VW Golf 2.0 TDI 140 DSG (2009) CAR review

By Anthony ffrench-Constant

23 September 2008 09:00

Despite the residue of hundreds of kilted Scottish football supporters who were far too sloshed to find the airport after the World Cup qualifying match – and, for that matter, probably still are – Reykjavik is an outstanding city from which to launch a car.

Compared to anything else on offer on the planet, the surrounding scenery is absolutely brand spanking new and largely still hot to the touch, the air’s so good that no amount of vigorous fag smoking will put a dent in its quality, it’s hilariously, wallet-meltingly expensive and the women are so pretty it makes you want to burst out cheering. Actually that last bit’s a fib; most of the girls are up there with Bjork on the Troll scale and, after a week of relentless Glaswegian chat-up line pummelling, are none too friendly to boot.

You’ll never, ever learn the language, which sounds like Scandinavian played backwards and bubbled through bath water, and your taste buds will find it equally hard to come to terms with the food. Puffin looks and cuts like duck, but tastes of anchovies, whale (bought ages ago off a Japanese ship refused a berth anywhere else) looks and cuts like liver, but tastes like a cow that’s recently been scuba diving in the Red Sea, and black guillemot tastes, um, quite unlike anything I’ve ever eaten before. And as for the Stinky Food Festival chunks of shark they bury for months in the sand until the seeping ammonia will weep the eye-balls clean out of your skull; don’t even think about it.

Into this absorbing environment, Volkswagen introduced a fleet of Phaetons, complete with more chauffeurs than Iceland has policemen (honest), in which I spent marginally more time than the car I’d turned up to drive. Seriously, in order to ensure we stayed on message and weren’t distracted by the delights of Reykjavik, VW built a main dealer sized, erm, indoctrination centre in the middle of nowhere and spent so much time ferrying us to and fro in rear seat luxury that it was a constant struggle not to review the wrong car.

Oh do get on with it!

Sorry. And then it struck me… They did all this on purpose. So little of import has changed between Golfs MkV and VI that the latest iteration was in desperate need of a USP. In that context, Volkswagen have opted for the Sound of Silence, and the reason why we spent so long in the back of a Phaeton is precisely because we were being covertly nudged into making cabin hush comparisons between the two.

Allied to a huge hike in interior quality, the MkVI has indeed been soundproofed senseless to seriously good effect. Ironically, the only gripe remaining is that they’ve thrown out the blue back-lighting to the instrumentation in favour of white. Surely that was something of a Golf USP in its own right.

So what’s the diesel like, then?

They say this is a new 138bhp version of VW’s 2.0 litre common-rail turbodiesel, yet it instantly feels as familiar as your favourite pants. From just 1750rpm a slug of 236lb ft of torque elicits predictable urge, particularly when mated here to the group’s admirable six-speed, twin-clutch DSG gearbox, which slurs both up and down changes with greased eel alacrity.

Thing is, however, faced with stiff competition from VW’s delicious 1.4 litre twincharger unit, I’m increasingly less inclined to favour the diesel option. It’s heavier, which makes the Golf a little less inclined to respond to the helm at turn in than its sibling, and, despite the soundproofing Tefal heads’ best efforts, it’s noisier, which somewhat goes against the grain of the whole quiet and refined pitch.

Anything else?

Not really. This is a respectable looking hatchback, but certainly no prettier than its predecessor. It now benefits from Adaptive Chassis Control, of which previous squirts in both the Passat CC and Scirocco have lead me to decide the ‘Normal’ setting need never be abandoned, standard equipment levels are perfectly acceptable, refinement – a genuine bonus for long-haul users – is first class and, speaking as an ex-Mk II owner, £20,550 (including £1300 for the DGS box) seems an awful lot of dosh to fork out for a Golf.

Verdict

There’s a whole raft of people out there who are never going to settle for anything other than a Golf, and they won’t be disappointed with the MKVI. In striving for interior refinement and hush levels matching higher segment cars, VW have been admirably successful. And the fact that just a whiff of verve seems lacking on the dynamic front isn’t going to perturb the Golf customer heartland in the slightest. Good, but the 158bhp 1.4 TSI version is better.

Statistics

How much?	£20,550
On sale in the UK:	January 2009
Engine:	1968cc, 4-cyl turbodiesel 138bhp @ 4200rpm, 236lb ft @ 1750-2500rpm
Transmission:	Six-speed twin-clutch DSG, front-wheel drive
Performance:	9.3 sec 0-62mph, 130mph, 51.4mpg, 129g/km CO2
How heavy / made of?	1374kg/steel
How big (length/width/height in mm)?	4199/1779/1479

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VW Golf 1.4 TSI (2009) CAR review

By Georg Kacher

08 September 2008 12:26

This is the first drive of VW’s new-but-same-again Mk6 Golf, a car brought forward from 2010 to 2008 to counteract slow sales and a costly and lengthy build process. But with only mildly revised looks inside and out, can the new VW Golf match the Ford Focus and Renault’s forthcoming Megane? Read on for our verdict on the Golf, and to find out whether Wolfsburg has dropped the ball with its most important car.

How come the new VW Golf doesn’t look new?

We should have received a facelift in 2008, but the Mk5 car was proving too expensive to make and wasn’t exactly flying out of showrooms to the accountants' expectations. Today’s Mk6 Golf is cheaper to build, apparently spending five fewer hours on the production line than its predecessor.

So just what is new on the new Golf?

All the body panels are new, bar the roof, and 60 percent of the parts are new. But it was a tough job for the design team, being unable to change any hard points, while the engineering team has to carry over the chassis, engines, suspension and electronics. And from that basis they had to create a quieter, more refined, better to drive Golf. Parts pinched from the Passat CC, plus gadgets like the automatic parking aid, the low-cost laser-based cruise-control and the integrated sat-nav/radio/MP3/telephone system offer a level of convenience no Astra or Focus can match.

How does the new VW Golf drive?

On the roads of our Icelandic test route, everything inside was hushed. The ride is more supple than ever and the new Golf barely registers cattle grids. Low-noise foil around the windscreen, insulation around the windows and doors, plus smoother door mirrors means those inside hardly hear a thing.

But dynamically not too much is new. The new Golf is more refined, but only a little. But this still makes it the most comfortable and quietest car in its class. It's impressively hushed and comfy.

What about the new Golf's engines?

VW harks on about huge 28 percent mpg improvements, but really this figure only applies when you match the new 158bhp 1.4 TSI Twincharger to the discontinued 148bhp 2.0 FSI. But as ever this Twincharger engine is clever, with lots of low down torque, decent mid-range shove and feels a lot bigger than its 1.4 litres suggest.

It’s even slicker with the seven-speed DSG and while it produces fewer ponies (158bhp compared with 168bhp) than our long-term test Golf, it’s cleaner. With DSG it does 47.1mpg and 139g/km, while our car does 38.7mpg and 174g/km. Big, impressive improvements. For those after cleaner cars, an even smaller 1.2 TSI engine is coming, while the Golf BlueMotion Mk2 will herald stop-start and brake regeneration. A word of warning though – four of the Mk6 Golf's launch engines will be replaced in 2009.

The Golf has always been great on the inside…

And it remains that way. The Golf's soft-touch dashboard is pure quality, the ergonomics are achingly intuitive and the seats adjust so many ways you'd think you were in a bigger car.

The touch-screen entertainment system is easy to use, easy to read and the rear-view camera is sharp. Pity the screen picks up greasy fingerprints so easily, though...

Verdict

The new Golf is very good. Better to drive than its predecessor, quieter and more refined too. With new looks Wolfsburg will be onto another winner.

But this is not a new car, and only a stop-gap. Underneath the skin the changes may not be enough for the Golf Mk6 to hold its crown once the Megane and Astra appear in the next 12 months...

Statistics

How much?	£14,500
On sale in the UK:	January 2009
Engine:	1390cc 4-cyl turbo and supercharged, 158bhp @ 5800rpm, 177lb ft @ 1500-4500
Transmission:	8.0sec 0-62mph, 137mph, 47.1mpg, 139g/km CO2
Performance:	Seven-speed dual-clutch, front-wheel drive
How heavy / made of?	1286kg/steel
How big (length/width/height in mm)?	4199/1779/1479

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VW Touareg R50 CAR review

By Tim Pollard

08 August 2008 00:00

A bit of a conundrum, this. How can a 2.6-tonne 4x4 put the Sport back into SUV? Volkswagen reckons the R50 Touareg is the answer – a tweaked-up version of its luxury 4x4. Except here, the emphasis is firmly on sporting luxury rather than pampering outright.

It's telling they've picked the diesel version for the range-topper. The R50 is based on the oddball of the SUV world: the 5.0-litre V10 TDI. That means 345bhp and – wait for it – a monumental 627lb ft of torque.

So, yes, it shifts with an alacrity that no lumbering 4x4 has a right to, scuttling to 62mph in just 6.7 seconds in a blur of Boeing-style thrust as you're pushed back into the squidgy leather seats.

Sounds more like a luxury rocket than a hard-charging sports car...

That's the thing with the R50. It doesn't feel that sporty, but the bare figures suggest otherwise. Distance-shortening shove is never more than a toe-prod away and it makes for a relaxing driving style. Especially as peak torque arrives at just 2000rpm.

So is a clean diesel the way forward for so-called sporty 4x4s? VW claims the R50 is neither dirtier nor thirstier than the standard 5.0 TDI – which means 22.4mpg and 333g/km. We actually managed a decent 21mpg over a week's driving; hardly something to be proud of, but not disastrous in a £62k monster...

And what else do you get for your money?

R50 spec brings a host of goodies, including those imposing 21-inch ten-spoke alloys (great news! They don't ruin the ride – this thing merely flattens road imperfections into submission) and an R design package. So you get a roof spoiler, oval tailpipes and wider wheel arches.

It all sounds a bit bling, but it's not. This is a luxury SUV that just happens to be extra fast and extra equipped to cope with anything that family life throws at it. Maybe it was a guilty pleasure, but several of us at CAR – people who normally rail against big, lumbering 4x4s – rather liked it...

Statistics

How much?	£62,015
On sale in the UK:	Now
Engine:	4921cc V10 turbodiesel, 345bhp @ 3500rpm, 627lb ft @ 2000rpm
Transmission:	Six-speed auto, four-wheel drive
Performance:	0-62mph 6.7sec, 146mph, 22.4mpg, 333g/km
How heavy / made of?	2602kg/steel
How big (length/width/height in mm)?	4754/1928/1703

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VW Scirocco GT (2008) CAR review

By Anthony ffrench-Constant

16 June 2008 10:00

Volkswagen has finally launched its new Scirocco coupe and CAR has tested the first production versions. Anthony ffrench-Constant reviews the new Scirocco and wonders why it has taken VW so long to get around to a Mk3…

Perhaps VW has simply been too busy frantically filling every other market segment it could identify, including some its customers clearly failed to. Happily, we now seem to have someone rather more badge-savvy at the sharp end than VW uber alles obsessed Piech, and they correctly consider a Scirocco to be a better people’s car-proposition than a Phaeton.

VW Scirocco: the history lesson

It’s a whopping 34 years since Giugiaro’s stunning Mk1 hit the streets and, more significantly, at least 15 years since the somewhat bland Mk2 succumbed to alternative employment wedging open the Pearly Gates. You, of course, will remember who’s responsible for that epic backward leap in all things styling-related. I confess, I hated it so much I never bothered to find out, always considering the elegant Corrado to be the original Scirocco’s true spiritual successor.

We’re still none the wiser as to how to categorise the Scirocco today, but I’ll settle for a cut-price coupe. It’s no accident that VW’s new corporate nose (three cheers for the death of the concept’s gaping gob) should appear on a Scirocco a few months before the new sixth-generation Golf; lest we forget, the first Scirocco actually preceded that first Giugiaro Golf by a similar margin.

So the new Scirocco has lashings of Golf under the skin, then?

Yes but, ironically, plumbing the depths of that elegant pressed-metal presentation, you’re more likely to get a strong whiff of Eos than Golf.

The good-looking but highly colour sensitive coachwork retains a surprisingly large dollop of Iroc concept, and in the cabin the dashboard is, irritatingly, almost pure Eos with white back-lighting to the instrument binnacle. Nothing wrong with that per se (except dash-top glare in the windscreen, that is), but doesn’t such a blatant style statement deserve rather more bespoke treatment on board? A trick missed through the blunderings of bean-counters, I fear.

The Scirocco’s front seats are immediately comfortable and ergonomics as first-class as you’d expect. However, those who like to sit low in a car may find that despite massive reach and rake adjustment, the steering wheel won’t hunker down quite enough for absolute comfort.

So is the new VW Scirocco a cramped 2+2, or is life in the back bearable?

Despite a heavily tapered glasshouse, sculpting of the Scirocco’s rear bench to sensibly limit accommodation to just two passengers finds them sitting sufficiently inboard that headroom only becomes a problem for those over 6ft tall.

However, to achieve even this VW had to set the tailgate hinges so proud that they need blisters on the roof to contain them. Actually, that looks pretty good. Boot space is down 58 litres on the Golf, but the rear seats still fold flat to up the ante to 755 litres. Buyers are unlikely to care about such figures, but I’m still docking a point off the usability rating for the absence of a boot release button anywhere within walking distance of, er, the boot. A shame.

Can you really tell the difference between this and Golf behind the wheel?

Only driven back to back, or in genuine anger, I’ll wager. Sharing the Golf’s 2578mm wheelbase, the new coupe is 40mm longer, 41mm wider and a limbo-dancer’s-nightmare 97mm lower than the company workhorse, whilst respective increases of 35mm and 59mm to front and rear tracks allied to MacPherson strut front and multi-link rear suspension and a 30kg de-larding offer the promise of enhanced agility.

Badged GT, the first Sciroccos will be launched in the UK with a 2.0 litre TSI petrol engine linked to either a six-speed manual gearbox or, for a £1200 premium, the VW group’s delicious DSG gearbox.

Is the new Scirocco quick?

A punchy 197bhp at 6000rpm and 206lb ft of torque at a lazy 1700rpm equates to 62mph in 7.2 seconds and the full George of 146mph. Don’t be dismayed by bald statistics, however; making a jolly pleasing noise whist going about its business, this powerplant rather excels through the gears, posting an unofficial 30-70mph surge of only 6.0 seconds.

The DSG ’box continues to please, slurring changes with an alacrity more usually associated with the late Reggie Bosanquet butchering News at Ten headlines, and smoothing down-changes so absolutely that boy-racer-appeal throttle blippings didn’t make it into the electronic mapping. Almost a pity.

Speaking of which, the wheel-mounted paddles are too small and not in the least tactile. VW missed another opportunity to differentiate the Scirocco cockpit from the workhorses of the range here with a pair of bespoke blades…

Adaptive suspension makes another appearance on the Scirocco

Unfortunately, yes. Identical to the ACC system appearing on the Passat CC, but here re-christened DCC (yes, such acronyms are lost on me too) the system allows you to select Comfort, Normal and Sport settings, utterly obviating its very purpose by effectively doing that constantly and automatically when in Normal mode anyway.

On truly disgusting road surfaces, Sport will dislodge even the most tenacious head lice, but the system only really makes itself felt through the adding of gently artificial weight to the steering as you climb to the Sport end of the scale. I drove a car on standard suspension and found no cause for complaint whatsoever, which makes it all the more galling that the car comes to the UK with DCC fitted as standard. A daft UK marketing decision fuelled, doubtless, by dosh.

You were discussing handling…

Ah, yes. On the road, the car’s stiff as a teenager when the alarm goes off and pretty much faultless in time-honoured, front-drive fashion. Given the opportunity for a serious hoon on an abandoned East German airfield, the Scirocco behaved in an entirely predictable manner to boot.

Over-cook a corner and the front washes gradually away without drama. Lifting the throttle tightens the line to an extent, but even yanking on the handbrake mid-corner will not seriously encourage the back end to step out of line, and gentle drifting with too much lock on for either comfort or genuine style becomes the order of the day.

Is it just me, or isn’t it a pity that so many cars of this good-looking coupe ilk offer the promise of tail-out fun these days but, thanks to the ubiquity of front-drive formats, consistently fail to deliver? The prettier the car, the harder that is to take, I find. And this really is a very pretty car.

Any surprises?

Well, the alternative engine choice (before the diesels in 2009) are the nifty little super- and turbocharged 1.4 litre units – and they suit the Scirocco rather well.

Giving surprisingly little away to the 2.0-litre GTI engine in straight line speed, I can’t help feeling it abets the car’s agility through the reduction of front-end weight adding just a sniff of further crispness to turn-in, whilst also allowing the car to hold its line for a whisker longer before front end traction steps over the can’t-be-arsed picket line.

Verdict: is it a thumbs up, then?

Almost entirely, yes. Appropriately handsome from almost every angle, the new Scirocco seems like a considerable amount of car for £20,000 and, at only £18,000 or so for the 1.4, something of a bargain.

Makes you wonder how much VW will offer it for when, eventually, the optimum version combining the 2.0-litre engine with conventional springs and the DSG gearbox finally reaches us. Personally, I’d hold out for that.

Statistics

How much?	£20,500
On sale in the UK:	September 2008
Engine:	4-cylinder petrol, turbocharged, 1984cc, 197bhp @ 6000rpm, 206lb ft @ 1700rpm
Transmission:	6-speed manual, front-wheel drive
Performance:	0-62mph in 7.2 seconds, 146mph maximum
How heavy / made of?	1298kg/steel
How big (length/width/height in mm)?	4256/1810/1404

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