Indiacar.com -Maruti Suzuki Ritz

Walk into any Maruti showroom and it’ll be all but impossible to walk out without finding a car to suit your budget or need. There are bare cars like the 800 and Alto; then there’s the Wagon R if you like a little style….still more

style? There’s the Zen Estilo, A-Star and the Swift which can be had with the best diesel engine in its class. Maruti also has India’s best entry level sedan in the Dzire, a sporty sedan in the SX4 and even a premium pricey SUV in the Grand Vitara – and now there’s one more – the Ritz – to increase Maruti’s small car tally to seven. OverDrive (June ’09) takes a first look at this Rtizy option…

Firstly, a good question to ask here is, does any manufacturer need seven cars in one segment, all within two lakh rupees of each other ? While it plainly looks like overkill, a cursory glance at sales figures show that the strategy has paid off handsomely. Despite the economic slowdown Maruti sales have grown. Despite competition, every second car sold in India is still a Maruti. And there are plans to raise capacity by a further 2, 00,000 a big chunk which the Ritz is expected to account for.

Design & Styling
The Ritz is based on the Swift’s platform and it makes for a cute yet contemporary visage with just that hint of sportiness in the flared wheel arches. The nose is large and expressive but overall it’s a more mature design tailored to the customer for whom the Swift would either be too sporty or too radical.

The wheelbase is shorter by 30mm while the track is slightly wider but the Ritz is significantly taller. The stylists though have been extremely clever and the planted stance and wide track manages to disguise its (mini MPV-like) 1.62 metre height very well.

The Ritz is particularly distinctive from the rear and the boomerang shaped tail lamps are apparently designed to look like splashes of water though it you follow a Ritz in the night, it looks exactly like a Honda CRV!
The upright design and clever packaging liberates more interior space than the Swift and the tall cabin makes it seem roomier than it actually is. Both front and rear seats are positioned higher than in the Swift. A big plus is that one does not need to crouch to get into the car; one just walks in and out. That said space isn’t Fabia rivaling and the 225-litre boot is just about adequate.

Interiors
Inside the car’s airy ambience is enhanced by the light colour of plastics and clever use of colours in the petrol-

engined variant. Touches of dark blue liven up the modern and stylish cabin and is a funky and welcome change from the beige everybody seems to be using these days approves OverDrive (June ’09). The seats too are in a similar shade of blue and the central console and air-con vents have silver effect surrounds with the air-con controls and door handles getting a similar finish. It all makes for a trendy cabin, a trait that carries over to the large white-faced speedo, the tacho housed in a separate pod and the gear lever integrated into the central console. Top-end Ritz variants also gets an integrated stereo with steering wheel mounted controls, height adjustable steering, twin front airbags and ABS though there’s no climate control like on the Swift.

A lot of the parts look and feel familiar says OverDrive (June ’09) as they are taken from the Swift but cabin quality feels noticeably better. There are lots of storage spaces – cupholders, an open tray above the glove box, a tray above the central console – and since the seats are positioned higher up there’s better visibility for the driver. The seats are also better bolstered keeping in mind driver and passenger comfort.

Engine & Performance
Headline news in the Ritz is the all-new 4-cylinder K12M engine that displaces 1197cc and is based around the A-star’s 3-cylinder unit. Not only has this engine been tuned for India but it also gets different cylinder dimensions to allow it to dip under our 1.2-litre engine capacity limit. This is the first BS IV emission compliant engine in this class and fuel efficiency is another talking point – the ARAI claimed figure being 17.7kmpl which is the best in its class.

With 85PS of power (3PS lower than the Swift’s 1.3-litre engine) and 113Nm of torque it feels quite rapid and is allied to a typically sweet Suzuki gearbox. In character it’s similar to Suzuki engines we’re familiar with, happy to rev and requiring a decent dose of revs to keep the speed up. But there’s more torque lower down the rev range and that makes it easier to drive in the city. Refinement is also good though when revved hard it can get quite audible.

Ride & Comfort
To further boost comfort, Suzuki’s engineers have tuned the suspension to make the car ride better and of course account for the 30mm increase in ground clearance. She rides on 14-inch tyres, 175/65 on the base variants and 185/60 on the ZXi. Handling doesn’t feel as sporty as the Swift’s and the soft suspension does give it more body roll but that’s done intentionally to make the Ritz a more family-oriented car. The steering does feel good though and the car is stable at speed. Ride is good and sorts out small to medium imperfections though larger ruts can unsettle the car and passengers.

Verdict
The only hitch so far is the omission of a top-end Zdi variant which means even if you want to pay for it you can’t get airbags, alloys or the integrated stereo on the diesel Ritz. What remains to be seen is how the Ritz fares against the i10 sums up OverDrive (june ’09)