Mahindra Thar Roxx Off-Road Test - Did It Get Stuck?

Okay, we're getting a bit stuck. That's one wheel completely in the air. Oh ho ho ho! Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Insane! These all are Thars and the improvements over the various generations is absolutely mind-blowing because the latest generation of the Thar, the Thar ROX is extremely smooth on road. But does it perform the same as the older Thars off-road or is it even better than the older Thars because this is obviously a very smooth, refined and feature-loaded car. But is it rugged enough? I'm going to be finding out today by taking it through some off-road courses. But there are a few problems. The brake pedal cover keeps falling off, the instrument cluster isn't easy to navigate and the beige interior keeps getting dirty very fast. Mahindra realised that and introduced a darker colour theme for the interior. However, deliveries of the same are still a few months away. Okay, it's time to start driving. Let's turn on the car. The car has done just 569 kilometres which means I'm going to be running it in off-road. First things first, we are going to come into neutral because I'm going to come into Ford Low which is super effortless. And now, what do I do? The camera is turned on actually. We are actually going to come into the adventure stats, the off-road one and straight away, we start going ahead. Okay, I need to actually come into drive. I'm still in neutral and off we go. This Thar is super smooth and super refined. It's saying low tyre pressure which is actually a good thing when you're driving off-road but the parking sensors will automatically activate. This is a huge leap up when compared to the three-door Thar and I'll tell you why. Because this one is running the fourth generation of the ladder frame which is stiffer and lighter and more rigid because of which the ride quality is also improved and obviously, the handling has improved too. The level of smoothness is unbelievable. This car will not make a turn without reverse here. So, what we are going to do is, we are actually going to come into this menu and I'm just going to turn this into the mud mode right away. I'm going to turn on the Intelli-Turn which is already turned on now. That was fast. As soon as I gave a full lock on the steering wheel, the inside wheel is getting locked. Brake is being applied on it because of which the car turns effortlessly. Yeah, that was super smooth. Otherwise, I've been reversing multiple times here. So, that Intelli-Turn is basically trail assist of Jeep which is now in this car as well. So, we are going to actually turn it off and I'm going to come into the normal mode right here because I don't need to be in any other mode. Everything is dry today and we're going to come into the Adventure Stats again. Before that, let me actually turn on the camera because I know for a fact that this will turn off after certain speeds. There it's telling me the parking sensors as well. We are in 4-low. I'm going to activate the rear differential as well. Yeah, the electronic differential lock has been activated too and now it's smooth sailing because this car is super-duper capable. Yeah, it is effortless to drive. In fact, I can speed up if I want as well and it just goes, no problem here. Now, it's a body-on-frame. So, obviously, it moves quite a bit if you speed up. So, this is not the speed you should be driving but in the interest of reducing the time of this video, I am going a bit faster here. Obviously, the ride is much improved when compared to the older Thar but it does move around quite a bit because of the body-on-frame platform. The steering is effortless now because this happens to be an electric power steering. The older 3-door Thar actually uses a hydraulic steering and trust me on this, when I was seeing the older Thar being driven right in front of me, I was like, oh my god, that takes so much effort but here it is absolutely effortless. I can come into manual control of the gearbox as well. However, there should have been paddle shifters and it will be best to keep it in first because you get some engine braking too. In 4-low now, you can just like not do anything at all and this car simply goes. It is that unbelievably effortless and taking turns and all, no problem at all. Yeah, the articulation is amazing. The engine is having a lot of punch. They only have the four-wheel drive system in the diesel which is a good call. Otherwise, you will have to carry a jerry can of fuel when going off-road in the petrol and then NCR people were so happy having a petrol four-wheel drive which drinks a lot of fuel. Okay, little bouncy but ground clearance is actually better when compared to the regular Thar. So, this is around 230 mm which is good. The suspension is much improved. In fact, it feels quite comfortable off the road as well even when you drive it fast because this car, okay, let me turn on the camera again. Because this car has watts linkage at the rear which improves the overall ride of this car quite a bit. Engine gets quite vocal. Otherwise, it's a very refined car but engine gets vocal if you push it hard and now since I have obviously locked the rear differential electronically, it also can activate Smart Crawl Assist which happens on sand. You don't have to do anything. Just leave the car alone and it will automatically get out of situations which makes this car like an autonomous car off the road. Anyone can look like a hero in the Thar Rocks because firstly, it's super duper comfortable and super refined and super easy to drive. You have so many electronic systems here. This camera is just amazing and this electronic diff lock is also mind-blowing because in the regular Thar, they have a mechanical differential, locking differential which I think is an option, brake locking differential is standard and when you have that, what is the issue? Well, simply, I'll tell that in a bit. First, let's cross this stream here. Okay, let's actually come into the auto mode so the car will upshift and that was not much water so easily taken here. I want the camera to be on, don't turn it off again and again. So, with the regular three-door Thar, they have the brake locking differential which will apply brakes on the wheels with less traction and thereby channeling more torque to the wheel with more traction to get you out of tricky situations but it is actually the mechanical locking differential, the MLD which is of a lot of use there and I'll tell you why because what it does is, it realises there is a 100 rpm difference between the rear wheels spinning speed and then it will lock the rear differential thereby ensuring optimum traction but because it does it so abruptly, first and foremost to engage it, you have to give it a bit of a throttle which obviously makes it feel like you are putting a lot of effort and secondly, you know it happens very abruptly and because it happens abruptly, the driver has to be careful, he has to hold on to the steering wheel because once it happens, you have to maybe counter-correct a bit but no issues here at all because the way this car goes is absolutely amazingly effortless yeah, it just goes, the only thing is, there is a lot of body movement naturally and then I'm hitting a few trees here and there because there is so much body movement, you have to make sure that probably you don't move your head around much because I think I hit my head aggressively right now on the B pillar which is okay, yeah but kind of hurts as well so what an effortless car to drive, this is just mind-blowing easy there is no effort only to drive this car, that's how easy it is we are just going to take a ride here, there is a stream of water which I can glide through so some amount of throttle, oh my god, that is a lot of spray okay, let's use the wipers as well and now I've decided we will enter a very challenging zone which is right in front of us there is very little kickback from the steering wheel which is also quite amazing here okay, washer fluid is over in this car right now we can test the articulation here, the tyres are decently capable although if you are really into driving hardcore off-roading I would suggest you upgrade your tyres as well and look at the way it goes the articulation and all, mind-blowing, what an easy car to drive off-roading has never been easier now obviously you can opt for the real deal which is none other than the Jeep Wrangler but this car puts the question, Ruby Khan because it can do everything the Wrangler can do yet if anything goes wrong if anything breaks, it's way cheaper to repair as well that is another USP of the Thar Rocks that it is very light on the pocket in terms of repair costs and it's more efficient because it's a diesel the Wrangler sips fuel, the Wrangler is extremely uncomfortable on the road that is, on the road this car is actually very comfortable so this car is more on-road centric now however, it is still very capable off the road, it is more capable than the regular 3-door Thar only one area where it falters, the longer wheelbase means that the breakover angle isn't that impressive but keep that aside trust me on this, this eats the 3-door Thar in every way because the steering is better here, the engine is very refined the new platform obviously super smooth, ride is amazing, handling is also good so everywhere, okay let's go why do I become Santa Claus all of a sudden, I don't know what a beautiful car to drive, I didn't expect it to be so capable off the road but trust me, it's put me in shock, it's put me in disbelief by being absolutely smooth, refined and supremely capable too yeah, the Thar Rocks is mind-blowing but the amount of money they are asking just for four-wheel drive is a lot and how much a lot? 2.4 lakhs more so this is priced at 27.5 lakhs on-road Mumbai meanwhile, the two-wheel drive version is priced at 25.1 lakhs on-road Mumbai so that's a significant price difference and if you opt for the manual, that is approximately 2 lakhs cheaper as well I can take any path because the car just goes, it never gets stuck obviously, I'm missing slush today, if there was slush, it would have been even more fun but I'm not complaining because I have come here in slush as well and trust me on this, the car absolutely flies you have to take in some more effort and I can absolutely feel the car bottoming out here and there, that articulation got me unaware because yeah, I'm sitting a bit low, I should be higher up in terms of my seating position to see a better view of what's around we're shooting at the very wrong time because it's super duper hot what's the temperature like? It is 28 degrees actually, not bad and then there's not much space but the camera here is so good it gives me such an amazing view of what's around and I think I'm kind of stuck, you believe it, off-road I'm actually sitting and honking, honking is also nice actually the regular Thar does not even have a rear camera this one has cameras everywhere which makes it super effortless to spot anything when you go off-road and when you come into four-wheel obviously ADA system gets turned off traction control also gets turned off we're going to quickly change this menu here because it has got multiple menus as well but this is a bit confusing because at times it does not respond okay fine, I understand, you want me to understand what is the parking sensors information but that's not something I want, I'm just going to put the information mode oh there, parking sensors shut up! yeah, that's fine just get into the regular thing check tyre direction which is also very cool thing tells me exactly where the tyre direction is pointing and there we have changed it let me come into the adventure stats once again come to the off-road one and just notice the roll and pitch because we are going through this big ditch here car is super capable off-road and this engine is amazing, very refined you don't feel like it's a diesel at all you feel like it's a petrol engine till the time you obviously rev it in the higher end of the rev range and then you realize that it becomes a bit boomy and in spite of the weight of this car because of the body-on-frame platform doesn't feel heavy at all it feels light, nimble, agile, steering is also light everything seems effortless here it is super effortless to drive this car we have a big ditch incoming no problem here the front wheel is going to lift there it does and it touches a bit on the right side ground clearance is great but some obstacles it tends to kiss a bit so as I see it the Thar rocks is an absolute rock star of sorts because it is unbelievable in terms of off-road capability so smooth, so refined it's just like a wow it's super effortless to drive as well which makes off-roading come to the masses and that's the reason 1.8 lakh people have already booked it in the first 60 minutes waiting period is going to be absolutely crazy Mahindra really needs to work on delivering the cars fast because they can't take their own sweet time in delivering the cars because who's going to wait for so much and then the other problem is it's selling in such great numbers that it's going to become very common as well we are going to take the same route back in fact the suspension is so silent which is quite surprising and then I think I didn't take the right angle I'm going to hit a tree so we're just going to reverse here this is the automatic which makes it even easier to drive this car supremely effortless what a car made by Mahindra now only if the three-door Thar gets similar updates that would be super duper awesome as well and obviously we cannot compare it with the Wrangler the Wrangler is way too sophisticated but super expensive as well it's such an effortless drive I'm just blown by the kind of refinement and smoothness this car has off-road and because I'm driving a Thar I have to behave like a Thar driver by being honky I didn't say honky I said honky I'm very smart there the Intelli-Turn only works when you're under 15 kilometers per hour and when you're in 4 low obviously and when you're off-road otherwise it can damage the wheel it's applying brake to the rear inner wheel and that's the reason the turning radius is just so less but it makes a lot of sound because you're dragging that rear wheel but yeah I can't circle around here I'm just going to go into that tree with the rocks Mahindra has made the Thar practical comfortable and easy to drive but in spite of all this this is still very capable off the road the Thar is a rugged car and it continues to offer you the best of both worlds with the rocks making it hugely impressive If you like this video make sure to give it the thumbs up that's the like button and also subscribe to the channel I will see you guys in the next video real soon Bye Bye