VW Golf GTI MK6 Review - RedRobinIn reading my review I'd like you to bear in mind that I'm not a professional driver nor a motoring journalist, neither have I driven this car on track. I am, however, a very experienced (over 40 years) and very focussed fast (when appropriate) road driver - No radio nor music nor other distractions while driving. So, my findings and comments are based on the kind of driver I am and I although am naturally inclined to make some comparisons with my beloved and much modified Mk5 GTI, on this occasion I will try not to do so too much (I think!!).All of us who already own and love our Mk5 GTI's have been obviously very keen indeed to assess and compare the new GTI version. Some of us don't want to like it because we fear we may then grow dissatisfied with what we already have. Some always want the latest model or version of everything and therefore want it to be streets ahead of the last version to justify us buying it. Others take a long term financial view and want to swop their cars regularly or while still under warranty and often are principally driven by what money is 'lost' - I've got news for you: You lose money on every single car you own, so if you truly are an enthusiast, get over it and just enjoy it. In the words of Stephen Stills from the flower power days of Woodstock: "Love the one you're with". I'll try my hardest to be as objective as possible and to see other points of view. So here goes.......   SOURCING: Available through the usual places - Your friendly neighbourhood dealer and built to order in Wolfsburg, Germany. The example I had is a DSG 5-door without the ACC. Very much depending on which factory options you choose, purchase price is approximately £1-2,000 more than the equivalent spec Mk5 GTI was in 2005. I haven't bothered to make accurate cost comparisons - It's somewhat academic - You either want the car and you have the money available, or you don't. When I was a lad, a bag of sweets only cost sixpence - So what! OVERVIEW - EXTERIOR: The example I've been driving is black. I'm not a fan of the glossy black on the Mk5 GTI though I love the metallic black. From the photographs, I think that this latest GTI is much more colour sensitive than the Mk5. For me, silver and red are the best looking. Coupled with the body styling, the Mk6 GTI in black and 5 doors looks disappointingly undistinctive. The body styling is the part of this new car that I am most critical of. I really want to like it but I can't fall in love with the styling. The acid test for eye-candy ratings is how much you want to photograph it - I had to persuade myself for the purposes of this review. It looks better in pics than real life too! Although the Mk6 GTI is a very organic evolution of the Mk5, to the point where many have described it as the Mk5.5 (and some Mk5.2!), the body stylists have somehow missed a few tricks. The small things mostly work fine visually in isolation but not as a whole. Example: The upper grill honeycombe is a deeply glossy coated black but the lower honeycombe grill is matt black as it was in the Mk5 - Why not match instead of making it so fussy? The side skirts look like a totally uncoordinated afterthought. The exhaust pipes look like wheelbarrow handles and don't sit well in the moulded exhaust trim design. And although the front treatment style works, it's virtually the same as most of the other VW's in the Golf range, plus a few others such as the Scirocco and even Volkswagen's new pickup truck! The Mk5 R32 had the same front design as the Passat - This did not go down well among hardcore .:R enthusiasts. This is taking coorporate marketing too far and letting the tail wag the dog. Talking of tails, the whole rear design treatment bears no relationship to the rest of the car and its only redeeming feature is the fact that the tail lights are tinted and look so much better for it than the others in the Golf range so far. Funny, I seem to remember criticising the rear end of the new Scirocco - However, this new GTI is much worse.     Another styling disappointment is that the vents leading towards the fog lights look quite nicely aggressive and functional but they are false. Note how the honeycombe grills don't match each other - The upper one being glossy bling:  I like the headlights but think the DRL's would have been more effective if LED's and consequently not so yellow.   In the pic below, notice how the new GTI looks so front heavy. This is even more evident when the body is in other lighter colours:  OVERVIEW - INTERIOR: Immediately you sit inside the new GTI you are impressed by a strong and undeniable feeling of quality - Quality of the Audi variety. Even the doors have a higher quality clunk when you close them. But Jeeze, those door handles are surely much bigger than they need to be - They are gigantic - Were they designed for ease of use by Attila The Hun? I thought that he no longer ruled Germany. The bits of silver trim are very Audi but I found them a bit distractingly flashy on a very bright sunny day. The legibility of the instrument display is miles better than the Mk5 but where's the kph display!? - Not clever if on a French autoroute jaunt or invading Poland. The interface for the heating and aircon controls is over-designed and unintuitive - I was fearful of switching on the heated leather seats which although feeling luxurious gave me a sticky back. The Mk5 controls, although far less stylish, are far simpler and far more intuitive - You don't need to read the handbook to learn what does what.  The steering wheel controls are easier but a bit too much silver bling has been applied.  Is there any feature remaining where the designers could have added some silver bits?  Overall a more luxurious feel but it's mostly as a result of the silver bits giving you the perception of it looking more expensive.   The Mk6 window controls are much better positioned and so is the horn as I was to discover later! Wing mirror views are very good but is the rear window smaller? Perhaps not, but it seemed so. I had switched on the engine and was talking to my friend Elliott through the fully open window before leaving. To my horror I discovered that I couldn't hear the engine and had to check if my ignition was on! This might impress many 'normal' car buyers but surely not an enthusiast. However, if Volkswagen have intended to match Audi quality, they have succeeded well. The Golf is no longer a poorer relative. So overall, I might award some plus points for the interior but minus points for the exterior. But hang on in there, guys - It isn't all criticism.... DRIVING: I set off in D-mode and my first wish was to get the feel of the brake pedal - Not much different from the factory Mk5 - Effective but lacking pedal feel. The first sensation I experienced was how utterly seamless the D-mode shift was and, unfortunately, that I could hardly hear the engine. The ride was a little soft at low speed but I knew that most customers would love the smooooth comfort of it all. As I left the 30-limit zone and gathered speed, I slipped her into M-mode but I still couldn't hear the engine. I was then grateful for the very clear gear indicator in the top of the computer window but personally I much prefer to feel which gear I'm in via the sound and the seat of my pants, and that applies to every vehicle I drive without exception. It wasn't long before I had the opportunity for overtaking a couple of lorries in the company of other cars overtaking and found that the GTI had the power mid-range to then safely and comfortably pass those as well. Suddenly she felt more like the Mk5, but with a little bit more power throughout the range. I was comparing it with my Mk5 in stock ECU map. I've worked out a local 'test' route of about 50-miles each 'lap' which includes just about every type of road you can think of - A smoothly surfaced coastal B-road (a well-known biker's favourite) which twists and goes up and down very steeply, a section of what I call C-road with only room for one car except with fairly regular passing point bays, some fast 2-way A-road followed by a long section of very varied B-roads with bends of many different types, back to base via fast dual carriageway A-road with a few roundabouts chucked in - The whole 'lap' with a variety of road surfaces. If local, I 'test' every new car I drive on this route - Recent ones being the latest S4 Avant (better than my expectations) and the Scirocco (lesser than my expectations). The power is smooth and very linear and gives confidence but you just can't hear the engine at work until you are near the 5,000 zone. If you are someone who listens to music or the radio while you drive (I never do) then you might be forgiven for thinking you are driving an electric car! The ride is very good indeed - It somehow seems to perfectly combine comfort without totally isolating you. It's soft yet firm and nobbly. The car is extremely stable in all conditions and I mean all conditions I managed to purposely chuck at her in a public road environment and also a couple which were uninvited, one of which could so easily have put me in a hospital's intensive care unit. It's strange when you know you aren't going to die yet. For a couple of miles I had patiently kept a textbook distance and position from one of those drivers who merely wanted to enjoy the countryside on a bright sunny day, including driver's arm dangling to catch a cool breeze - 40 mph everywhere including 30's - You know the type. If you read my S4 review you may remember my coming across an overturned car where the woman driver had fallen asleep [pic below]. As you can see from the pic this was a straight enough section for me to overtake and so I did so with much acceleration. However, about a mile and a sweeping bend later I found myself confronted by a car coming straight at me with about a third of its width across the white line and increasing! I registered a high bank on my left (nowhere to escape) and the gap for my car funnelling fast and went for my horn and headlight flashing with a touch of braking but thinking of accelerating if I thought it might get me through before there was no gap at all. When I set out on my test drive I hadn't planned on testing the airbags! My thoughts were also, oh dear what am I going to tell Elliott (when I've regained consciousness) about the mess I've made of their car, but also I remember thinking to myself thank goodness it's not my car! No witnesses around and I could also hear the driver of the car I had just so patiently followed at a distance but overtaken very fast, saying to the incident investigators that I had been going like a bat out of hell - Doubtless he probably hadn't even been aware of me following. Or had my Mk6's Daylight Running Lights alerted him? Well, I tested the horn and I'm glad to say its ease of operation is an improvement on the Mk5 and a whole lot better than the Audi S4. The idiot driving the oncoming car fortunately heard and saw me in time to just leave me enough gap - It was a situation in which I had no choices and I remember wishing I had my loud Italian triple airhorns onboard. But what is it about the drivers in that neck of the woods? Had this driver fallen asleep as well? The snotty woman in the overturned car last month had virtually boasted about how a friend of hers had recently also fallen asleep at the wheel and survived - It was as if she was trying to impress someone at a cocktail party. In the time I've been roaming this planet I've had a number of near death experiences and also experienced the deaths of others at close (very close in some cases) quarters. You build an acceptance and I have found that so far I have never felt it was my time to leave this planet [Please God, can I go to Venus next? And please, this time, can you give me enough blood to work my penis and my brain at the same time]. After a couple of phews I motored on.  So the new GTI is very stable indeed. It feels very flatly planted even when getting fractionally airborne. Within the circumstances of other road users and the road conditions at the time, I didn't exceed or even find its limits and I did try to push it while staying within safe bounds as I became more confident with the car. I was able to go for those overtakes which only performance cars can manage safely whether up a very steep hill or politely queue hopping at speed. This car didn't have ACC and I can't say I was disappointed it didn't. I think it's purely a marketing feature - In the real world different types of driver will stick it in the setting they prefer and just leave it there for the whole duration of their ownership. Better to save money on the ACC option and put it towards DSG or aftermarket mods such as an exhaust. If only it sounded more sporty inside the cabin. I resorted to having the windows down just an inch but the road noise mostly drowned out any exhaust music. Volkswagen's marketing states that: "Then there’s that wonderful exhaust note. The GTI burble is ever present in the cabin, while in cars fitted with the DSG double-clutch automatic, there’s a satisfying pop every time the car changes up gears and a rumble and spit when you lift off the accelerator coming into a corner." and also"A resonance tube carries induction growl into the cabin when the engine is under load." I'm sorry but all that simply isn't true unless you the rev the hell out of it, and even then it's remote - The cabin soundproofing has simply been overdone. Why? It's doubtless the same throughout the Mk6 Golf range and it's pandering to the lowest common denominator - Joe & Joanne Public and not the enthusiast. Thank goodness for aftermarket companies like Milltek. BUT, hang on! WTF is going on!? - Turn up your volume and listen to this : - |