Reference Auto

Nissan, which has rolled out an automatic version of the Sunny sedan (the Sunny XL X-Tronic), has priced it near about Rs 9 lakh (which is Rs 80,000 more than its manual version), but is a tad cheaper, compared to cars of its class, and this could give a fillip to sales.

Nissan is going all out to rev up its presence in the Indian market with its SUV Duster (which comes with awesome looks) selling around 3,500 units a month on an average whereas the Nissan Sunny’s figure stands at a poor 2,000 units.

Comparing automatic cars in its peer group, the Honda City comes for Rs 9.25 lakh, while the Ford Fiesta is priced at Rs 10 lakh, among others. So, among cars in its segment, the Sunny automatic is the cheapest.

Already having a twin car with an automatic variant (the Scala X-Tronic) and with the pricing not really great, whether the Sunny automatic variant will live up to the expectations of the Japanese company is a question that could come to mind. The company needs to go for an ad blitz to rev up sales.

Compared to the Scala X-Tronic (the top variant), the Nissan Sunny’s high-end version will come cheaper by nearly Rs 10,000.

The automatic gearbox variant of the Sunny sedan will be equipped with a 1.5 litre naturally aspirated petrol engine that offers an output of 99 bhp of peak power (compared to 97 bhp in the manual version) and 134 Nm of peak torque.

The Nissan Sunny automatic will use a CVT automatic gearbox, making it the second car after its twin, the Renault Scala, to use this technology. The advantage a CVT gearbox offers is that it comes with power and torque without jerks, unlike the manual gearbox variant.

But such gearboxes suffer from what is known as the rubber band effect, where the CVT transmission takes some time to respond to the throttle inputs. Another big stumbling block is that fuel economy delivered by automatic gearbox cars is slightly less than that offered by a manual gearbox.

However, ARAI-tested fuel economy of the Sunny CVT is better at 17.97 km for a litre compared to the Ford Fiesta (for instance), which offers nearly 18 km per litre.

According to reports, the Nissan Sunny XL automatic comes with keyless entry, a start-stop button and chrome door handles on the inside.

Nissan Sunny is a car which falls in the C-segment and it is still the only one in the segment which did not have an automatic variant, and this probably came as a big deterrent to its sales as almost one third buyers who opt for cars in the C-segment, prefer the automatic variants.

So, with a commendable fuel economy and good pricing, the Nissan Sunny automatic may get a fillip so far as sales are concerned.