Although there were many nice things about it, there were still some things that I didn’t like (these are still before the test drive):
When I first looked at the car I noticed that the tires are VERY thin. This makes the ride somewhat uncomfortable, especially with the stiffer suspension. Also, since the car is pretty low to the ground, going over speed bumps and other things may be dangerous to the underside of the car, along with the “body kit” it has. It seems like a skid plate would be a must, but my dad thinks they’re a waste of money. As I mentioned before, I think the big “TDI Cup Edition” on the sides is pretty ugly. The TDI emblem on the back of the car is much smaller than the one on my Golf and is much harder to see, especially because the “I” in “TDI” is the same color blue as the rest of the car. Also, with its low “aggressive” stance and the “body kit” that makes it look “sporty”, it may be somewhat of a cop magnet because they might think it’s just another teenager who fixed up his car to break the law and speed. I bet they’ll be surprised when they pull him over and they see a 52 year old man behind the wheel.
Going back to the interior, as I already said the seats are kind of stiff and it starts to hurt in a certain area if sat on for too long. In the back, the cup holders are in a fold down thing that comes out of the center of the seats. These cup holders are much sturdier than the pop out ones in my Golf and won’t leak, but usually on long car rides where both front seats are occupied I like to lay down in the back seat and sleep.
Because the antenna is so small, the AM/FM reception SUCKS! Only the satellite radio comes in clear. Maybe I’m just crazy, but I think they did that on purpose so you’ll pay for the Sirius. I tend to be super anal about how things are in my car (mostly just stuff being on straight) and the volume knob for the radio has the power button on it that turns the radio on or off. My problem with it is when you use the knob to turn the radio up or down, the power symbol rotates with it. I guess that isn’t a big deal, but it still bugs me…
Turned knob:
Although the fit and finish on the interior is pretty nice, it scuffs/scratches as easy as that “soft touch rubber” stuff the plastic bits in my Golf are coated with. When I get out of our new car, my foot usually kind of rubs against the bottom of the door. When you close the door it is not noticeable, but I’m surprised that the plastic gets scratched just from my shoe sliding against it.
The radio may sound great with music, but when you do a hands free call it sounds like ****. It is very hard to understand what the other person is saying and you pretty much have to yell in order for you to be heard by the other person.
Alrighty then, so now it’s time to finally start the car and take it for a drive!
When we were first handed the key, it still had the same feature that mine has: the key that flips out when you push the button. The new key flips out much faster than my key (most likely because my key is 10 years old). When we first started the car, I was amazed by how quiet it was. If you listened closely you could still hear it, but it is nowhere near as loud as my Golf. You can’t hear the engine with the windows rolled up, whereas with my Golf the engine is easily heard with the windows up. They claim that you can’t hear the turbo on the new Mk6 cars, but that is not entirely true. If we are in an enclosed space (such as between cars or in a tunnel) you can kind of hear it. With my Golf you can hear it no matter what your surroundings are. My dad hasn’t driven a stick in 15 years, so it was expected that he would stall it a few times on the way home, and he did. Supposedly with a dual mass flywheel there is a large “thud” while the car lurches forward, and we found that to be true. I was glad that I was wearing my seat belt when he stalled it, or else I would have been thrown through the windshield! The main reason we kept stalling it is because my dad wasn’t giving it enough fuel when he was getting going. The car shuts off fuel to the engine if the RPM’s get below 750, so it stalls quite easily. On our drive home, the sun was in my face the whole time. The sun visors are too small to block out the sun when it’s staring to get late in the day. When the sun is in the middle of the windshield above the mirror, the little black dots don’t do anything to block the sun. My Golf has a nifty little mini sun visor that I can fold down to block the sun. Bumps were very rough and seemed magnified with the ultra thin tires and the stiff suspension.
As a conclusion, this is a nice car and it has MANY great features not found in the older cars, but I would still rather keep my Golf. That is mostly because the ride is much smoother, it is harder to stall, the seats are more comfortable, it is a bit higher off the ground so it is less likely to scrape over speed bumps (I am still getting a skid plate for my Golf), I can't STAND that gap above the mirror and windshield on the Jetta, and I really like how much more "diesely" my car sounds.