RE: VW Golf R: Driven

[ash reynolds]

epom said:

Terrible, over rated. Its how much for a Golf ?? Its too heavy. Needs to be RWD.

Enter the ever present elephant in the room...the BMW M140

[Jonno02]

I'm very much of the opinion that in 8~ years time, people will be saying "The new *whatever car* lacks any character. They don't make em like the 2017 golf R anymore. That was full of sparkle."

Rose-tinted and all that. And no, I don't have a golf R.

[SlimJim16v]

Four pipes! Is that one system per cylinder

Edited by SlimJim16v to add smiliey that I can no longer do on my mobile

Edited by SlimJim16v on Thursday 13th April 15:03

[playalistic]

ChocolateFrog said:

A great everyday car still let down by having 4 pipes.

Mine are so dirty you can't see them. Problem solved.

[Slurms]

Got my Facelift Golf R on order.

Much more entertaining than the BMW 240i I drove, which appeared to have really numb steering.

[doogle83]

FN2TypeR said:

I suspect I'm in the minority here but a performance pack GTI would be my preference over an R, too.

+1 That's exactly what I'm looking at doing currently

[GloriaGTI]

doogle83 said:

FN2TypeR said:

I suspect I'm in the minority here but a performance pack GTI would be my preference over an R, too.

+1 That's exactly what I'm looking at doing currently

And exactly what I have, albeit one of the first models registered in 2013.

Next door neighbour bought an R shortly after I got my GTI PP (Joneses). I envy the sound of the exhaust but that's about it, I've just remapped mine and pretty close on power now.

[GloriaGTI]

Dave Hedgehog said:

except they fit a fake engine sound speaker in the engine bay which for me makes it totally undesirable

i would happily fork out a lot more money for an RS3 or A45 to have a real engine noise rather than to be scammed by VW

i cant deny that on the cheap lease deals its an awful lot of car for very little cash

You can turn the soundaktor off in VCDS

[TomScrut]

GloriaGTI said:

Dave Hedgehog said:

except they fit a fake engine sound speaker in the engine bay which for me makes it totally undesirable

i would happily fork out a lot more money for an RS3 or A45 to have a real engine noise rather than to be scammed by VW

i cant deny that on the cheap lease deals its an awful lot of car for very little cash

You can turn the soundaktor off in VCDS

Or on the older pre facelifts (such as mine), unplug it.

[Dale487]

doogle83 said:

FN2TypeR said:

I suspect I'm in the minority here but a performance pack GTI would be my preference over an R, too.

+1 That's exactly what I'm looking at doing currently

Me too, I'd rather have a GTI PP or A GTI Clubsport or even a plain GTI - I just prefer the looks inside & out as well as the handling sounding more engaging but I guess slower. But I wouldn't say no to an R - particularly if they made an estate PP with a manual gearbox.

[Hackney]

gumsie said:

Helicopter123 said:

Epic, all the real world car anyone could ever need.

AnyONE maybe. Any family, then not even close unless you like to be cramped.

It's perfect for my family and doesn't feel cramped at all. We went over to Ireland in it last year, when I'd only had it a few weeks.
Loaded with enough stuff for two adults and two kids (at the time 4 months and 20 months) as well as space for presents etc.

Certainly not had space issues for the 4 of us, but then there's the roof rails if I do feel like moving something bigger.

On shorter (25 mile return is the longest) journeys we've even had an adult between the two child seats in the back.

[kambites]

xjay1337 said:

They automatically change up to protect the engine.

I can understand refusing to down-shift to protect the engine, but what happened to the idea of a simple rev limiter to protect it under acceleration?

[Dave Hedgehog]

GloriaGTI said:

Dave Hedgehog said:

except they fit a fake engine sound speaker in the engine bay which for me makes it totally undesirable

i would happily fork out a lot more money for an RS3 or A45 to have a real engine noise rather than to be scammed by VW

i cant deny that on the cheap lease deals its an awful lot of car for very little cash

You can turn the soundaktor off in VCDS

so?

why not just make the car sound excellent from the start, Audi have no problems making their RS models sound epic. My R32 golf sounded brilliant

Edited by Dave Hedgehog on Thursday 13th April 15:46

[GloriaGTI]

TomScrut said:

Or on the older pre facelifts (such as mine), unplug it.

I had thought about just doing that, mine is a pre-face lift (2013) but my boss has a VCDS cable so it was another tweak I could do.

Plus by simply unplugging it I thought I might have run the risk of them plugs getting damp/damaged.

[tonyb1968]

I see its still restricted to a minimum 98 ron fuel though....

[GloriaGTI]

janesmith1950 said:

I chose a 140 as to me the Golf doesn't seem to have a lot of character.

But the M135/140 aren't distinguishable from a 116d or 120i M Sport.

Plus BMW interiors make for such an uninspiring place to sit! A friend has the M135i.

I might be considerably biased in my opinions though

[TomScrut]

GloriaGTI said:

I had thought about just doing that, mine is a pre-face lift (2013) but my boss has a VCDS cable so it was another tweak I could do.

Plus by simply unplugging it I thought I might have run the risk of them plugs getting damp/damaged.

Yeah you need to put the plug end in a bag or something and fasten it tightly. I havent done it on mine but I saw a video of somebody doing it.

[Lucas Ayde]

big_rob_sydney said:

I'm a bit surprised by the weight of the wagon. Nearly 1600kg?!

Aren't these supposed to be mid-sized cars?

Back in the day, an Impreza was a 1250kg mid-sized car. What on earth has happened to cars to make them into such lardarses?

Safety requirements, mostly.

What is amazing is that performance and economy have been maintained (or improved) even using lower displacement engines to power them and with much stricter emissions standards.

A 300bhp mid size hatch that could do 0-60 in 4.6 seconds and yet deliver 30mpg or more on unleaded fuel would once have been unbelievable.

[GloriaGTI]

Dave Hedgehog said:

so?

why not just make the car sound excellent from the start, Audi have no problems making their RS models sound epic. My R32 golf sounded brilliant

Edited by Dave Hedgehog on Thursday 13th April 15:46

Well by turning off the soundaktor, you turn off the "fake engine sound" and change the car from being, in your opinion, "totally undesirable".

The RS3 is a 2.5 5cyl anyway, so maybe not comparable to 4 pot R in terms of sound.

Completely agree with you on the R32 sounding epic though.

[Lucas Ayde]

Dave Hedgehog said:

so?

why not just make the car sound excellent from the start, Audi have no problems making their RS models sound epic. My R32 golf sounded brilliant

Edited by Dave Hedgehog on Thursday 13th April 15:46

In order to meet emissions and taxation targets, they had to go with a 2 litre 4 cylinder engine. The 3.2 V6 sounded great but guzzled petrol, attracted massive road tax and only delivered ~250bhp anyway. As well as making anything you put it in extremely nose heavy due to the extra weight and centre of gravity.

In everyday use, the soundaktor is very subtle. It's only intrusive if you go into 'Race' mode which you'll only be doing for very short periods of time anyway unless you are some sort of boy racer chav, in which case you'll probably like it. You can tweak the settings to make it extremely quiet if you like.