I bought the new Corolla Altis D-4D GL(Top variant of the diesel version) this year on the 29th of February, against the advice of a lot of my peers. Now, 3 months down the line, I'm very happy that I chose the Altis over the Jetta & the Cruze.
Before the purchase, every friend had to say that it is an under powered car, given the 1.4l engine churning out only 88bhp for such a big & heavy body.
I had an extensive research of the available diesel cars up to 20L and I'll agree my heart went out to the VW Jetta for it's immense drive-ability, both in the manual as well as automatic versions. Why I didn't choose it, please read my comparison 'Jetta vs Altis'
The Cruze also kept pulling at my heart strings, but the inside plastics were really cheap, not worth the purchase, I test drove a 1 year old car & there were peeling plastics inside.
Coming to the Altis, I was zapped after the test drive. maybe because I went into the drive expecting too little(read: under powered). The car felt surprisingly spritely considering the meager power on tap. Agreed, it is no racer, the Jetta & the Cruze will beat you at the red light shoot off, but, on a long drive, 200 kms down the road you'll overtake them with a big smile on your face.
I drove from Dwarka to Kumbhalgarh( approx 650km) in 11 hrs flat, and then climbed, on foot, all the way to the fort. Meaning, you can drive this car for hours & hours without getting tired from the unnoticed vibration of a diesel engine.
When you start the car you of course get the feeling that this is a diesel car, there is that slight rattling of the diesel engine, then you try to speed up & you feel a slight laziness. Once you are into 3rd gear you have started zipping and the car is very spritely in the 4th gear, overtaking is not a problem as told by many. Only you have to get used to driving a diesel. Please remember that the turbo hits between 1800& 2000rpm, keep your rpm in that band & you can actually beat the cars around you.
The mindboggling feature of this car is that you put it in 6th gear(this one has 6 forward gears!), hold a speed of 100~120 between 2000~2200 rpm and you can expect an average mileage of 26Kmpl+! The Cruze & the Jetta are frowning at a max of 13Kmpl. How's that for a loooong drive?
In fact, let me mention, that in city traffic, with the AC always on, I'm regulary getting 21Kmpl+ in my travel to & from office everyday. The Cruze & the Jetta will return a max of 10Kmpl.
The plastics inside are top notch, the braking is excellent, the shock absorption is immaculate, after the 3rd gear the engine putters down to the sound of a petrol engine, the seats are very very comfortable. This is one area I need not harp about, the riding comfort of the Toyota's are well known across the models across the world. The gearshift is short and very precise, you get a confident feel when shifting.
Since I got the top variant, HD lamps come as standard, but only for the near ones, the high beam is halogen. The steering wheel does not give you the constant vibration of a diesel. There's bluetooth connectivity to the stereo for up to 5 phones! The stereo comes with a 7" touchscreen which can also download & keep your phone book for dialing straight from touchscreen. The DVD video playback is as good as it can get. The audio quality could be better though, despite the 6 speakers.
The downside, if you ask me, is the provision of only 2 airbags. I would have felt safer & happier if there were 6, for the price of the car. Secondly, the head lamps & tail lamps protrude a little way outside the body of the car, this, I feel makes them more prone to damage in bumper to bumper traffic in the city. I've still not understood the logic of this design by the Toyota engineering design team. In the external looks department, as goes the tradition of Toyota, this car maintains a low profile on the road, not as appealing in design as the Cruze or Jetta. But it is far better looking compared to it's elder siblings under the Corolla badge.
Currently I have done 8700Km in the car including 2 long drives, both into Rajasthan and I'm very satisfied with the performance of the car. This is my first diesel car, I have driven Ford Fiesta Petrol & Mitsubishi Cedia petrol for the last 4 years, before purchasing this car and I'm very happy. I have had no difficulty in climbing the Western Ghats en-route to Kumbhalgarh, which I feared before undertaking the tour. Yes, I'll agree I have had to de-learn my ways of driving powerful petrol cars and re-learn driving as in a diesel car.
Overall I'll recommend this car for it's excellent build quality(switches, buttons, wipers, plastics), both inside & out, excellent mileage, excellent space inside the cabin and trunk, quietness in the cabin, excellent customer support and service. When buying this car keep in mind that you can't race around in this car alike the Jetta & Cruze(more so in the new Cruze, which is now even more powerful).
*Update after 35K Kilometers and a trip to Kolkata from Delhi:
Last year in the month of December I did a trip from New Delhi to Kolkata in this car, self driven all the way. First day I drove to Allahabad & took a night stop in Allahabad. Next day morning started at approximately 6am and was in Kolkata at 6pm. Total distance traveled was approximately 1500Km.
The road was fantastic all the way, the new GT road is something you have to experience to believe. All major towns have a bypass, the Allahabad bypass being an elevated bypass of approx 20Km. For these two days I drove the car from dawn to dusk without either of us getting tired. I found that both evenings, specially the second one, I did not feel as fatigued as I was myself expecting. All kudos to the cars excellent vibration damping and low engine noise.
Only one incident to report in the entire drive, just out of Allahabad, in the dark of the dawn I missed a slight step in the road where a flyover started off and hit it at a speed of approx 90Kmph, the car jumped and landed with a thud, I was afraid I had either broken an axel or misaligned the from wheels. None of that happened and the car happily completed the trip.
This year, in the month of June I made a trip to Mussourie. All my friends discouraged me to take the corolla for two reasons:
It's too under-powered for the climb;
It's too long for the hairpin bends on the way;
The car proved all of them wrong. I had absolutely no problems in climbing and no problems in negotiating the hairpins both ways. [Just for everyone's information I met a couple of BMW's(one was a 730) and a Jaguar on the way, I believe both cars are longer than the Corolla, though much more powerful.] The final climb was from the mall road to the Avalon resort which is extremely steep and I had my doubts whether my car could make it. Thankfully it did without breaking sweat.
Now at 35K+ on the odometer, I'm still glad I decided on this car. Considering this car as one of your options? Go for it.*
*Update after 59K Kilometers and a trip to Jaisalmer
Still very happy with the decision I took in 2012. The car has never surprised me with a single component malfunction, still on the original Bridgestone shoes. Now the time is arriving for me to buy a new set of shoes for my car and I'm contemplating getting the Yokohama Earth 1(215/60/R15) tyres. They have some good reviews to their credit on teambhp.com. Have changed the rear pair of brake pads in my last service(50K) will probably have to change the front ones in the forthcoming service(60K). Still getting a mileage of 23+ in daily driving.
One of the 6x9 speakers in the rear parcel tray has recently started stuttering even though I never ever crank up the volume to it's full. But that's a very small point, nothing to crib about after 2.5 years of excellent service. I look forward to replacing the rear pair soon.
What more can you expect from a car of this segment?*
