VWs - I dont get it....

[pogweasel]

 

BMW's own figures show that a very high proportion (80 or 90%) of 1 series buyers do not know it is RWD.

GR8 4 DRIFTN INTO A DITCH.

That is quite astonishing, given that you can buy 1-series with some really quite powerful engines. Do they teach these people (presumably raised on a diet of scrabbly fwd) how to drive them at all?

[Alexg]

[VWPowered]

lol@that ad

 

[Alexg]

Sniffpetrol

 

[Negative Creep]

You have to hand it to VAG's marketing team though. They can take the same basic car and sell it with a budget, normal and premium badge attached. I wonder how many A4 drivers would say they'd never own a Skoda?

 

 

Having said that, does anyone know what the point of Seat is anymore?

[Claypole]

I've never driven anything apart from VW's, from 1990 until two weeks ago.

 

First time in 20 years that I've not owned one.

What made you change your buying habits then?

Sold the Polo tdi I had to fund starting a business, now driving an Astra estate.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

Having said that, does anyone know what the point of Seat is anymore?

Surely SEAT is VW's effort to get in on the burgeoning shite market. Look at this!

 

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/57-PLATE-SEAT-ALTEA-FREETRACK-4-TDI-1-PREV-OWN-FSH-/130395441210

 

Just pure shite, no two ways about it.

[Mr Lobster]

I though that the plan for the VW Group brands was that SEAT would be sporty 'like Alfa Romeo', VW would move upmarket and Skoda would be the mainstream 'family orientated' brand.

 

Nothing about a VW Fox says 'upmarket' to me though.

[VWPowered]

Nothing about a VW Fox says 'upmarket' to me though.

did you not know the headlining in a VW Fox is made from pineapple skins

[Alexg]

The resin in the pineapple skin may cause an itchy rash in some people

[gtd2000]

The resin in the pineapple skin may cause an itchy rash in some people

Same goes for scabies I hear

[Cavcraft]

The resin in the pineapple skin may cause an itchy rash in some people

 

Fair to assume that Golfs come with a box of VAGisil then?

[CIH]

I've always figured;

 

Seat - budget cars for yoofs or Seat loyalists

Skoda - budget cars for old giffers or Skoda loyalists (like my old man)

VW - who or whatever

Audi - snooty ex-BMW drivers

 

I hate mk3 golfs with a passion. Always slammed by scene idiots and every fitting is rusty and seized.

[Lord Sterling]

Goes like this from what I've seen:

 

Seat - Budget cars for yoofs who cant afford VWs or Seat loyalists

Skoda - Budget cars for old giffers or Skoda loyalists (like my old man)

VW (Some models) - Snooty new-money wannabes who want to be seen in something worth a few quid and hold its value

Audi - Snooty ex-BMW drivers or stressed out company types

 

These are mainly on newer cars, older ones dont apply.

[gtd2000]

NOTHING (Perhaps Czech?) is as reliable as a Volkswagen...well not according to this list of the top ten most relaible UK cars..

 

1 SUZUKI 31.13

2 HONDA 33.17

3 MAZDA 53.5

4 TOYOTA 56.22

5 SKODA 58.87 (made with VW bits how odd?)

6 SMART 66.4

7 CITROEN 66.61

8 HYUNDAI 66.97

9 NISSAN 70.02

10 FORD 70.71

http://www.reliabilityindex.co.uk/top10.html?apc=3128339010848601

[Lord Sterling]

Nice! Here is the Top 10 Worst:

 

1 JEEP 231.09

2 PORSCHE 221.39

3 LANDROVER 213.73

4 ALFA ROMEO 158.4

5 CHRYSLER 155.61

6 JAGUAR 146.13

7 AUDI 142.35

8 MG 131.08

9 MERCEDES 129.89

10 SAAB 126.12

 

Dont where BMW lies but I've seen countless BMWs break down, including a 05 M5 on the M5/M6 and the other day an 09' 540D at a petrol station

[Milford Cubicle]

In terms of where this reputation started, we need to look back to the 70s.

 

Imagine being an average car buyer shopping for a family motor in 1975.

Your choices;

 

Or maybe the car that didn't go out of production until 2009

 

 

What about the Fiat 127? Just like a Golf, long before the Golf existed.

[Tayne]

.

[Milford Cubicle]

My dad really rated the 128s he owned before I was born.

My main point is the Golf wasn't the first of its kind.

[GJR 11L]

The 127 wasn't a hatchback at first though, so yes, a bit like a Golf, but one that's had the tailgate welded shut and a catflap installed in its lower half.

 

I had two Golfs, both MK3s, one after the other:

 

Golf #1 - White, 5-door, '92 'K' 1.4cl with 170,000+ on the clock and no real worries with things falling off or wearing out. It was a good enough car as it cost only £300 at an auction in 2002, engine was superb, went remarkably well for a 60bhp car of that bulk, should have kept it but then, temptation came along in the shape of a 2.0 CL Variant, a '97 'P', only 30,000 since new, full history, etc. That bloody thing was simply the worst car in the world, ever.

The factory part of the body was pretty well free of rot, but the bit that Karmann added to turn the hatch into the Variant, well that wasn't so good, the division between good bits and rusty bits made it look like a bloody cut 'n' shut after a few Months of owning it, the brake discs for the front had to be ordered in from Germany as vented ones for 4-stud hubs weren't specified for any other UK-spec version, the fuel injection cost more than £500 in repairs over the two years I kept the thing, the window cables failed, then the motors, then the cables again, then the water pump, then.... oh f*ck this, you get the idea!

 

One Winter, I thought that it had been stolen, but my joy was short-lived as, once the snow melted, this was the sight that greeted me when I looked out into the garage:

 

Yep, the evil little sod was still there.

 

Is it wrong to confess that a pair of 1972 Triumph Dolomites, one my current daily, are so far the only properly reliable cars I ever owned?

[Tayne]

.

[Talbotman]

Yes the golf was a neat design for its time...but its longevity and endurance was not good and was no better than th 70s norm..in fact an allegro was probably less rot prone than a golf.....and as rightly has been mentioned cars like the fiat 128 and7s....the simca1100.....renault16 ..renault 5. peugeot 104.all paved the small fwd eurohatch long before the golf and had similar lifespans ie a typical 8 to 10 years. Although not a hatch in its earlier years an alfasud would be far more fun to drive...and anybody that doenst admit to the woeful braking ability of an early golf is a liar!!.....Clever marketing has always been vws key trump card - remember the old ad with burt kwouk andthe red golf droping down by his side from above..to the recent "like a golf"campaign...all very subtle and clever..but all appealing to the fundamentally snooty middle aged telegraph reading snobs.

[In The Pit]

One of the reasons VW has a good reputation is car journalists tend to favour them, take Quentin Willson he always used to rave on over anything german mainly Mercedes Benz but if it was a group test between say a Toyota, Renault, Vauxhall and VW you just knew he’d pick the VW (the Vauxhall would probably have come last with all that Vauxhall bashing Top Gear used to do in the late 90’s).

 

Check this out for his love of VW as he tells us to buy a Golf as it wont rust!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWwmdoMO-AI

 

I totally agree with what most seem to be saying on here about the VW Golf and how badly its rusts the MKII and III rot pretty much everywhere (the MKI does too but that’s to be expected with a 70‘s car), the VW Golf is my most hated car I just think they are ugly dull rust buckets that stay dull, when a new model comes out, it looks to similar to the previous one. I had to go to the launch of the new MKV Golf in about 2002 (working in the media) and my boss new I liked cars so thought he was being nice by sending me it was so boring and the thing looked no different to the previous model. The interiors are usually a depressing place to be and most VAG stuff tend to need new gearboxes a lot sooner than most others makes. I once went to view a Passat it was an N reg and this was about 2004, it was rotten the bottoms of all the doors had bubbles there, id never seen such a new car with so much rust.

 

Now im no lover of VW but I quite like Audi, I have a 1994 L reg 80 SE and its quite nice to drive and look at, and the 90’s Audis don’t seem to rust like 90’s Golfs (Polos don’t seem to rust as bad as Golfs). However I have had a fair few problems with the Audi nothing too serious but it has let me down at various times, my other car is a 1978 Ford Escort MKII 1300 L which I trust far more than the Audi and it is a much better car than the Audi.

[Tayne]

.

[chaseracer]

...and anybody that doenst admit to the woeful braking ability of an early golf is a liar!!

Isn't this an issue with RHD cars only, due to VW leaving the brake servo in situ and lashing up the system using toffee and rubber bands...?

 

[alf892]

I have always liked Audis.........only had two though.

The first was a 1993 1.9tdi SE. Fantastic thing as we had it 10 years and only ever fitted 1 set of discs, 1 set front shocks and a couple of sets of wishbone bushes with a quick (oil and filters) service every year. Never any trouble. Replaced it with a 2002 1.9tdi A4 estate which we now have 5 years and no issues. I don't like working on modern stuff so this is great for me. Biggest problem with Audi is the fact too many ex BMW drivers now having them leading to reputational issues!

[GJR 11L]

MK3s had galvanised tailgates, well done VW! MK4s and on were fully dipped so don't rot. That late MK3 had lousy brake pedal feel and really could have used the all-disc setup found on hatches with the 2 litre engine, yet by MK4, the pedal had no feel and was, much like many other modern cars, way over-servoed so it isn't just early Golfs that came with shite brakes; they all did but in different ways!

The fact that earlier ones had the servo mounted at the end of a tube was blamed for their poor pedal feel, yet Volvo used the same arrangement in late 140 series cars and they had brakes that felt exactly the same as the earlier ones with the servo in the front o/s corner of the engine bay, both arrangements were very effective, VW just couldn't get the balance between servo ratio and master cylinder travel right, IMHO, since the earlier cars had a 1.6:1 servo, MK4s on had 2:1.

 

I have to admit that I do like Dad's '51 plate Passat though but. It was bought with 140,000 miles and has now done more than 200,000, one water pump and a set of springs have been the only non-service jobs we've had to put into it, that 1.9 TDI is one feckin' good engine and the Tiptronic gearbox actually works well with it.

 

BUT.... When I have a taxi home and instead of the usual shagged-out, 'K' plate Sierra they send an Octavia or a Superb with that same, 130bhp TDI engine, sitting in either of those is almost exactly the same as sitting in the Passat, the only tangible difference being the font of the dial print on the instruments.

 

Skoda FTW!

[Cavcraft]

MK3s had galvanised tailgates, ...

FAIL.

 

[Claypole]

MK3's rot like it's a scene tax.

[martc]

I bought a brand new Polo in 2006. The allure of quality and reliability and customer service was too great. In no particular order...

 

The customer service before I bought it was excellent. Afterwards not so good, let my tale unwind...

 

It was delivered without a handbook or service book - it took 6 weeks for the dealer to supply one (after numerous phone calls).

One of the headlights started to leak and had 1" of water in it - described problem on phone - took it in "leave it with us" comes back in the evening - "it needs a new headlight, we've ordered one for you" (in other words "we didn't believe when you rang up").

The folding seat mechanism fails. Grudgingly repaired. Mention a rattle from the boot - "they all do this"

Find a tear in the seat upholstery following mechanism repair - mended but with much grudge.

The rattle gets worse - took it in apparantly due to a loose rear wash wipe pipe behind the panel.

Rattle now louder than the engine - took it in - the tack welds holding the boot floor to the wings had failed! (the honesty of the dealer at this point was quite refreshing!).

Sold it and will never let a VW darken my door again.

 

Did I mention it used water and oil like a glutton? And it needed VW's own coolant and long life fully synethtic oil.

 

Grrr.

 

Before (and after) this debacle I favoured Asian cars - I still do.