Tata Nano: Diesel Model price,launch date

there is no Tata Nano diesel yet. It’s gonna be here, but that’s at least a year away. For now, what you are going to see in tata dealerships across the country is the Tata Nano petrol in its three variants - the standard, deluxe and luxury.

There is going to be a diesel Nano first, then a Nano automatic, then a CNG Nano followed by an air-powered Nano. Of course, give an year to each - which means your high mileage air-powered Nano would be here only some 3-4 years from now.

What we hear so far is that the diesel Tata Nano would be launched in 2010 mid-day. Considering the normal delays in projections for future launches, it would be wise to take that with a pinch of salt. But that’s almost one and a half years, and it is still within the realm of possibility that Tata Motors would manage to launch the diesel Nano by June-Junly 2010. Not too bad.

Tata Motors has asked vendors to be prepared to supply parts for the Tata Nano diesel six months from now. That is say, August-September 2009. From then, give it some time for Tata to finish all the testing required, mid-2010 launch seems quite feasible.

Rs 2 lakh is the estimated Tata Nano diesel price. This would change based on many factors such as input costs, economy, duties and the like. But at two lakhs, a diesel Nano definitely seems worth it. By the launch date, the customers also would have got used to seeing Nano cars around, and would have a clear idea about the features, power and practicality of the car.

The top end petrol Nano is expected to be priced at Rs 1.6 lakhs. Add another Rs 40,000 to that, you can buy a diesel Nano.

By the end of this year, it is expected that Tata Motors’ Sanand plant would be fully functional, and the diesel Nano would be produced from there. Tata would be on more solid ground when it comes to the diesel, as it has more experience in producing diesel engines - the Nano diesel engine is expected to be the smallest diesel around at a two-cylinder 624 or 684 cc. At this point, its all just guesswork, of course. There are rumours that the engine would be a DiCor. No further details are available at this time.