Indigo, tata never approved but ASPI cars scammed . Review on Tata Indigo - CNG

I upgrader from Indica(DLE) to Indigo GLS fitted with CNG kit by company authorised Shrimankar Auto. Car total cost came to Rs. 5.65 lakhs with CNG kit. Beige interior is very pleasing and looks spacious than gray one.

As usual indigo is best in leg and head room and space inside. Indigo seat is lowered bt about 1-2 inches than indica hence it is less comfortable than Indica. Also lumbar and lower thigh support in Indica is better.

First day after taking delivery, it was difficult for me to understand how CNG engine perform. Also there was some problem with adjustment of flow next day I visited Shrimankar and they made me seat for about 30 minutes and addressed the problem, then car became very smooth. However still I am finding it difficult due to habit when engine change over from patrol to CNG.

Rear of car has became heavier. Tata should design little stiffer suspensions for CNG conversion and struts must be replaced when car is converted to CNG. Because of heavy rear it seems that car may become difficult to drive off roads and bad roads. I dont understand why cant OE people sells all composite CNG tanks, which weighs just 32-35 Kgs against 70-75 Kgs steel tanks. It may cost 10-20k more but car remains ligher and stable.

Engine is responsive, silent. Hoever it will take few days to understand auto switching of fuels, still it is little jerky especially in lower gears.

Update: 14/08/2007, It ran 270 KMS in 10 Kgs of gas fill. Means about 17.5 KMPKG of gas, in City driving of Ahmedabad with AC on.

UPDATE: 27 July 2010

Now its about 68000 Kms and almost 3 years. Performance was satisfactory so far. However recent experience made me very bitter about quality of services especially when it comes to resolution of highly technical problem. Some where in June 2010 last week car timing belt got snapped and it was toed to their authorized dealer Aspi motors, they took more than 10 days to repair and when gave back car engine started working very erratically. Too much of vibration, no smoothness, engine stall and stops, no power in low RPM and all sort of engine peroformance related problems started showing up.

Interesting part begun now, Tata authorized service station started blaming Shrimankar(Authorized gas kit fitters) for poor quality of kits they supplied and also told me stories about how it caused Indica Vista CNG failure in market. Finally Shrimakar motors suggested me to change CNG vaporrizer costing Rs. 7500.00. Still problem remained unresolved. Now ball was passed to petrol side of engine. Finally delear agreed that there is some problem in engine block. In total in lasst 30 days my car has remained in service station for more than 20 days without any resolution of problem. So moral of story is if you have CNG, one should prepare to tackle two agencies and customer is taken for ride by two agencies.

Edit 30/09/2010

After lots shouting and complaint to TATA motors, ASPI motors put sincere efforts to resolve engine problem. They gave me car on 16th Sept. Car is working about 80% of its original performance. However they refused to address problem of CNG. Though they have fitted CNG conversion kit. I have sent them mail regarding it and if they do not listen to my request, I am considering to drag TATA motors and ASPI motors to consumer court for cheating.

EDIT 20/03/2012

Car is working satisfactory, engine performance is  deteriorating. As per other CNG user loss of power and pick up is observed after 50-60 k kms. My car is clocking 90k kms on ODO. No other maintenance as such.