ZEN ESTILO

The car had a loyal fan following that had fallen for the car's jellybean design. But with the entry of more players and choice in the compact car segment widening, the Zen's design did seem less attractive, though it still had the trusted, peppy and rev-happy engine that was a delight to drive for the enthusiast and the novice alike. The experience of the engine is mind blowing.

The Zen should win the top honours in TNS' Total Customer Satisfaction Study 2006 under the premium compact segment, ahead of the Hyundai Santro and the Tata Indica, no doubt made Maruti sit up. The company also divined the Zen's undiminished image amongst the young and the old, as also among the performance and the style conscious alike.

The Zen brand is quintessentially Japanese and with its strong recall, Maruti-Suzuki was not going to let it die. So, after a breather, the Zen is back adorning the panels of a completely new premium compact car. Here's the new Zen Estilo, the all-new small car from Suzuki with a refreshed, but recognisable brand name.

Spanish twist
The Zen Estilo (with a lowered emphasis on the `t', Spanish style) is, even as the name seems to suggest, an amalgam of Japanese simplicity and European chic. Put together to conform to the standards of a `monoform' design, the car is for the most part a carry forward of the original Suzuki MR Wagon, the Japanese parent's popular small car.


Now the fact that everyone everywhere is talking about how The MR Wagon was introduced in 2000-01 and sold only in Japan for about four years, before it was withdrawn last year. The car is about a generation old by definition, but barely looks the age. After some quick redesigning and re-engineering to partially change the looks at the front and the rear and for integrating the relatively bigger 1.1-litre Wagon-R engine (the Japanese version was offered with a 660cc engine), Maruti managed to roll out the car from within about 18 months.

The Zen Estilo shares its platform with the Alto and the Wagon-R. Maruti has shrewdly commonalised a number of parts of the Wagon-R for the new Zen, enabling a good cut in costs. One key part that is also shared is the powertrain.
The same 1,061cc, four-cylinder engine and five-speed gearbox combo that power the Wagon-R have been strapped on to the new Zen. The engine's characteristics are identical, putting out a peak power of 64bhp at 6,200 rpm and maximum torque of 84Nm at 3,500 rpm.






DESIGN AND INNOVATION
The new Zen Estilo's monoform design concept has quite a fan following. This is not the first car with the monoform exterior design, nor is it restricted to the small-car segment.
The Daewoo Matiz was a classic example of the monoform design, as is the Mercedes Benz A-class hatch.
Also, the Toyota Innova and the Honda Civic conform loosely to the monoform definition.
As the name seems to suggest, a car that features a monoform design has a single line defining its form. Starting from the front bumper, the design line (more evident from the side) swoops all the way to the rear bumper in one, uninterrupted sinuous stroke.
This would mean that the regular classic sedan mould or the simple two-box mould will not conform to this standard as the design line for these style of vehicles will be interrupted at the windscreen and the boot area.
This also obviously means that the monoform design will, to a large extent, require a cab-forward style basic structure.
Inherently, the monoform design enables carmakers push out the two axles to the extremes, thereby dramatically reducing the overhang and maximising the wheelbase, which in turn improves cabin space. Cars sporting a monoform design also carry-off bright body colours very well.






I'M UNABLE TO LOAD PICS ON BLOGGER
ZEN IS BEAUTIFUL BUT COULDN'T LOAD THE PICS.... PARDON ME

Pune trip

Well the riots during our trips seem to be getting more and more frequent. The first years got their trip cancelled to Delhi thanks to the protest against Delhi sealing drive. But we were lucky nothing happened in our case.

Index
*the preparations
*the journey
*the check in
*the visits

part 2
*the stay
*the end


*The preparations
Ah, the preparations were pretty simple. packed my ag in half an hour and I was ready to go. But the actual preparations I mean here are different. My classmates weren't as excited as I was during the trip but they surely were preparing for the trip. I indicate this to many. My class is as desperate as a whore. I say this because I was also a bit disgusted at some friends falling for small baits and needed partners for 4 days. Enjoyment doesn't always mean having a partner. And come on! Don't you have a choice??

The preparations came in the form of 4-5 more couples getting formed... so shocking that I didn't know what to say and kept my mouth shut. By the way I'm always vocal about my feelings on such issues.

*The journey
The journey was pretty good, late as usual and was fun. I sat with all my friends throughout the journey. Had amazing fun with everyone, sang songs, Himesh was popular as well, my walkman phone was also handy and I clicked amazing photos which I'll show you now.





We travelled for about 4 hours and reached Pune with a lot of excitement and Pune looked pretty commercial and cool. I didn't excpect so much from Pune actually, thought it would be some small town or something but the infrastructure was better planned than Mumbai. The roads were wider and as heard about the bikers were truly unpredictable, the signals were not observed well and this was a major cause of accidents. By the way one of my friend's father has been a victim to such a disaster.




*The check in
The most controversial part was here. We reached on time but weren't alloted good rooms at first. The rooms were dirty like anything and stinking. Our earlier trip to Silvassa was heaven like because of the three star hotel with pool et all. Moreover this time around we didn't get A.C's in our room also. Only some of the rooms got this privilege. So temporarily we were told to pack our luggage in one room as we got just 3 rooms. We were supposed to get possession of the rooms when we came back in the evening.
Later in the evening we had to go to another hotel nearby because the rooms weren't empty. We were pretty frustrated because dragging the luggage around was not an activity we enjoyed.
So late at night when we came back from dinner we had to stay away from all the fun(gals). we slept early as we had to report very early in the morning the next day.

*The visits
We visited the best of the places and had real good fun all the time. the most amazing one was on the first day itself when we visited Sinhagad fort and climbed almost 8 kilometres. Had amazing fun and the most beautiful pics ever over there. The pics were almost like we were some professionals getting the best of everything, the weather was superb and the ambience amazing. Nature was at its best exclsively for us, the rookie photographers.

I'll show you in my next post


We had amazing fun during the three and a half days we spent there. visited almost the full Pune with the same enthusiasm. The television studios, film libraries were exquisite and the form of editing we saw was an eye opener. Doordarshan, radio 90.4 and what not. We are almost professionals with the camera now.

The fun at nights was not less at all. we had discussions, played a lot, played truth and dare, cards, roamed around the hotel, went about swinging in the gardens, singing songs and all, had pep talks and watched tv and movies together. The couples were as usual getting cosy with each other. Most of them were cute while others disgusted me.