RE: VW Golf VR6 | Spotted

[irish boy]

Great articles. Back when road tests were really road tests. And before YouTube or forums, so the printed press was our main source of any info about our next perspective purchase, realistic or dream.

The question was how many magazines a month could you limit yourself to….mine was 4 (plus the weekly auto trader) but sometimes a very tempting cover on another circulation had the wallet out again!

[Tim Cognito]

Always thought they were cool where I was younger, would have liked a MK3 golf of some sort but insurance was ridiculous on them when I was 17/18.

It's the front of the MK3 which let's it down in my view, looks nice from other angles.

[s m]

greenarrow said:

s m said:

I only really remember the CAR article being not particularly complimentary at the time. The rest of the mainstream press like Autocar, Performance Car and Fast Lane seemed to say it wasn’t bad at all, praising the handling in some articles. These were the early press cars and there seems to be some uncertainty over whether the suspension was softened/changed in later years looking at some of the later articles I’ve read. Not the first time that’s happened to a car where early criticism of a stiff ride might have been taken on board

Autocar certainly found the handling to their liking





Performance Car seemed to find it acceptable too apart from not being as good as the best French stuff like the 309Gti on a B-road ( was any other fwd hatch though? )






Fast Lane similarly gave it a decent review I thought





They also managed to get it to 60 in a Renault 5 GT Turbo/Astra GTE 16v equalling 6.9 seconds, pretty much as quick as fwd hatches got in the late 80s/early 90s



Surprised people found them slow for a car of this weight/power…….but then maybe not healthy examples that were commented on?

Good articles there as always SM

Yeah, the VR6 was never slow in its day. In 1996, Autocar lined one up against the new GTI-6 and found the VR6 noticeably quicker in a straight-line (not bad given that the 306 was only 7 BHP down on power) but the GTI-6 murdered it in the twisties (not a surprise to be fair).

The early E36 325i didnt have the best reviews so not a great surprise Autocar preferred the Golf. I think the tables were turned when the 328i turned up, which was much punchier and had a few chassis mods.

Definitely something to be said for a car which has "just enough" performance. I like cars in this performance bracket. Quick enough to despatch dawdlers on A or B roads, but slow enough to allow you to wring out the lower gears and not immediately be up the arse of the car in front, or 50% over the posted speed limit. If you ever watch a Harry's Garage video, on many moderns, he literally has his foot down for 3-4 seconds before he lifts off, because he has reached the NSL so quickly from 30 MPH.

I remember the 306GTi twin test - Peugeot went on to be the best in class hatch for quite a while in the eyes of reviewers - so no shame in the Golf coming second - was quite an old model by then I guess and everything had moved on

[s m]

irish boy said:

Great articles. Back when road tests were really road tests. And before YouTube or forums, so the printed press was our main source of any info about our next perspective purchase, realistic or dream.

The question was how many magazines a month could you limit yourself to….mine was 4 (plus the weekly auto trader) but sometimes a very tempting cover on another circulation had the wallet out again!

How many magazines per month??

Hmm, well I don’t drink much so I used to justify itself as each one being a pint

You are right though - they all used to give you more facts and figures in the road test reviews back then

[VeeReihenmotor6]

My step Dad was in the Met Police and gave chase to a Golf VR6 stolen on a test drive from a VW showroom. Once he intercepted the Golf, as paths crossed, he was left for dead as he attempted to give chase. He was just in a panda car, probably an Astra to be fair, but he tried hard all the same. It's a story he told that I remember well as a 12 year old kid and I have a soft spot for them.

[s m]

VeeReihenmotor6 said:

My step Dad was in the Met Police and gave chase to a Golf VR6 stolen on a test drive from a VW showroom. Once he intercepted the Golf, as paths crossed, he was left for dead as he attempted to give chase. He was just in a panda car, probably an Astra to be fair, but he tried hard all the same. It's a story he told that I remember well as a 12 year old kid and I have a soft spot for them.

I was reading the earlier posts from Msportman and Earthdweller remembering their VR6 pursuit cars.
When you recounted about your Dad in his Astra panda car it made me recall the Shropshire Paramedics had Astra GTE 16valves as First Responder Cars for a time in the late 80s/early 90s

Would have had a chance of sticking with a stolen VR6 in one of those!

[biggbn]

Stonking engines. Had two mk2 golf with vr6, a 2.8 and a slightly breathed on 2.9. The 2.9 was an absolute blast, one of the most fun cars I've owned. Well worth finding a well converted one in opinion, they go really, really well.

[Earthdweller]

s m said:

VeeReihenmotor6 said:

My step Dad was in the Met Police and gave chase to a Golf VR6 stolen on a test drive from a VW showroom. Once he intercepted the Golf, as paths crossed, he was left for dead as he attempted to give chase. He was just in a panda car, probably an Astra to be fair, but he tried hard all the same. It's a story he told that I remember well as a 12 year old kid and I have a soft spot for them.

I was reading the earlier posts from Msportman and Earthdweller remembering their VR6 pursuit cars.
When you recounted about your Dad in his Astra panda car it made me recall the Shropshire Paramedics had Astra GTE 16valves as First Responder Cars for a time in the late 80s/early 90s

Would have had a chance of sticking with a stolen VR6 in one of those!

The problem with chasing stolen cars is that their drivers don’t have to treat red traffic lights as give ways!

Conversely their ability was usually inverse to the amount of risk they take that quite rightly the Police driver can’t take which is where the skill of the police driver came in, in their ability to make progress rather than just drive fast

At the time of the VR6 Golf’s the Met panda car was either a 1.1 Metro or a 1.1 Fiesta

They’d just started introducing incident response cars (IRV’s) which were 1.4 Astra’s (mostly) with blues/twos and mainset radios ( linked to NSY ) fitted but they weren’t widespread as you had to give up two panda’s to get one IRV and divisions were loathe to lose vehicles which were already in short supply

Unlike today the only marked vehicles fitted with two tones were area cars/traffic cars and TSG carriers and the introduction of IRV’s coincided with station vans having sirens fitted to replace their bells .. yes they still had “ding a lings” in the mid 90’s

The interesting thing was that a lot of scrotes would just pull over and give up when they saw the VR6 behind them whereas with the Vectra’s they’d try it on

In fairness the Golf’s really did look the part though

[s m]

Earthdweller said:

s m said:

VeeReihenmotor6 said:

My step Dad was in the Met Police and gave chase to a Golf VR6 stolen on a test drive from a VW showroom. Once he intercepted the Golf, as paths crossed, he was left for dead as he attempted to give chase. He was just in a panda car, probably an Astra to be fair, but he tried hard all the same. It's a story he told that I remember well as a 12 year old kid and I have a soft spot for them.

I was reading the earlier posts from Msportman and Earthdweller remembering their VR6 pursuit cars.
When you recounted about your Dad in his Astra panda car it made me recall the Shropshire Paramedics had Astra GTE 16valves as First Responder Cars for a time in the late 80s/early 90s

Would have had a chance of sticking with a stolen VR6 in one of those!

The problem with chasing stolen cars is that their drivers don’t have to treat red traffic lights as give ways!

Conversely their ability was usually inverse to the amount of risk they take that quite rightly the Police driver can’t take which is where the skill of the police driver came in, in their ability to make progress rather than just drive fast

At the time of the VR6 Golf’s the Met panda car was either a 1.1 Metro or a 1.1 Fiesta

They’d just started introducing incident response cars (IRV’s) which were 1.4 Astra’s (mostly) with blues/twos and mainset radios ( linked to NSY ) fitted but they weren’t widespread as you had to give up two panda’s to get one IRV and divisions were loathe to lose vehicles which were already in short supply

Unlike today the only marked vehicles fitted with two tones were area cars/traffic cars and TSG carriers and the introduction of IRV’s coincided with station vans having sirens fitted to replace their bells .. yes they still had “ding a lings” in the mid 90’s

The interesting thing was that a lot of scrotes would just pull over and give up when they saw the VR6 behind them whereas with the Vectra’s they’d try it on

In fairness the Golf’s really did look the part though

Oh yes, it wasn’t a criticism of your pursuit - more an observation that the local paramedics managed to get ‘hot hatches’ too

[Earthdweller]

s m said:

Oh yes, it wasn’t a criticism of your pursuit - more an observation that the local paramedics managed to get ‘hot hatches’ too

I didn’t take it as such at all

[s m]

benjidog said:

WPA said:

Always remember this magazine cover, having owned one (GTI 8V), they were not that great.

It was an interesting idea, V6 in a hatch but standard they were poor, upgraded suspension transformed them.

Not sure I would pay this much for one, R32 or mk5 GTI are so much better to drive for the same or more money.

Remember that cover.

They changed their tune on the car from the first drive of one but that was more of a long term view of their ownership of the car on their test fleet.

Roger Bell liked the early example they had when tested vs the 325i



They also managed to get it off the line pretty smartly too, matching the times Fast Lane achieved for the benchmark sprint



Not too slow compared to other 170bhp hatches


Does go to show how long term ownership of a car can be a very different experience to a one-off press test - certainly some people unimpressed whilst others loved theirs

[Msportman]

The nice thing about a VR6 Golf or Vento is that effortless performance and the fact it was a six pot in a small hatch ....it was quite a different approach for VW squeezing in such a big engine into mainstream hatch in its day. The look on peoples faces when they heard a smooth and sonorous sound track coming a MK3 Golf was a nice touch. Certainly it wasn't faultless and it likes a drink but I enjoyed mine especially after some well chosen mods by AmD in Oddington Oxford who were the go to experts on anything VAG, Porsche & BMW. Sadly the original owner is no longer with us but Geoff Everett was extremely well known in motorsport and tuning having designed the Bosch & Crypton engine diagnostic rigs back in the 80's.

[MattsCar]

Having seen a few ropey MK3 non VR6 Golfs being sold for silly money over the past few weeks on various sites, this actually seems really sensibly priced.

[s m]

Msportman said:

The nice thing about a VR6 Golf or Vento is that effortless performance and the fact it was a six pot in a small hatch ....it was quite a different approach for VW squeezing in such a big engine into mainstream hatch in its day.

Ford dabbled with the idea of a rwd Escort with the Cosworth 24v V6 and similar looks to the Escort Cosworth ( minus rear wing ) as a competitor to the Golf VR6 - John Bull from SVE even built a test mule but it never came to production

[Earthdweller]

https://x.com/ludenclassics/status/177774200006368...

Just popped up tidy looking Golf VR6 just sold for £2484

[s m]

Earthdweller said:

https://x.com/ludenclassics/status/177774200006368...

Just popped up tidy looking Golf VR6 just sold for £2484

If I had one I’d have to go manual box i think

[VeeReihenmotor6]

me to re the manual. However if jap important came up for the right money (all autos) I would consider a manual swap. Got to be cheaper than chasing rust on an old car!