RD Rides

Seldom in history do you find two cars this similar in intent and yet this different in execution. The Mahindra Thar is the personification of badass.  This is how big bad American off-roaders are made. The unmistakable Jeep styling, the tall stance, the bulging wheel arches, the huge 18 inch wheels and two very, very powerful engine options that make the Thar not only badass but extremely capable both on and off-road. The Jimny, on the other hand, is the personification of minimalism. It's a hermit who carries all his essential belongings with him in a small bundle of cloth. Small body, small tyres, small engine and two decade old gearboxes. All of this to ensure the car remains light on its feet and lives up to the "mountain goat" tag that its predecessor in India, the Gypsy had earned for itself.  In fact, so obsessed were Suzuki engineers with weight savings that they decided to even do away with essentials like bottle holders and cubby holes! Is this even a fair comp...

SUV. The car type that every buyer aspires to buy and the category that every manufacturer wants a piece of the pie of today. The result is quite cringeworthy, honestly. Give a car slightly more ground clearance than a typical sedan or hatchback and voila! You've designed an SUV! What hurts more is that these pseudo SUVs are some of the highest selling car models in the country today. Few SUV buyers even know what the S in the name SUV stands for. It stands for "sport". It means going higher, farther and deeper into terrain that few would dare to even enter. It means discovering new places, making new friends, experiencing new cultures and making new memories. More than anything else, it means freedom. Freedom from being limited by the road conditions or the terrain or the weather while choosing where to travel next. Sadly, very few cars available on a budget in India today can provide you with that freedom and the ones that do, are so one dimensional, they feel out of pl...

The Royal Enfield Super Meteor 650. What a name! In one glance you know it's a cruiser, a 650 twin and more capable than your non super Meteor 350. They could have simply named it the Meteor 650 but that would have been like serving idli without sambhar or dal without tadka or sushi without wasabi. The Super brings the zing in the name and in the way it makes you feel. Nobody does marketing better than Royal Enfield, you gotta give it to them for this one. The styling of the Super Meteor is that of a premium category cruiser. The top end Celestial variant, especially in the red and white paint scheme with its tall windscreen and pillion backrest looks like an Indian motorcycle from a distance. Like an Indian "Super" Chief to be precise. While the lower Astral and Interstellar variants look much like the Harley Davidson Dyna range of motorcycles. It's not a blatant copy like how the Thar - Wrangler relationship is. It's more of a true to the tee cruiser design wher...

The much awaited Jimny was recently showcased at the Nexa showroom, South Bombay. They had made quite an event out of it. There was a live band, compere, snacks and refreshments arranged for the pot bellied, middle aged enthusiasts eagerly awaiting the unveil. After being seated under loud music mostly comprising classic hindi songs (yeh mera dil pyaar ka deewana types) for over an hour, it was getting a bit irritating. The compere tried infusing some energy into the crowd by doing the typical "are you all excited? i can't hear you" drill. Finally, just as I was about to snap and walk out, they obliged and lifted the curtains off the sparkling bright Kinetic Yellow Jimny. My first impression as I saw the Jimny in the flesh was: what is it? Such was the scale of the hype created by Maruti and social media that the one word that came to my mind when I first saw the car was "underwhelming". The Jimny looks way bigger in photos and videos than it does in...

The Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara (GV henceforth for this review) is the lovechild born out of the Suzuki-Toyota love story. A match made in heaven if you ask me. This product had to work, especially for Maruti as since a very long time, the Creta had been ruling this segment singlehandedly. To make matters worse, Kia came in with the Seltos and made the Korean moat around this segment even stronger. So can the Japanese duo of Suzuki and Toyota break into the Korean fortress with the GV (and the Hyryder)? Lets find out.  We need to note that essentially there are 4 main engine-drivetrain combinations that the GV comes in and each one feels like a different car to drive. The car we're driving today is the all wheel drive or as Suzuki calls it, the AllGrip version that comes with the K15 mild hybrid engine mated to a 5 speed manual gearbox. Is it any good? Is it any fun? Lets find out. The GV AllGrip comes in only one variant: the top end Alpha. That means it gets all the goodie feature...

When Mahindra launched the all new Thar on the 15th of August 2020, it took the market by a storm. Not only did the Thar now look a lot more modern with the Jeep Wrangleresque looks, it had also become a lot more civilised on the inside. We now got independent front suspensions, automatic transmissions and creature comforts like cruise control, touchscreen infotainment system, built-in navigation, front facing rear seats and air conditioning (yes, this was optional in the previous Thar). We also got mightily powerful engines, both diesel as well as petrol making this the most powerful Thar yet. Needless to say, people from all over the country, particularly from the north, flocked to book the Thar and that sent the waiting periods to meteoric levels. Almost three years later, two big issues had cropped up in this dream run for the Thar: 1. Majority of Thar buyers would drive it on the road and would almost never go hardcore off roading. They too had to pay the extra price f...

The Toyota Urban Cruiser Hyryder is the first love child born of the Maruti weds Toyota blockbuster. With its DNA coming from two Japanese automotive giants, the Hyryder promises to be a child prodigy of sorts. Can it deliver? Lets find out.  So what genes does the Hyryder get from which parent? The chassis: Suzuki's Global C platform. The one on which the S-Cross for the global markets is based. Incidentally, this platform has a 5 star crash safety rating as well. Smug smile aimed at desh ka loha manufacturers. The Smart Hybrid Engine: This is Maruti Suzuki's tried and tested 1.5 litre, 4 cylinder K15C series petrol engine, assisted by a mild hybrid system to squeeze out the maximum efficiency from the last drop of fuel available. The Strong Hybrid Engine: This is the show stopper. Toyota's 1.5 litre, 3 cylinder petrol engine running on the Atkinson's cycle, assisted by an electric motor in a strong hybrid set up. This system has been perfected over decades...