Volkswagen Plant Tour For TAI-Gers in Pune on 7th March

sethumurugan · Mar 9, 2014

350Z said:

Vibhor, Thanks a lot for another initiative which could be an opportunity for other members those who had missed this plant tour and wonderful meet after that.

ash7979 said:

Ashish, I really missed this post. Sorry. If I would have known definitely we could have had dinner together. Am really sorry. Next time we will make it.

KALINGA said:

Kalinga thanks for the first pics of the meet. And also thanks for everything you did for us when we were in Pune. Fantastic hospitality by You, Amit and Ashish. Thank you once again. Hope next visit you all will be driving down to chennai and we try to match the hospitality and care extended by guys.

KALINGA said:

sanjaysg said:

I remember he had even reserved you some Spl COFFEE for you. Hope to meet you in next meet without fail.

vu2gte said:

you are mostly welcome sir. Actually am happy that i have got an opportunity to meet you all guys. It was lovely that you made it with your son. Hope your son enjoyed the meet. Sorry we could n't had enough time to do a proper introduction before the meet (since we were running late) but after the meet you have left early but we had a very good photo session as well introduction session.

Guys, we (chennai TAIgers) reached chennai just 5 am in the morning (nearly 21 hours of driving). Thanks to Dhaya for taking all the burden of driving entire stretch. We will try to do some posts from our end by today. The best photographs are yet to come (Mr. Ajay/Mr. Vishwas pls..)

In whole, it was fantastic trip and had very good time together. I think there were no opportunity to meet other city members (since we were living very far away from each other) and we have broken that barrier today with this meet. I was very happy to meet the Mumbai and Pune members (we bangalore and Chennai members meet often in every 3 months or 6 months). Hope they also would have the same feelings.

Thank you once again guys.

For the grand success of meet with around 30 folks together.

Gurrala74 · Mar 9, 2014

Sethu Sir

Varun560061 · Mar 9, 2014

Thanks every one for making this meet successful !

Here are few pic's.

thegreatv · Mar 9, 2014

It was just WOW WOW WOW! No words to express for this meet. I am sure it was the best automotive group meet i have attended so far. People from Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune, Mumbai and Bangalore! [clap]

Thank you all for a wonderful experience.
Special thanks to Konkantrip, Sandykudva, Ashish7878 for arranging and co-ordinating with members to make this meet a grand one! [clap]

ash7979 · Mar 9, 2014

thegreatv said:

This was my first TAI meet & more than visiting VW plant (which I could have visited any time, as this plant is located in Pune) & I enjoyed meeting all you TAI guys from various part of India (I think we missed guyss from North, otherwise we had guys from all part of India, mostly well represented by southern part of India :))...

Varun, RK Sir, Sethu Sir, Dhaya, Vishwas to name a few, you guys really made this meet successful & given us Pune guys (Amit, myself, Suvendu) opportunity to help Sethu sir to make some arrangement for this meeting...but All credit should go to Sethu Sir for organizing this meet ..Three Cheers for Sethu Sir :)
and I am really looking forward for Nissan Plan visit in Chennai very soon..

anshuman8 · Mar 9, 2014

Maybe I am the last one to reply. [anger]

The plant visit & meet was in one word "superb".

I would like to extend my thanks to all members to contributed to this visit and meet.

Special thanks again to Sandy,Sethu, Amit and Ashish.

Gurrala74 · Mar 9, 2014

A brief report of the tour and meet

As all of you know that this wonderful idea was initiated by Sethu Murugan and also he was very active in getting permission from VW for this. As all the members responded well on the thread and confirmed their participation. So after some additions and deletions, members from out station started towards Pune.

On 6th members from Bangalore Varun560061,Vishwas,karthick, Sethu(who started on 5th night to Bangalore and joined Bangalore members on 6th morning)started in varun's Enjoy and reached Pune in the evening.

Anshuman and VarunV started from Bangalore on 6th evening by Volvo and reached Pune on 7th morning. Amit from Pune picked them up early morning and dropped at the stay and he was with us till the night.

Dhaya,Appu,Bikerboy(ajay) and Appus friend went to Mahabaleshwar trip and reached on 7th morning to Pune.

My self started on 6th by train and reached Pune in the late night where our members Varun560061,Sethu,Vishwas were waiting for me at the station at 11pm. We all went to the stay later on checked in to the service apartment arranged by Pune members Amit,Ashish,Suvendu.

On 7th morning Anshuman,VarunV reached they with the help of Amit. We got ready and reached a restaurant where our other Pune members where waiting and finished our breakfast.

Sandy and other members from Mumbai started and gave us a call that they are reaching VW plant by 10am. We were bit late at the breakfast and started towards the VW plant at 9.15am. I had a chance to drive Ashish's Vento(thanks buddy) till VW and finally we reached at 10.30am and assembled together and total members were 29 as per my count.
It is really a huge gathering exchanged hello to each other.

Then we were welcomed by the VW manager Mr.Chaitanya and took us to the conference hall. He has briefed us with a Video on VW cars and also given us the instructions while we visit the plant. He gave us ear phones to hear what he is explaining as the plant is very noisy. All in a group followed him to the plant.

We have seen the assembly line and paint shop and inspection area. Believe me guys the plant is awesome I remembered my visits to BMW and Merc in Europe. They maintain the same kind of standards in this plant and use all the advanced technologies for various processes like laser welding all. We have witnessed doors,body assembly, entire power train fixing, complete dash fixing in few seconds and understood their working process which are international standard. He explained us continuously for a hour with same kind of energy and we got delight looking at different LHD,RHD Polo,Vento,Rapid. He has also explained about VW academy and how they induct +2 finished students into the course and include them as employees in VW.
After the plant tour, we again assembled at the conference hall where he allowed our members with questions and answered them at his best. Then we went to see the test track of cars and there the plant tour ended. VW has provided us with a table top calender and a information booklet about their company,plants,various brands and cars and a beautiful blue cap. They we took a group photo with VW person at Vento which was their 1,00,000th car produced in that plant. They source complete power train from abroad and all other parts are getting manufactured in Pune plant. They assemble Skoda Octavia,Luara,Superb,VW Jetta,Passat and few AUDI models at their Aurangabad plant.

After the wonderful tour we came out and did some photo session at the parking lot and left to Talegoan for the lunch. Here few of Pune members have to go back due to their office commitments. I drove HuruH's City this time(thanks buddy) till Talegoan. We all finished our excellent lunch and clicked some pics there. Then it was time to bid bye bye to all the Mumbai members except Johnyboy. Mumbai guys left to Mumbai, VarunV,Varun56061,Vishwas,Karthick left for Lonavala for a short trip and rest of us headed towards Pune. Here I drove Punto of Johnyboy(thank you buddy) till our Stay.

Finally we had our dinner meet with Amit,Ashish,Kalinga from Pune along with JB and other outstation members at our apartment.

I was the first to leave on 8th morning with the help of JB's car, Anshuman,Sethu who dropped me at the station at 5.30am to enable me to get into Shatabdi for Hyderabad. Later on JB left to Mumbai and Chennai and Bangalore members left to Bangalore/Chennai. As per their info Bangalore members reached around 9.30pm in the evening Appu and his friend reached Vellore at around 2am today and Chennai members reached at 5am this morning finishing a long drive of around 21hrs and Dhaya was driving his Jetta for all this distance, hats of to you buddy [:)]

Thanks to Sethu for initiation, Sandy and amit,Ashish,Kalinga for excellent coordination and arrangements at Pune.
Thanks to Mumbai team(Keith,Superbad,HaruH and others) for your friendliness and enthusiasm.
Thanks to all Pune members who made it to the meet and carried us till VW plant.
Thanks to all other out station members for making it to the tour and meet.

My subjective experience of cars I drove

Vento diesel : Excellent car with awesome power, easy gear, light steering, clutch. I really enjoyed driving this car except little seating comfort for me as my legs were touching the steering and I was not able to stretch my hands completely, otherwise a beautiful car.

Honda City(3rd gen): Excellent seating comfort and easy steering,clutch,gear. At times I felt the car is not able to cope up with overtaking as I want it to be. Overall very good comfortable car. I found little knocking in 2nd gear in slow speeds

Punto petrol : Again a beautiful hatch and better in power delivery than City and raced along with Jetta for a while. A good car overall and very strong and never vibrates at any speed or while braking.

Overall it was a nice tour and meet and look forward for such meets in near future [:)]

thegreatv · Mar 9, 2014

And yes i would like to give a big THANK YOU to Sethu sir who was the main person to initiate the Volkswagen Plant tour. Thank you sir and sorry for the delayed response. [clap]

HaruH · Mar 9, 2014

Very nicely written Gurrala74 Sir. While reading I feet like i was there only with you guys. [:)]

Very very refreshing and knowledge worthy experience with you guys. [clap]

Hope we can mange more meets like this.

Sandykudva · Mar 9, 2014

Yes finally out of my Exhausted Zone

First of all thank you to Sethumurugan for taking the initiative and making this trip possible. Without his initiation we would not have had such a wonderful meet.

The meet was one of the best ones i have attended. Had a wonderful time. Actually i would like to appreciate each and every out station members who came all the way from Chennai, Banglore and Hyderabad and hats of to the enthusiasm of those members who drove all the way to Pune for the meet and back. Even we Mumbai members were outstation members but our distances of travel were very minimal compared to the others.

This Trip/Tour opened 2 new things for me.

1. I could see from scratch the making of the Vehicle that i own and see the technology & hard work that goes in making it. It makes me happy to know that my decision was correct in choosing it as my companion on the roads.

2. The second most important thing that the trip opened up for me was in introducing new Members/Friends from various locations who share the same passion and enthusiasm in automobiles as i do. Before the trip i had members/Friends from my location but now my circle just increased.

There were about 28-30 members and unfortunately due to time shortage could not know all the members well but surely in the future if i do get another opportunity will surely not do the mistake again.

Also would like to appreciate Konkantrip's hard work in managing the accommodation and other arrangements for the outstation guests.

Finally would like to thank and appreciate each and every member who made it to the meet/tour, without you'll all this would not have been possible.

[clap]

Vishwas · Mar 10, 2014

Hi guys,

Sorry for coming in late, i was busy all day with some work held up.

This trip was a great success and it happened with all support from TheAutomotiveIndia.com

We enjoyed this trip to the fullest because it was a whole new experience of driving long distances with like minded people.

Sethu Sir was the star of the whole event and this was a whole new idea of visiting a plant along with lots of purposes where:

1) To Visit a car manufacturing plant.
2) To drive long distances with people who met online and make things happen.
3) Stay for multiple nights with loads to share.
4) Awesomeness and enthusiasm of what to do next or how to plan things further.
5) Finally to take a break from the routine activities and by here i meant that having a trip which we normally go around with friends, family.

Thanks to Konkan Trip, ash7979 and Kalinga for assisting us with the accommodations where the hospitality is never forgotten.

We had a great time in the whole meet, and i enjoyed every bit.

The visit to the plant was totally worth and that is where i realized that how much of hard work is put to make a car which has to satisfy the customer in his ownership and VW really makes a good job, hats off for Mr.Chaitanya for the plant tour and for happily addressing our questions with much ease.

The drive was brilliant in Varun's enjoy and a big thanks for him bringing his enjoy and this was a major part for us enjoyment.

Phew i'm tired of typing, will post the experiences later this day guys until then have a good night.

sethumurugan · Mar 10, 2014

RK, Sandy and Vishwas well written write-up. It gives full picture of the plant tour, meet and driving experience. Thanks a lot for every one.

Hats-off to Amit, Asshis and Suvendu for help us.

Still we are waiting for pictures from Ajay.

Hope to meet you guys soon in Bangalore or Chennai for another wonderful plant tour.

anshuman8 · Mar 10, 2014

Nice updates for all.

Can we have a list of members who attended the meet along with name and TAI handle ?

sethumurugan · Mar 10, 2014

anshuman8 said:

Am working on it. Am waiting for some photographs.

BTW guys, no one posted the group photo which we clicked. I heard Sandy/Anushman has the pics. Can you pls post it.

Gurrala74 · Mar 10, 2014

Oh !! great to read the experiences of members [:)]

, if I have to say in single sentence it was like..

It was like attending close relative/friend marriage, spending together and enjoying a lot [clap]

. This meet is really different for me as all the members behaved like close relatives and old friends.

Waiting to see pics from others like bikerboy,appu,vishwas

Volkswagen Plant Tour For TAI-Gers in Pune on 7th March

sethumurugan

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Gurrala74

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Varun560061

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thegreatv

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ash7979

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anshuman8

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Gurrala74

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thegreatv

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HaruH

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Sandykudva

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Vishwas

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sethumurugan

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anshuman8

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sethumurugan

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Gurrala74

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