Long Term Review 2

The Vento TSI makes for a perfect everyday car with its small direct-injection turbocharged petrol engine and lightning quick dual-clutch DSG automatic transmission. It has been quite a companion on the everyday city commutes returning a respectable efficiency of around 11kmpl. The highway figures of the long term however were unknown, so with the aim of shedding light on them, it was time to do the customary Mumbai-Goa-Mumbai drive.

The target was to reach Goa in one tank of fuel with a little detour that would add another 50km to the journey. A total of 650km on a single tank of petrol does seem like a stretch, but the Vento has a 55-litre tank (much larger than any of its rivals) and that makes things relatively simple. With a planned detour around Pune, selecting the route became simple – head all the way down to Nipani on NH4, take a right for Amboli ghat, crossover on to NH17 at Sawantwadi, take a left, enter Goa and continue straight to reach Panjim.

A daytime drive meant additional traffic on the highways, which in turn meant lower speeds and liberal usage of the brake pedal. The trick was to get maximum efficiency on the Expressway with cruising speeds between 100kmph and 120kmph. Looked like I succeeded, since after crossing Pune, the fuel gauge still showed full tank and DTE was around 600km.

The next 250km four and half hours was the main test. The NH4 till Satara is under works with multiple diversions, plus the traffic all the way to Kolhapur is dense. The best way to tackle this was in automatic mode, letting the car select the gear ratios. On my part, I kept a light foot on the throttle, stayed above 80kmph as far as possible and did not lose patience over traffic.

It still took a toll on the efficiency, by the time I reached the right turn for Amboli, the tank showed little over quarter with 180km to go. The information was confusing, the car had consumed too much or the gauge isn’t even close to being precise. It seems the latter is the probably reason, since I covered the remaining distance with 12 litres to spare, averaging just over 15kmpl over the entire journey. 41 litres of petrol to Goa is more than decent for a petrol automatic, especially for the one that can be so much fun to drive.

The return journey was exactly the opposite; a time trial with the intention of getting to Mumbai in less than nine hours. Leaving early morning from Goa helped (I need a pat on the back for self-control and determination to make it happen), hitting the road at 7 am meant the half the battle was won. There was no traffic till I reached Kolhapur, and whatever little that I found later, the sports and manual modes of the seven-speed DSG gearbox made a mockery of it. I made it back in eight hours, and of course the efficiency was lower, 61 litres to cover the same distance with the car returning close to 10.5kmpl.