Volkswagen Golf GTI TDi PD 150 Review

Overall Rating

Well built
Accelerates well
Economical cross country and in towns at low revs

Poor fuel economy on Motorways at 80+
Not the best driving position

I have now had my Volkswagen Golf GTI TDi PD 150 Family Car for a year and covered 31,000 miles. I am very pleased with it. Good value for money, long service intervals and economical with fuel. I get around 55mpg with a mix of motorway, cross country and town driving. It is at it's best around decent A and B roads - with firm road holding in all weathers and little rolling around corners. Overtaking is a joy - the turbo cuts in at 2,000 rpm and pulls extremely well. I used to have a Honda CBR 1000 bike and feel much the same pull when I need to get past a hat wearing Grandad on busy single carriageway roads at rush hour!
VW always had a reputation for quality but I'm not convinced about this Golf - the heated rear window didn't work and there is a piece of soft interior trim cut off half way down the central pillar from new. There are quite a lot of rattles and squeaks which appear from time to time. The boot doesn't always shut cleanly. Generally though these are minor niggles.
The air con unit is very good and doesn't seem to harm fuel consumption unduly; the cd player/radio/cassette is fine but nothing to write home about - why aren't mp3 usb plug in players fitted?
Overall a pleasure to drive except for the difficulty for me to get totally comfortable - I have a long body and normal legs (weird I know) but this seems to mean that despite tilting, sliding and bending drivers seat I can't be the right distance from the pedals and the steering wheel at the same time. I drove the SEAT Leon before this and found it a much better position.

Members' Comments onmarmotte's Review

• dukerly on 23rd Apr 2005

  Can't believe you even think about comparing the pull of a 1000cc bike to a car. Perhaps you weren't riding your bike properly????
  But.....nice car!

• Elricardo on 29th May 2006

  The comments re interior build are spot on. I think its a great all rounder but have a few rattles and a glove box door that now won't close. The Vw DIY forum goes into detail about how to fix it and you won't believe it....half the car has to be removed to renew the door! Poor design all round.

• chris7494 on 30th Jul 2006

  I disagree with poor design all round, more like some of the cars have been treated with slightly less respect possibly, maybe even when built, but many of the golfs out there are still spot on. They are usually high milage though when sold for the right sort of money, suggesting the car has had a bit of a life. I dont think a few squeeks for cars above 50-60k is all that bad really especially when the car if of such a high quallity otherwise. Compare it to a ford ka then it looks silent, compare to a roller and its very noisy. Most of even the prestige cars end up with squeeking and noises after 60k!

• Elricardo on 1st Aug 2006

  Fair comment about the squeaks. I accept that an older car will show its age, but my issue was around the design of the interior, not the quality of materials or construction per se. A quick glance at a Haynes manual reveals a certain amount of cynicism in the design....basically they don't want you to be able to do anything yourself. We all accept that much of the profit for main dealers come in after sales, but when you have to remove the handbrake cover to get the glove box out, you know there were hands being rubbed together when the MkIV was still on the drawing board!

• chris7494 on 2nd Aug 2006

  LOL. Yeah, agreed!! Thing is though, its great to be able to fix your car yourself and be able to get cheaper garages to fix your car, but i bet the people who do such things are the first to be complaining about VW reliability when they go wrong! Personally I can understand the VAG reasoning, I don't agree with it, like yourself, but I can understand it to a certain extent.