Maruti Baleno wants to be a Volvo with this modified front grille

Modified front grilles are among the most common changes that budget car owners opt for in India. In fact, after market parts makers offer a range of modified front grilles, often in designs mimicking luxury cars. Here is one such front grille for the Maruti Baleno from SIPL Automotive. The front grille apes Volvo’s grille design, giving the Baleno a wannabe Volvo look.

The modified grille is a stock replacement unit, and gets a piano black finish while the Volvo-like sash is finished in chrome. However, the Volvo badge is replaced with a Baleno badge. However, we’re not sure if the Volvo grille works for the Baleno. There’s no Volvo car that resembles the Baleno. So, if the grille is meant to make the Baleno look like a Volvo, it doesn’t really do justice.

There are many other such modified grilles on sale for Indian cars. A popular modification on the Maruti Brezza is the Jeep grille with 7 slats, and the Land Rover honeycomb grille. On the Hyundai Creta too, Land Rover grilles are common while the Mahindra Scorpio has BMW and Mercedes grilles available in the after market. Clearly, people are opting for such grilles, which explains why there are so many designs floating around.

Coming back to the Maruti Baleno, the car is India’s best selling premium hatchback. It competes with the Hyundai Elite i20 and the Honda Jazz. On an average, Maruti Suzuki sells around 15,000 units of the Baleno each month. the premium hatchback is available with 3 engine options – 2 in petrol and 1 in diesel. Two gearbox options are also available on the car.

The petrol engines on the Baleno include the 1.2 liter naturally aspirated unit with 83 Bhp-113 Nm, and a 1 liter-3 cylinder turbocharged unit with 101 Bhp-150 Nm. While the 1.2 liter petrol gets 5 speed manual and CVT automatic gearboxes, the 1 liter turbo petrol uses a 5 speed manual. The diesel engine is a 1.3 liter turbocharged unit with 74 Bhp-190 Nm, and a five speed manual transmission.

Maruti has plans of launching a facelifted Baleno next year. The facelifted version is expected to get a stylistic makeover and additional features including a mild hybrid system. The car will also be seen with Toyota badging and restyling sometime next year. It will be among the first cars that Toyota borrows from Maruti Suzuki for badge engineering.