My 2 Months

It’s almost 2 months since I’m married to My. It has it’s ups and down, and we both had made it this far. We’re still learning to tolerate each other. I’m learning to tolerate her maintenance and appetite, while she’s learning to tolerate my driving and my karaoke session duirng jams.

Well, since this is my blog, I’m thinking of writing about her, both good and bad. Well, not to say bad things to her, but if any of you thinking about marrying the likes of My, then this may help. Oh, don’t worry, she gave her consent, as long as I make it a fair review.

She’s spacious, and the curvy body emphasizes just that in relative to similar built cars. Don’t be fooled by the cute exterior. It’s spacious, and suits a family need. After all, that’s why I chose her in the first place. My parents love it for it’s spaciousness, although with full passenger capacity, the rear baggage compartment is limited. Rear seats can be folded if there’s less passenger.

And for a car her size, she’s light. And this is crucial as the engine is not a very powerful one. My‘s using a 1.3 Twincam EFI K3-VE engine with DVVT (Dynamic Variable Valve Timing), similar to it’s Daihatsu and Toyota counterpart (Boon and Passo respectively). Although she can easily move from 0-60 with full passenger capacity, going past that needs some extra revs. Especially so since My‘s an auto.

Light body’s a problem when you’re going fast. She’ll wobble in high speeds. And the 14in tyres don’t really help. If you’re thinking of going fast in this baby, consider a new spoiler, skirting, and a set of wide 15 in tyres. Turbo engines could come in handy too.

Another downside of a light body, is safety. Myvi, in order to make it light and spacious, have been using lightweight material. Perodua, however, had claimed that they, Toyota and Daihatsu have implemented extra beams to the chasis to absorb the impact of an accident. How true of this still remains a mystery to me. Let’s hope I do not need to experience an accident to know that. The body panels seems less durable, since a little force on the hood may cause it to dent. We cannot believe factory claims that much, do we?

And speaking of claims, Perodua claims that in factory settings, a Myvi goes about 13Km for the litre. And in real life, a full tank My (40 litres) goes about 500Km. that equals to 12.5KM to the litre or 15sen per Km. Although that’s on a highway prior to 1st service, expect higher consumption for urban use, but less after 2nd service. If My travels strictly from my house in Port Klang to Shah Alam (about 40km daily) and consumes about RM40 worth of petrol (currently RM1.92/litre) for 6 days.

Having driven an Avanza, one cannot but feel the similarities. The silent alarm, the headlights and snub front bonnet, even the doors. It’s no coincidence that Myvi is a joint collaborative work of Daihatsu, Toyota and Perodua, and that Perodua‘s assembling Toyota‘s Avanza for local sale. Even the engine are similar. And since Avanza is one of the most fuel efficient MPVs available, Myvi should be similar, in fuel efficiency.

Control wise, My gave a good response in low speed, such as coming out of tight parking space, or snaking in a traffic jam. But as mentioned earlier, its lightweight body (about 945kg on it’s own, and I’m not that heavy) ‘glides’ when in high speed. Although a ‘gliding’ car means low consumption, but it also means less friction and grip on the road. And again i repeat, a combination of wider tyres, a spoiler, and skirtings, may slove or lessen this problem.

Interior design is made to be fool-proof. The buttons are big and lettered, especially for the radio/CD player. The dashboard’s illuminated in amber (orange) or white in EZi. I prefer white, actually. As a reminder, there’s no ‘door closed’ indicator in the instrument panel, but there’s a safety belt indicator blinking unless the driver straps on. The missing door indicator, however, is substituted by the overhead lights, which switch on when doors are open (provided you set it to do so), and stays on for another 10 seconds after the door’s closed. It’ll automatically switch off if the ignition keys turn on. Nice touch. No more fiddling in the dark to find the key hole.

Nothing seems out of place, and the ‘hook’ type of gear lever for auto is a good thing to have. at least I don’t need to be in an ackward position everytime i need to change from D to N or P, since the lever is a bit on the low side, about the same level as your knee.

If only the material used were of higher quality and lasts longer. The steering wheel’s starting to peel off, as My had to be parked in the open every working day. The buttons feel wobbly, and most probably the silver trims going to fade. Seats are covered basically in an off-white color, so it’s prone to dirt and sweat.

So there, what I think about My right until now. She does what she said she would do, and for 2 months, she’s not giving any problem, (apart from the aforementioned tolerance thingy). I hope this state of relationship will last long, as Malaysian cars are prone to problems after their 3 free service period.

I fell kinda kinky writing about this…wonder why.

p/s: I just realized that My is a 1.3EZ, not 1.3EZi. I was actually wanting a 1.3EZi, but maybe both my brother and father got confused during the purchase.