Intelligence Inside!. Review on Chevrolet Cruze 2012

Its been more than 5 years since I wrote on MouthShut and a little over an year since I own Chevrolet Cruze LTZ model! I think an experience of over an year has given me enough perspective about this Sedan to share a view with you!

The Dilemma (Not the review yet; For Review, please scroll down...)

My choice of Cruze was not an obvious one, not least because it was just a month old in the market! I started checking out cars in the C segment earlier such as Honda City and Fiat Linea however didn't find them very exciting. So I thought maybe its worth checking out the next segment as well and I went to check out Skoda Octavia but my eyes got fixed on the New Laura which had a suave exterior and a sophisticated interior feel! Octavia seemed like a bland loaf of bread in comparison. But Laura was beyond my reach then (~INR 14.5+)..So I checked out the Civic which was such a big disappointment for me...

I wondered why Honda wouldn't interchange the new City and Civic models- The City looked much better to me! Anyways, then there was a buzz around the launch of Cruze but also with a bit of caution since it belonged to GM- the company that had recently gone bankrupt in the US (...but few people cared to dig that it had been acquired by the US government (51%)and sold to GM Korea (49%)). I think it is this damage to brand image that prompted GM to launch a very intelligent and sophisticated product at a very competitive price- so competitive that today the Civic and New Laura have scaled down their prices below Cruze but cant match its sales whereas the Cruze has scaled up its price by a lakh and still sells like hot cakes!

The Review on Chevrolet Cruze LTZ Model

I'd say if you are contemplating buying a D segment car, you would already know a lot about the cars in this segment through the auto blogs. So I am going to focus in this note from a user's perspective. Having bought the sedan, the first thing that strikes you on a highway is that its power seems limitless for the best of Indian roads. I could just overtake other cars on the highway in a flash and see then left behind half a mile in my rear view mirror in a matter of split seconds! I have touched 170km/hr on the Greater Noida Expressway without a sweat and its only the traffic that restrains you from going further. Thats about speed and power. No complaints there, only more surprises. Enough said.

Talking about being an economical car, first of all it runs on Diesel which brings down your operating costs by 30% right at the start. I get a mileage of 12.3 km which is I think is not expensive to run a car of this size. And in the last one year, I have just spent INR 3000 on a service as far as maintenance goes.

One downside that I do face however is that if you get a scratch, you will have to get the whole panel painted which costs INR 4000/ panel. So thats where you would burn your money here. In terms of rear seat space, I have been told by my guests the seat behind is not very comfortable (I feel there is too much of a slide) or that the leg space is not enough. Also I have noticed that when the car is full with 5 adults, it does tend to hit on the high bumpers on the roads. I have also read on other blogs about the expensive spare parts, especially the PEPS/ sunroof motor replacements but haven't experienced about it, so you might want to check about those before making a purchase decision. Initially I also did feel the Turbo lag but that is something that you will get attuned to and will not be a bother after a month of use.

So if a car has great power (2000cc), is fast (170km+ smooth) and has decent fuel economy and low maintenance costs, and is cheaper than its competitors, you would say its a good deal already! But I want to highlight one more point that the eager salesman in the GM showroom will choose to ignore and that is that this is an Intelligent car. Its intelligence comes handy in its bitsy quirks that you'd miss if you dont actually own it. Here are a few examples: It has an auto-wiper, it wipes off your windscreen whenever it rains before you think about it. Another one- if you are in the car in switched off mode listening to music, it will auto-halt the music every ten minutes to ensure the battery doesn't run out if you have left it on by mistake and gone off! The Cruise Control (though well advertised) is another good feature on long drives.

I also like steering mounted audio controls (believe me that was my reason to choose LTZ over INR 1.5  Lac cheaper LT model!) and guess the key less entry and push button are nice to haves in this era too! Plus you also get a sun/moon roof and when you have all these features, you begin to think of Civic and Laura as inferior me-toos and it completely outclasses others like Octavia etc. I feel its dealers are also professional enough unlike Skoda.

Overall, a modern car which is fun to own and drive. I intend to attain an ROI + some benefits over 8 to 10 years of which I just finished my first year!