What a car this is to drive on the hills. Also, the fuel efficiency for the trip was pretty impressive – around 18.5 kmpl.
BHPian jijivishu recently shared this with other enthusiasts:
Took mine on a Kedarnath and Badrinath trip last month. The Turanzas finally got some turns to shine out and the dry grip was phenomenal.
The ABS light notoriously started coming on and off before the trip, though not bothering the drive. Took it to the ASC, the SA said nothing bothersome if the driving ain’t impacted so went ahead with the trip.
However, things took a turn after Rishikesh. The ABS which wasn’t causing any issues in the plains, betrayed on the very first day in the hills. The car began to accelerate and de-accelerate itself without any throttle inputs, the needles started flickering with self-changing speeds, the screen showed 1st gear even in 2/3/4 gear, and the brakes not working (felt rough and metal-ish like there were no brake pads, though brake pads were new). Was a nightmare downhill for the first 2-3 times.
However, a simple pattern was sensed. Handbrake was working so that and lower gears/engine braking became best friends (I’ve only driven a couple of cars and engine braking on Polo seems very faint, correct me if I’m wrong. Is it a Turbo issue?). Every time the ABS light turned ON, the car was back in its glory but whenever it went OFF (usually for every half an hour after start), every minute felt like a hanging sword. Restarting the engine used to fix braking for a while but every time the ABS light didn’t show up, we never knew when the brakes would suddenly give up.
This happened like 30-40 times in our 5 days in the hills. Silver lining was that our usual 10 times a day stops were reduced to half. Apart from all that, what a machine this car is to drive on hills. That tuned with Turanzas made it quite a memorable drive (also for 3 cramped people in the back). Tank-to-tank mileage for the trip was somewhere around 18.5kmpl, impressive for 4/5 people in Himalayas.
Our route
- Day 1: Lucknow->Bareilly->Najibabad->Haridwar->Rishikesh
- Day 2: Rishikesh->Srinagar->Rudraprayag->Sonprayag
- Day 3: Kedarnath
- Day 4: Sonprayag->Rudraprayag
- Day 5: Rudraprayag->Karnaprayag->Joshimath->Badrinath->Nandaprayag (Market around the Badrinath temple is worth appreciation. Though they frown really badly upon bargaining, managed to get a few warm clothes at VFM quoted MRPs. Must try for inexpensive warm shawls, IMO)
- Day 6: (most fun to drive) Nandaprayag->Karnaprayag->Gairsen->Dwarhat->Ranikhet
- Day 7: Ranikhet->Kathgodam->Haldwani->Bareilly->Lucknow
Somehow the Polo’s stance looks much better with 5 people and luggage on board. Attaching a few pics…
The car would be going for the yearly service around the year end, ain’t opening a job card right now as there are no problems when driving in the plains. Any suggestions on what might be causing the above-mentioned issues?
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