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Say namaste to the first Indian-designed sports car in the history of TIME.
It's called the DC Avanti, it's just been unveiled at the Delhi motor show and it's a comfortable signpost that India's appetite for cars has just got a bit more discerning.
It's cheap(ish), too; the pricetag's expected to hover around 30 lakh rupees (£36,000-odd in Church of England).
Which isn't at all bad considering how spritely it promises to be. Initially, it'll get a blown Ford 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engine, which makes 261bhp. A 394bhp Honda V6 version will join the fray later, both of which will be attached to a six-speed dual clutch transmission.
The, err, idiosyncratically styled shell's got a lot of aluminum in it so weight's kept down to a relatively buoyant 1560kg. This means the (claimed) 0-62mph time's less than seven seconds, which, admitedly, stretches the definition of supercar a bit, but it's still fast for the money.
So, who the hell is DC? They're an Indian tuning house better known for adding big plastic nappies and bling-a-ding rims to everything from Rolls-Royce Phantoms and Porsche Cayennes to Tata Nanos. Then charging punters inordinate amounts of money (its tinkered Nano costs £141,000. ONE HUNDRED AND FOURTY ONE GRAND).
The manufacturer wants to build 200 cars a year at first, but plans to churn out up to 2000 cars a year longer term.
Would you drive India's first sporty/superyishcar, TopGear.comniverse?
Open Car Bar
What do you think?
Want to comment on this?
Chinaguy1998 commented on this article
at 12:02 pm on 06 January 2012
No thanks. I'm just envious that India's got a supercar while China is stuck with trying to be "environmentally green" when Beijing's smog is so bad...
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ahsanraza1981 commented on this article
at 12:15 pm on 06 January 2012
Well, anyone could make a car by importing engines from BIG companies like Ford and Honda already well known and established. If India is doing it...it's not a big deal.
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Barracuda989 commented on this article
at 12:45 pm on 06 January 2012
@ahsanraza1981: uhm if I remember correctly, then the engine from a Koeniggsegg first came of Ford I believe, and even more, the FAMOUS Zonda still uses a Mercedes engine... the Veyrons engine comes from VW, Lambo engines come from Audi... and the engine from a Noble came from a Volvo... so pretty much all the new league supercar builders use engines from estabilshed brands... the price for developing a brand new engine is astronomous and would sky rocket retail prices... :/
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TonyGeo commented on this article
at 12:51 pm on 06 January 2012
I agree with ahsanraza. It 's not a big deal. The car wont be even sport. My mothers x1 does 0-62 in 6.8 sec
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rustymx5 commented on this article
at 12:52 pm on 06 January 2012
36k for a four pot sports car? I'll have a Subaru BRZ and 11k change instead.
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