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MOTORINDIA
l
February 2012
clean. The driver gets a wonderful
driveline, he will get a feel of the
MAN engine, the driveline and the
gearbox. Of course, the most im-
portant in the bus is the passenger.
He must feel comfortable, and the
seats have some fantastic features to
make it more comfortable in the bus.
Last but not the least, the owner of
the bus – he should get his payback
by the vehicle. I would say that the
MAN Airobus, ‘the less you don’t
like, the more you don’t need’, that
is the MAN Airobus.”
Speaking on the occasion, Dr.
Abhay Firodia, Chairman, MFTPL,
observed: “Basing our design on
the inputs received from the typi-
cal Indian coach traveler, we have
incorporated customer-friendly fea-
tures like luxurious reclining seats,
individual reading lights, individual
AC vents, aisle seats which can be
moved sideways for class lead-
ing elbow room, ample leg room,
large overhead storage racks and
an equally spacious underbody lug-
gage compartment. The idea was to
come around 20% lower than what
competition offers and that is an at-
tempt we have succeeded with this
concept. We decided that we will
do a front engine bus to reduce the
cost, but it should have Noise Vibra-
tion Harshness (NVH) and riding
environment which is of the same
standard, which is accepted by the
public.”
“I’m very happy that our team in
R&D, both in Force Motors and in
MAN Force, has done a very good
job in putting together what essen-
tially are very mature elements – ag-
gregates, building blocks – which
have been developed, localized, re-
fined and updated and put together
as a concept which is very valid for
India and which has the DNA from
some of the very famous aggregates
from MAN as also from ZF. It also
incorporates the knowledge that
our teams have on how to moderate
these products for India”, he added.
w
Auto expo 2012
Mr. Stephen Holsmann addressing the media
Owing to complete localization
of engines and gearboxes and
sourcing of axles, MFTPL goes
into the market without depend-
ence on imported aggregates or
high-cost inputs.