RE: VW Golf R (Mk7) | PH Used Buying Guide
Discussion
On paper an Estate 'R' would make an ideal next car for me (useful family lugger that does a commute and kids/bikes/shopping whilst also beign fast and fun) but I am completelt put off by two things:
A) it will almost certainly get stolen.
B) everyone who I know who's owned one simply thinks they are 'meh'. As in, wow, its fast, amazing, what next? Shortly followed by boredom. I guess it depends on whether your into numbers, or into other non-quantifiable qualities.
A) it will almost certainly get stolen.
B) everyone who I know who's owned one simply thinks they are 'meh'. As in, wow, its fast, amazing, what next? Shortly followed by boredom. I guess it depends on whether your into numbers, or into other non-quantifiable qualities.
leviCV8 said:
I don't think you are alone there... The competency of the R is undeniable but I think the GTi is probably the one to have if you are after a bit more driver involvement and fun at reasonable speeds.
I agree and personally I would have picked a GTi estate if that was a thing (forgetting the Octavia VRS for a minute and the fact it goes against the GTi ethos), but I wanted a petrol and needed an estate for the dog.In my opinion 310ps with DSG is mostly unusable day to day without risk to license, yourself or others. Crazy to think you can go faster in something like an M340i and relatively speaking these are still far down on the pecking order when it comes to outright pace....
snotrag said:
On paper an Estate 'R' would make an ideal next car for me (useful family lugger that does a commute and kids/bikes/shopping whilst also beign fast and fun) but I am completelt put off by two things:
A) it will almost certainly get stolen.
B) everyone who I know who's owned one simply thinks they are 'meh'. As in, wow, its fast, amazing, what next? Shortly followed by boredom.
If it helps with the decision, both of those are just overused PH tropes, rather than facts. A) it will almost certainly get stolen.
B) everyone who I know who's owned one simply thinks they are 'meh'. As in, wow, its fast, amazing, what next? Shortly followed by boredom.
I had one for 3 years and it wasn't even stolen once.
Great car, but nothing you could get attached to.
Primary issue is that it removes a lot of the challenge and skill from driving quickly, very few roads give you the opportunity to really explore it.
me it was fast for what it was though.
Great car, but nothing you could get attached to.
Primary issue is that it removes a lot of the challenge and skill from driving quickly, very few roads give you the opportunity to really explore it.
me it was fast for what it was though.Edited by BrettMRC on Monday 2nd November 11:07
BrettMRC said:
I had one for 3 years and it wasn't even stolen once.
Great car, but nothing you could get attached to.
Primary issue is that it removes a lot of the challenge and skill from driving quickly, very few roads give you the opportunity to really explore it.
me it was fast for what it was though.
Yep the whole IT WILL GET STOLEN thing does my head in, i've known loads of people with them and not one has been stolen, the golf doesnt even make a lot of the 'Top 10 Most Stolen Cars' lists. It certainly didnt put me off buying one, if that sort of thing put me off then i'd never leave the house in case i got hit by lightning, or tripped and banged my head etc.Great car, but nothing you could get attached to.
Primary issue is that it removes a lot of the challenge and skill from driving quickly, very few roads give you the opportunity to really explore it.
me it was fast for what it was though.Edited by BrettMRC on Monday 2nd November 11:07
I find them a bit dull just because everyone has them, but my mate has a pre facelift DSG car mapped up to just over 400bhp and it's savagely quick off the line. It's a proper PlayStation car with the flappy paddles and huge traction levels. I'm not sure the manual makes a massive amount of sense with the R, I feel like it mostly makes sense as something that you can go down a B road at warp speed in with minimal effort.
PH said:
Note however that cars from the end of 2018 on were dialled back to 300hp to get the R through new WLTP emissions regs.
Why do all of the journos seem to get this wrong?WLTP doesn't mandate anything different to NEDC in terms of emissions. It's not something that can be 'passed' or 'failed'. It's just a measurement method.
What you mean is the EU6c regulations that came in at the same time, which meant the use of a particulate filter in many DI petrol engines, hence the power loss.
scottos said:
Yep the whole IT WILL GET STOLEN thing does my head in, i've known loads of people with them and not one has been stolen, the golf doesnt even make a lot of the 'Top 10 Most Stolen Cars' lists. It certainly didnt put me off buying one, if that sort of thing put me off then i'd never leave the house in case i got hit by lightning, or tripped and banged my head etc.
We've had ours for 18 months, parked on the street at all times, haven't had any issues.GTEYE said:
At the risk of being shot down in flames, I tried the R and the GTi Performance and found the GTi to be more fun and the car better suited to the UK.
The GTi gets overlooked, but the key difference for me is you can actually use more of the performance on UK roads where the R pushed you too quickly into licence losing speeds.
With the VAQ diff, traction isn't an issue either. For me it was the better car (for the UK).
The comment above about the Mk7 being better to look at than the Mk7.5 had me baffled though, that seems to go against 100% of other views!
Just because the R is the quicker car doesn't make it more fun.
I'd be also be pretty wary of buying one used. There's a certain type of buyer they appeal to and the problems you read of gearbox and diff issues are most likely down to the treatment they have received.
The gti was more involving but definitely not the better all round car
The GTi gets overlooked, but the key difference for me is you can actually use more of the performance on UK roads where the R pushed you too quickly into licence losing speeds.
With the VAQ diff, traction isn't an issue either. For me it was the better car (for the UK).
The comment above about the Mk7 being better to look at than the Mk7.5 had me baffled though, that seems to go against 100% of other views!
Just because the R is the quicker car doesn't make it more fun.
I'd be also be pretty wary of buying one used. There's a certain type of buyer they appeal to and the problems you read of gearbox and diff issues are most likely down to the treatment they have received.
The gti was more involving but definitely not the better all round car
Edited by GTEYE on Monday 2nd November 10:11
scottos said:
kultsch88 said:
On my second, a mk7.5 lapiz blue estate. Previously mk7 black 3dr DSG.
7.5 sounds better than the 7.0 in my opinion .
If you're getting the sound comparison between your hatch and estate its probably because the estate doesn't have a valved exhaust, rather than the mk7/ mk7.5 comparison. The estates do generally just sound better 7.5 sounds better than the 7.0 in my opinion .
i didnt realise this until i test drove the estate i bought and did a bit of googling.Shiv_P said:
scottos said:
kultsch88 said:
On my second, a mk7.5 lapiz blue estate. Previously mk7 black 3dr DSG.
7.5 sounds better than the 7.0 in my opinion .
If you're getting the sound comparison between your hatch and estate its probably because the estate doesn't have a valved exhaust, rather than the mk7/ mk7.5 comparison. The estates do generally just sound better 7.5 sounds better than the 7.0 in my opinion .
i didnt realise this until i test drove the estate i bought and did a bit of googling.7.5 had all four without valves.
Pictures and explanation in this thread.
I haven’t driven one of these or a car built in the last ten years for that matter but I’m fairly sure this is a boring white goods PCP mobile that is over engineered. Had a Passat in the early 2000s and the windscreen wiper blade wore awfully quickly. Dealer wasn’t helpful so not considering a VW ever again.
kultsch88 said:
leviCV8 said:
I don't think you are alone there... The competency of the R is undeniable but I think the GTi is probably the one to have if you are after a bit more driver involvement and fun at reasonable speeds.
I agree and personally I would have picked a GTi estate if that was a thing (forgetting the Octavia VRS for a minute and the fact it goes against the GTi ethos), but I wanted a petrol and needed an estate for the dog. (see my garage for modlist)
leviCV8 said:
I don't think you are alone there... The competency of the R is undeniable but I think the GTi is probably the one to have if you are after a bit more driver involvement and fun at reasonable speeds.
I've got a Mk7.5 GTI. Again highly competant and in most regards a very good car, but still very little to no driving involvement by PH standards. I think the same can be said for GTI/R/Cupra/anything built on this platform, regardless of gearbox/spec/bhp/driven wheels.KD2020 said:
Had a Mk7 R for 2 years as a daily - brilliant all round car (and my girlfriend loved it) but lacked any driver involvement!
I've moved onto an M2 but I am sure I'll be back when I need the extra space!
Ha, I made exactly the same switch! I usually hang on to my cars for a good 3 or 4 years, and whilst I couldn't objectively fault the Golf R, it just didn't light my fire at all. Sure, it's incredibly rapid but devoid of character or involvement. I've moved onto an M2 but I am sure I'll be back when I need the extra space!
Edited by KD2020 on Monday 2nd November 08:36
Towards the end of my ownership I found myself driving at irresponsible speed to garner some feedback or interaction, alas it was not for me.
By comparison I'm loving my Long Beach Blue M2! With oodles of character it has me smiling before I reach the end of my cul-de-sac. Getting the kids in and out is a bit of an arse, but it's worth it.
Matt
Edited by 996GT3_Matt on Monday 2nd November 14:25
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