I wasn’t rich enough to purchase this piece of art when it was released way back in the 90’s but I admired it like nuts when I saw it glide thru the roads. I did get one of these after my last car, which was a Maruthi Esteem (1996 VX). The Esteem was a good car and I used it for about 2 years which was mostly trouble free for me and was worth the money I paid for it. Once I was done saving up and got a good deal for my Esteem I just had to go for the City(the one with the old looks) since I honestly didn’t feel the new one looked that great. At first, I was looking for either of the 1.3 or 1.5 since down here at Bangalore, the old City’s are quite highly priced but while I was on with my search, I came across this beautiful Champane Gold Vtec 2002.
After a test-drive (which went quite bad since I almost caused a traffic jam), I decided to buy this one whatsoever because I just went super charged and overwhelmed after driving it. Its seer power (over 100bhp) and handling were the first things that impressed me the most and the ride as a whole was just pure awesome. My dad owns Hyundai Accent and honestly I’ve never found it thrilling to drive it unless I rev it to over 3000 rpm but this car goes for 0 – 5000 rpm almost instantly and with all that power it gives you cant even figure how fast it can get which ironically becomes one of the flaws in the car. In a city crowed with everything from domestic animals to trailers and with people who has the least of either courtesy or etiquette for the skill of driving this
car just makes you feel that nothing else is moving around you.
However, to make the most out of my car, I just rely on my office cab to traverse to my work place and use my car on the weekends or for long trips. It’s just been a couple of months since I’ve got this one and I’m enjoying every moment of it… I’m not quite sure of the new Vtecs you get in the market but all I can say is if your going for a second hand vehicle try the ones that came before 2003. It looks hot even as of today, give awesome mileage (about 14km/ltr with air conditioning) and I bet would out perform even the latest
Maruthi SX4 (100 bhp) if tired. Yeah, true I accept that the service of Honda dealers can never match up with Maruthi’s and this car has smooth suspensions, which is great but not for a country with roads filled with potholes. These are all but minor hiccupscompared to what it actually delivers. I would recommend it to anybody who has the passion of driving because trust me this one will most likely quench your thirst. I’d like to end it with what Jeremy
Clarkson says, **“Over a 100 million Vtecs sold as of today and every single
one of them are still running”.........
*OK every thing sounds good but I’ve got a little update here....Recently I had my car serviced at Dakshin Honda in Bangalore. It was just a normal service and I had nothing wrong with my car when I gave except a dent on the boot which thankfully an auto gave me on a rainy day. But after the insurance claim for that I thought why not get it serviced too… When I did receive it back I had this yellow engine light flashing on the dash right when I took off from the service station. Obviously concerned I took it back immediately and was informed that an O2 sensor has died. Now this at first sounded weird because the mechanic had mentioned this over a phone call then I figured I’d have to
shell 17 grand to get that repaired. Now my question was how could that happen when the car wasn’t even driven over a KM after I’ve delivered it to the service station?? It was perfectly alright
when I gave the damn car for servicing??? They weren’t able to answer me….
I kept questioning people but there were of no help. They finally raced the car like mad and got the light to go off but it came back on the very moment it took it out...I’ve written to Dakshin about this incident but haven’t got any response yet..... Just feel like Honda may be a nice brand after all but if your looking for customer satisfaction, I bet this wouldn’t be the right choice after all It was utterly disappointing, though I’m not disappointed with my car; yes the service bought me down real bad.
I guess I’d just opt for Whitefield Honda servicing now and hope you guys don’t fall into the same pit...