher seat to relieve the pressure on lower back and knees, has good suspension to soften the effect of the potholed roads, has very comfortable seats, effective air-conditioner/heater and is more spacious inside. I am not sure if the Hyundai Getz can offer good mileage. Is it worth waiting for Suzuki to launch the Swift? My budget is up to Rs 4.5 lakh. Which car would you recommend?

Anoop Maheshwari

Vikas K. N.

Except for the mileage part of your expectations, the Hyundai Getz would be able to satisfy you on all the other parameters. With the base GL variant priced close to your budget of Rs 4.5 lakh, this car should also be within your reach. This car with a 1.3 litre engine should only be able to come up with a mileage of about 9-11 kmpl in city driving conditions and an average of about 14 kmpl on the highways.

However, having waited this long, we recommend that you hold on for a few more weeks to be able to check out the Suzuki Swift before making the final decision .

The Swift promises to be an exciting package and the new 1.3 litre engine in this much-awaited Suzuki could be a winner, offering both peppy performance and decent mileage. The Swift has also been tested extensively on Indian roads and modifications to take on local road and climactic conditions must have been incorporated.

Of course, it will also come with the promise of fairly low maintenance costs in the long run, though it could still be higher than the comparable costs that you may have to foot for other Maruti cars such as the M800, Zen, Wagon R and Alto.

The Alto is meant to be a frugal performer, which focuses much more on fuel economy than on premium interior comfort. So, this reflects in the ride quality that the car offers. As such a distance of about 40 km one way on bad roads can take a toll on cabin comfort.

As for your knee pain, check your posture and seat position, before putting the blame entirely on the car. The ideal position would be where you are sitting upright gaining full support for your back from the seat rear cushion and your leg is stretched almost fully (not overstretched) when the clutch pedal is depressed.

I am 50 years old and live in Pondicherry. I have always been a bit of a late starter with vehicles and bought my first two-wheeler a Hero Majestic only by the age of 30. After switching to a Bajaj Chetak in 1997, I have been riding a bike — Hero Honda Splendor — for the past three years. I want to know whether at this age I can learn to drive a car. I intend shopping for a second-hand car.

V. Padmanabhan

Age should not be a deterrent for you to get to a driving school and learn how to use a car. Of course, you may take a while longer to come to grips with what they call road sense and develop a driving style of your own.

However, our suggestion would be that rather than going to a small-time local driving school, where the quality of training and attention to detail may be found wanting, you may join a Maruti authorised driving school.

These Maruti driving schools are being set up in collaboration with the company's dealers and a few select schools are also set to be equipped with simulators for safer driver training that will not involve getting on to the roads straight away. These imported simulators will enable learners to familiarise themselves with the controls of the car before they take the actual vehicle on the road.

The schools will also be manned by trained professionals and so the quality of training and sensitivity amongst the instructors to a relatively slow learner will tend to be better than the average local driving school. Check with Maruti dealers in your city about the location of such a school.

I am a house-maker and research scholar. I would like to buy a two-wheeler to go about within our institute's campus and some nearby places for shopping. Between the TVS Scooty (any model), Honda Activa or Dio, Kinetic Honda and Hero Honda Street, which one would you recommend? I am interested in a value-for-money scooterette that offers reasonably good mileage, has good storage space for keeping books, and so on, and can assure me of hassle-free maintenance.

PLK Priyadarshini

All the three — TVS, Honda and Kinetic — scooterettes will be equally good in terms of offering storage space for you to be able to carry both books and groceries. But the TVS Scooty Pep or the Scooty 2S may be the better option, if you are not too particular about power and would rather look for better fuel efficiency.

The Hero Honda Street Smart is not in production now and even if you shop for one in the used vehicle market, this step thro' may not be the option that will suit your requirements best.

The Honda Activa or the Dio and the Kinetic Honda are all more expensive options, much more powerful and may also feature a higher saddle height than the Scooty.

Priced at about Rs 40,000, all the three scooterettes will be almost Rs 9,000 more than the top end variant of the Scooty. The Scooty 2S is a 60cc, two-stroke, variomatic transmission scooterette and the Pep is a more stylish, slightly more powerful, 75cc-engine version.

Our recommendation will be the Scooty Pep for its style, better finish and material quality and the loads of storage space .

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