Tata Tigor Electric Car - 10 Talking Points

By Abhishek Uchil

The Tigor Electric Car from Tata Motors was delivered to EESL (Energy Efficiency Services Limited) and few of them have also been made available to Zoomcar, who have started leasing the car to individuals.
The Tigor EV is not available in Dealers as of March 2019, but we managed to test drive the car for few hours.
​Here are some talking points.

• The Tigor has a DC fast charging port and an AC slow charging port. The former is where you would expect the fuel tank refill port to be, but for some weird reason, the latter is located inside the boot!
• In a similarly weird vein, the brake lamps are at the back where you’d expect them to be, but the tail lamps are located just under the roof of the car at the back.
• The boot is spacious at 300 litres capacity, but the spare tyre’s stored in it, which compromises some of the space.
• The front of the car has a sleek look, although we think it could have done without the old-fashioned honeycomb look of the grill.

Watch our video about the Tigor Electric Car

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• The dashboard is virtually indistinguishable from that of an ICE car. Even the instrument cluster is part analogue and only part digital. There are two analogue dials that show the range (on the left) and the speed (on the right), and in the centre, there is a digital display. This display shows the range remaining and whether the car is accelerating or regenerating energy. A green light comes on when the car is accelerating, and a blue light come on when the car is regenerating energy.
• There are no buttons to turn the car on. Instead, there’s a conventional ignition port and a key. You insert the key into the port and turn it, and that’s it! Of course, there’s no engine in the car; all you’re doing is turning on the motor.
• There’s generous leg space in the front and decent leg space in the back. However, the backseat is wide enough to accommodate three passengers, which makes the Tigor EV a true five-seater hatchback.​
• The air-conditioning is excellent. However, whether its power comes at the cost of range is something that can only be determined by a range test.
• ​The suspension is quite soft, which helps cushion the blows from India’s ubiquitous bad roads.
• The gearshift is just like the one you would find in a conventional automatic car. There’s a ‘Sports’ mode available for drivers who may get impatient with the Tigor’s sedate acceleration, but using it may cost you the car’s already low range (100 km).​

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Final Words
What we also liked was that, Tata opted to use - The lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO 4) battery, just like what Mahindra did with the e2o, e2o Plus and the e-Verito. The chemistry has much more heat tolerance compared to chemistries used in electric cars around the world and in a country like India, that is important.
Also, we would like to know the following

• Did Tata Motors make this car only for the EESL Tender?
• Will we see be any improvements for the consumer version of the Tigor EV?
• When will be the Tigor EV be launched in Dealers?

Tata Motors are tight lipped about the release and we hope to have these answers soon. Stay tuned!