Tata Harrier SUV: Production version spied testing at Pune ahead of launch

The Tata Harrier is barely a month away from a full reveal. Tata Motors continues to test their new flagship SUV on  the roads of Pune in the run up to the official launch. Recently, a test mule of the Tata Harrier was spotted testing  in traffic in Pune.

From the spyshot, it’s easy to make out that the Tata Harrier has quite some street presence, and from the looks of  it, the SUV is towering over the Maruti WagonR that’s driving alongside. The Harrier will be a 5 seat SUV, and is  expected to be larger than both the Hyundai Creta and Jeep Compass – its prime rivals.

In terms of pricing though, the Tata Harrier will be slotted in between the Hyundai Creta and Jeep Compass. We expect Tata Motors to play the value card with the Harrier. The SUV will be pricier than the Hexa, and prices are likely to start at around Rs. 15 lakhs for the base model. The top-sped variant could be priced at a little less than Rs. 20  lakhs.

The Harrier will use a 2 liter Fiat Multijet turbocharged diesel engine – the same unit that’s found on the Jeep  Compass. On the Harrier though, this motor will produce 140 Bhp-320 Nm, significantly lesser than the 170 Bhp-350 Nm it makes on the Compass.

Tata Motors will pair this engine with a 6 speed manual gearbox as standard while a 6 speed torque converter  automatic gearbox will be offered as an option. Both front wheel drive and all wheel drive (AWD) layouts will be  offered on the Tata Harrier, whose AWD variants will get the terrain response system.

The Tata Harrier will sit on the OMEGA platform, which is a low cost derivative of the Land Rover D8 platform. While  Tata Motors has replaced aluminium on the Land Rover D8 platform with steel bits to drive costs down, the ruggedness and dynamic performance of the D8 platform is said to be retained. The Harrier is expected to be robust and agile SUV, or in other words a low cost Land Rover for emerging markets if you will.

While Tata Motors hasn’t announced anything about the Harrier’s global ambitions, we do expect the SUV to be exported to multiple markets around the world. India will be the first market for this SUV, which will officially be launched in January 2019. Bookings are already on at Tata dealerships across India and the first deliveries of this SUV are expected to happen soon after launch.

Image courtesy ClubHarrier