Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Chat about your 2018+ AW/BZ model Polos here!
Andy Beats
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Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by Andy Beats »

Colleague was showing me photos of some Golf he's interested in.
Same engine as mine, DSG and even same wheels, active dash etc.
He's not driven it and doesn't have time to across to the dealer (don't even know if they're doing test drives), so I chucked him the keys to mine and he's just back after 1/2 hour.
He's not so keen now... :?
To be fair he's used to a 330D M-sport auto and I suppose the lack of grunt was always going to be a surprise, but he was a bit shocked at how jerky the DSG was (again, no surprise in comparison).
I think me mentioning 40mpg was only possible when driven VERY gently was the final straw.
His face when I mentioned <20mpg was a picture. :)
But he does commute a lot further than me.
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iichel
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by iichel »

Just laugh it off... :D
Andy Beats
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by Andy Beats »

iichel wrote: Thu Mar 11, 2021 10:33 am Just laugh it off... :D
I have, I've owned a Nissan Leaf and Juke before, I don't take offence at anyone else not liking my cars. :D
SRGTD
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by SRGTD »

@Andy Beats; It’s just as well that your friend didn’t take a trip to the dealer as most dealers probably aren’t doing test drives from their garage premises under the current lockdown, and travelling to a car dealership to buy a car may not be considered an essential journey under lockdown either. I’ve read that test drives are only permitted under the current lockdown if the prospective purchaser has paid a deposit for the car they’re interested in. Dealers are still able to sell vehicles via click and collect though, and purchasers have a 14 day cooling off period if they change their mind. I suppose that the cooling off period could be considered as an extended test drive.

As for the Golf that your friend was interested in - presumably it’s a Golf GTI if it has the 19” version of the Brescia alloys. If it’s a ‘nearly new’ car, then the it’ll be the GTI Performance which has a 7 speed DSG, rather than the 6 speed in the Polo GTI / GTI+. I don’t know how this compares to the DSG in the Polo GTI in terms of shift quality, but I can’t recall reading of owners over on golfgtiforum.co.uk having any issues with - or being critical of - the shift quality being jerky. The 7 speed DSG in the Golf GTI Performance will still change up early like the DSG in the Polo though.

As for MPG; I don’t really bother too much about fuel consumption - if I did I wouldn’t be driving a GTI. However, the lowest I’ve seen in the 6 months I’ve had my car is low 30’s, I regularly see upper 30’s / low 40’s, and on longer journeys mid 40’s. And I don’t drive it like an old granny either! Admittedly, I’ve not seen 40+ mpg much in the last couple of months though, as the car has only been used on essential journeys; a weekly 12-14 mile weekly supermarket run and this last week, a 32 mile round trip to get my Covid vaccination.
Andy Beats
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by Andy Beats »

SRGTD wrote: Thu Mar 11, 2021 12:14 pm As for MPG; I don’t really bother too much about fuel consumption - if I did I wouldn’t be driving a GTI. However, the lowest I’ve seen in the 6 months I’ve had my car is low 30’s, I regularly see upper 30’s / low 40’s, and on longer journeys mid 40’s. And I don’t drive it like an old granny either! Admittedly, I’ve not seen 40+ mpg much in the last couple of months though, as the car has only been used on essential journeys; a weekly 12-14 mile weekly supermarket run and this last week, a 32 mile round trip to get my Covid vaccination.
I'm not even in that ballpark.
If I drive into town, which is all gentle downhill, I can get 40mpg because I'm barely tickling the throttle and it's 40mph.
Same drive back, well down into the 30s just because I'm using a smidgeon more throttle to hold the 40mph uphill.
On my drive home, which is a steep uphill climb and I basically just thrash it like a ginger haired stepchild - 18mpg :shock:

i don't know what he's doing about the Golf now, he's asked me to text my friend that works at the local BMW dealer and see what they have instead.

EDIT - it's a club sport Gti, if that means anything to anyone...(shrug)
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by TurboTrev »

He really does need to drive the Golf, imho there is no comparison between the two cars based our two. I have a MK7 Clubsport and my wife has a Polo GTI+ and mine is noticeably superior in every respect, there really is no comparison. I would have thought the MK8 CS would be better than mine so the difference could be even wider. Obviously the mpg won't be fantastic if that's a big concern.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by monkeyhanger »

Mpg is pretty good in the Polo, given a fair comparison. Andy has said in the past that his commute home is under 3 miles and driven hard on a cold engine. Anyone doing a 3mile journey with a stone cold engine is going to see way less than half of their official figures for the car.

On a 12+ mile journey on mixed roads, with at least 5C ambient temp, 40mpg isn't hard to achieve, it'll do 46mpg on a 100 mile journey doing 80mph on the motorway.

You might be surprised by the MK8 Golf - VW have cheaped out in a lot of ways - interior plastics are on par with the Polo, no bonnet gas strut etc. The MK7 Golf was noticeably cheaper built than the MK6 and Scirocco with the much thinner body panels, really thin paint, no lacquer layer where they think it won't be noticed and incremental removal of little things here and there throughout the MK7's lifecycle (lock on glovebox, under seat drawers etc). The MK7 Golf is great to drive but there's a lot of cost cutting that's not right for the price-point of the car. For me the MK5 was the last Golf built to a spec and not a price.

Seems to be the way VW are going - the T-Roc's interior is horribly cheap, like it was an experiment by VW to determine how cheap they could go without affecting sales. The ID3's interior has some incredibly cheap.materials too, but this is all relative to the standards expected for a German car, still better than Ford, Honda, Renault etc.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by SRGTD »

TurboTrev wrote: Sat Mar 13, 2021 7:16 pm He really does need to drive the Golf, imho there is no comparison between the two cars based our two. I have a MK7 Clubsport and my wife has a Polo GTI+ and mine is noticeably superior in every respect, there really is no comparison. I would have thought the MK8 CS would be better than mine so the difference could be even wider. Obviously the mpg won't be fantastic if that's a big concern.
From what I’ve read, the mk8 isn’t better than the mk7 / mk7.5 in some respects because of VW’s cost cutting philosophy; the bean counters in VW’s Ivory towers will have controlled the purse strings, so I dare say keeping costs down will have been a prime consideration. Also, development of VW’s ID range of electric vehicles will almost certainly have had an impact on the mk8’s development budget - and not in a good way.

Positives; it seems that dynamically, the mk8 is a better car to drive, AID is more configurable and the tech is next generation, but currently the tech is also the mk8 Golf’s Achilles heel - see below.

Negatives;
  • under-developed software with many error messages for no apparent reason, functions not working as they should. The user interface is laggy and slow to respond.
  • Cost cutting;
    • removal of physical buttons from the interior with many functions operated from the central touchscreen; form over function IMHO. In many instances, a function that was a simple push of a button in the mk7/mk7.5 may now require navigation through multiple menus and sub menus on the touchscreen, making it difficult and potentially dangerous if attempted while on the move). The rotary control for lights is now a cheap touchpad.
    • removal of physical buttons from the steering wheel on performance models and replaced by more difficult to operate touch pads with haptic feedback.
    • sliders below central touchscreen for volume and heating controls aren’t illuminated at night.
    • removal of under bonnet gas strut, glovebox no longer lined, no sliding cover over the cup holders in the centre console, less soft feel interior plastics.
    • spare wheel is now an extra cost option, although this seems to be the new norm for VW across other model ranges too.
So I’d argue the mk8 isn’t necessarily better than the mk7/mk7.5. In some respects it’s worse. And don’t get me started on the design of the standard 18” alloy wheels on the mk8 GTI; subjective I know, but I think they’re horrible - just my opinion of course.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by S_94 »

The standard Golf MK8 / GTI are really underwhelming. As mentioned, the cost cutting is really obvious and it definitely shows. I thought it would slowly grow on me, in a small way the exterior has (minus the alloys) however the interior is awful.

Not sure if anyone has seen the Golf GTI ‘Edition 45’ anniversary model, but that does look nice. Still can't unsee the 'Clown Face' steering wheel but it's an improvement on the standard models. If I was moving on from the Polo I'd go for a MK7.5 GTI TCR.
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SRGTD
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by SRGTD »

@S_94; I agree on the mk8 GTI Clubsport ED45; IMHO it’s definitely the best looking mk8 Golf. I think the grey paintwork, black alloys and red accents work well on the car in those pictures too.

Would I buy one? I don’t think so; it’ll be an expensive car - a bog standard mk8 GTI CS has a list price in excess of £37k, so I’d expect the ED45 to list at well over £40k, and you’re then into luxury VED territory too.

If I was in the market for a performance Golf, I think I’d also consider a mk7.5 GTI TCR.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by TheRacingRat »

Of course the Golf GTI is superior to the Polo, but it should be at 50% more expensive! Also I don’t understand this jerkiness thing? My wife only commented the other day how smooth the gearbox is and it’s her favourite thing about the car. I also love the DSG gearbox.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by lancslad1985 »

TheRacingRat wrote: Mon Mar 15, 2021 12:04 am Of course the Golf GTI is superior to the Polo, but it should be at 50% more expensive! Also I don’t understand this jerkiness thing? My wife only commented the other day how smooth the gearbox is and it’s her favourite thing about the car. I also love the DSG gearbox.
Car experiences differ depending how much you let things bother you. We’ve pretty much all had the squeaking brakes on reverse, for example, but some people say it ruins the car for them while it doesn’t bother me - I think it’s a good little car. I also find the gearbox quite smooth and accept as it downshifts it’s going to retain a chunk of revs in case you want to floor it - it is a gti after all not a standard polo.

At the end of the day it is a polo, not a golf. Having owned several golfs in the past I knew the quality wouldn’t be the same as my mk7s but it isn’t bad. Certainly better than many other supermini cars I looked at when changing such as the fiesta ST, the corsa, the Ibiza and so on. The world would also be a very boring place if we all liked the same cars.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by SRGTD »

I’ve owned Polos (current and previous generation GTI’s) and Performance Golfs (mk4 GTI, mk5 GT, mk6 GTD and I’ve driven performance mk7’s). IMHO a performance model Polo isn’t far behind a performance Golf in terms of ownership experience. Granted, the Polo GTI / GTI+ misses out on such items such as softer, more tactile door cards, no interior roof mounted grab handles, has a little less interior space, and doesn’t have an independent rear suspension set up of a performance Golf. However as @TheRacingRat has said, there’s quite a significant price differential between the Polo and Golf that can’t be ignored when considering model superiority that @TurboTrev refers to, and as @Lancslad1985 has said, the Polo compares very well with its direct competitors in terms of build quality, price, equipment levels, performance and handling. If the Polo is compared to its ‘premium’ in-house VAG sibling the Audi A1, I’d go so far as to say there’s pretty much nothing in it now in terms of build quality, as visible cost cutting measures are also used by Audi (e.g. the A1 also gets hard plastic door cards now). IMHO the main differences between the Polo and A1 are now brand perception (Audi perceived to be more premium than VW) and price (model for model, the A1 is more expensive) and not much else.

I’ve also not experienced any issues with the DSG in my car. It does seem to be programmed with an economy bias though (changes up too quickly if left in D IMHO), but there are ways to get around this - e.g. by using the flappy paddles.

The Polo is pretty close to the Golf in many respects. VW will never make the Polo to be an exact mini clone of the Golf - to do so would have too great an impact on cannibalisation of Golf sales (e.g. multiple Golf customers defecting to the Polo if they didn’t need a Golf-sized car and saving ££££’s in the process). However, with the introduction of the mk8 Golf and the visible cost cutting measures employed by VW with that car and it’s flawed tech (presumably, the tech gremlins will be fixed?), I’d say that VW have (unintentionally) reduced the gap between the Polo and the Golf which won’t have done any harm for Polo sales.

I for one won’t be switching to a ‘noticeably superior’ Golf any time soon.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by Andy Beats »

monkeyhanger wrote: Sun Mar 14, 2021 7:49 am The ID3's interior has some incredibly cheap.materials too, but this is all relative to the standards expected for a German car, still better than Ford, Honda, Renault etc.
Have you checked lately?
I've said for years, put you or I into any car that didn't have any visual cues to its identity (badging etc.) and we wouldn't be able to tell what we were in by materials alone.
VAG may have raised the bar decades ago and forced others to catch up, I'm not denying that.
But the fact is the competition has caught up, no problem at all.
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Re: Don't know whether to laugh or be offended

Post by monkeyhanger »

Andy Beats wrote: Mon Mar 15, 2021 9:17 am
monkeyhanger wrote: Sun Mar 14, 2021 7:49 am The ID3's interior has some incredibly cheap.materials too, but this is all relative to the standards expected for a German car, still better than Ford, Honda, Renault etc.
Have you checked lately?
I've said for years, put you or I into any car that didn't have any visual cues to its identity (badging etc.) and we wouldn't be able to tell what we were in by materials alone.
VAG may have raised the bar decades ago and forced others to catch up, I'm not denying that.
But the fact is the competition has caught up, no problem at all.
Yes, I've checked lately. Renault are still crap, the Koreans are getting better at faking it, but are still more SEAT than VW, Ford aren't great but always like to put in 20 switches when 8 will do.

The biggest surprise for me? Vauxhall (prior to the Peugeot buy out). My mate's wife bought an Adam and it was as plush as a MK7 Golf.
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