Nissan Terrano User Reviews

I purchased a car Nissan Terrano 1.6 XL (Petrol) in April 2016. This car has been giving trouble from day 1. There are two major problems that I found with the car. The first is slow pick up, because of low RPM, which cannot be corrected since there is no accelerator cable in the new models. As a result, the car often stalls in low speed and heavy traffic, especially when going uphill on a flyover. The second is the “no start” condition i.e. the starter motor cranks but the engine does not start. This happened with me when the car was less than a year old and had done just about 2000 Km. It had to be towed to the service centre but they could not find the fault. Next day, it started on its own. A few months back, the car just stopped after 50 mtrs. Once again, it had to be taken to the service centre. It was found that the fuel pump was faulty. This was replaced after about a week. Then I discovered something interesting. This car cannot be taken to the hills. According to the Certificate of Registration, the car has a 1598 cc petrol engine, unladen weight of 1261 Kg and gross vehicle weight of 1755 Kg. Hence, the weight of load carried by the car including passengers, luggage, tools, accessories etc should not exceed 494 Kg. According to the Page 6.9 of Owner’s Manual, the engine output and climbing ability are reduced with altitude. It recommends that the maximum load should be reduced by 10% at an altitude of 1000 metres and an additional 10% for each 1000 metres thereafter. Since most popular hill stations in North India are at altitude of approx. 2000 metres, this will result in a weight reduction of 20% and the gross weight will be around 1404 Kg only. Since the unladen weight of the car is 1261 Kg, the load that can be carried including passengers, luggage and tools will be only 143 Kg. Obviously, it will be difficult to use the car in the hills if is fully loaded, with five passengers and luggage. This is a serious design defect in the car, which is being sold as an SUV. In the Army, I have driven the Nissan Jonga, which had a 6 cylinder engine of 3526 cc. I drove it three Himalayan Rallies -1982, 83 and 84 – and it could overtake any other car while going uphill. That is why the Army replaced the Willys Jeep, which had an engine half this size, with the Jonga in the mountains in 1965, when I had just been commissioned. How did they expect to run the Terrano, which is a bit heavier than the Jeep or Jonga, with a 1600 cc engine? In the last two years, my car has done just 7000 KM. Incidentally the mileage that I am getting is just about 7-8 Km per litre in the city. I have now filed a complaint in the Consumer Forum, asking the company to take back the car and refund the cost. I would recommend others to do the same. If you see the sales figures of the Car, it is now just about 40-50 cars in a month. Obviously, the car has some serious problems that Nissan needs to address.