Test drive Volkswagen Golf V 5 doors 2003 - 2008 hatchback

With "five" - \u200b\u200bto the next class

The new golf leads to thoughts cleaner than philosophical treatises. The latest achievements and trends of the automotive industry, technical finds and marketing contradictions all this came together in the long -awaited Volkswagen product. At its core, Golf is simple and unsophisticated everyday car for the lower class. However, how many passions and conflicts hide this simplicity under it! That's what I thought when I was chasing on equal terms with nine and dozens, and a minute later with an unreal speed and unrealistic calm, I passed a typical urban turn of ninety degrees.
 
Where to start? Probably from the fact that Golf has grown once again. And it was he who asked this fashion thirteen years ago. Now everyone is growing from generation to generation, they are growing rampant: the Swedes and Koreans, the Japanese and the French, Italians and the British. Unless the Americans have nowhere to grow. I wonder what will happen in a couple of decades? Golf will catch up with Phaeton? Or will Phaeton be the size of KrAZ by that time?

 

Here you have the first contradiction. Golf came close to the Passat, and in size of the salon, and in equipment. Yes, and for the price. And he broke away from Polo. And there is nothing to fill out the gap, alas. And competitors will definitely take advantage of this. In addition, do not forget that it became better about golf very often means more. Too straightforward technique: the quantity is now issued for quality with a passing requirement to fork out.
Meanwhile, Golf is really more spacious than its predecessor. The rear passengers who now have no acute problems with the location of the legs are especially distinctly distinct. And in general, the salon became airy. And this is the second trend. We will call its mini -inanization the desire to maximize the passenger compartment by increasing the roof line and shortening the bow. A similar method is practiced by the Japanese, and in Europe, PEUGEOT 307 took up its popularization. What is this talking about? Golf for the first time in his career is forced to follow, and not dictate his own standards!

 

And not everything is smooth with the design. The crisis that befell the German school is evident. There is no forward movement, there is scaling and cosmetic correction as two main ways to obtain another new model. Chris Bangle pulled out BMW from a vicious circle with incredible efforts and victims, Martin Smith moved Opel from a dead point. Valter de Silva is now fighting over changes in the Audi image. Radical decisions in the near future will have to make Murat Gunaku, the chief designer of the Volkswagen/Skoda/Bentley department. In the meantime, we see a strange symbiosis of technocratic respectability, Far Eastern motifs and rudiments of bio -design in the form of playful headlights and chubby rear lights.

 

Golf is conservative and strict inside. If not for the new and extremely successful central console, nothing would have changed at all. But in terms of ergonomics, the car is only impeccable. The mutual arrangement of the controls, the control ranges, the logic of the disposition and the appointment of buttons is beyond praise. Even with a detailed study, only one snort was found: an adjustable lumbar backdoing that supports at all and not the lower back, but the shoulder blades. But the seats themselves, if anything is not enough, is that very lumbar backup. A remarkable three -spoke steering wheel with sensory buttons is invaluable, the benefits of a wide area for the rest of the left leg are invaluable. The trunk is good, capacious, simple and therefore optimal in shape.
 

However, Golf is convenient not only in terms of global things, but also in small things. More precisely, with fitness for trifles. Spacious pockets in the doorway, cup holders, a glove compartment cooled by the air conditioner and a subsurrent container, drawers under the front chairs you can’t mention! So there should be a leader in his class!

 

Leader in his class? It remains only to decide in which, with such sizes and such equipment?
 
In the segment with or still some kind of special golf class? It seems that the segment from speech is no longer about: to compare the fifth Golf with cars such as Seat Leon, Toyota Corolla or Mitsubishi Lancer, is simply incorrect. Golf once again left the opponents overtaking him, raising the rates. To compete with it on equal terms in the state of the nozzle Audi A3 and the already announced BMW of the first series. The company advanced Alfa Romeo 147, Fiat Stilo, Ford Focus, Peugeot 307 and Renault Megane II, alas, is in the rearguard. The remaining cars of the CO segment and do not at all go through Face Control into today's golf class. Let's see what the new Opel Astra and Ford Focus II will be offered, the debut of which is scheduled for autumn. In the meantime, Golf is ready to attack the segment D, and among its victims, Alfa Romeo 156, Citroen C5, Ford Mondeo, Opel Vectra and Renault Laguna are seen.
 
Golf is convincing: the base includes six airbags, air conditioning, disconnected ASR anti -wings system. And here it is not original: you have to follow the 147th alpha, four years ago setting fundamentally new standards for equipping machines of this class. As for the list of options, it is huge: there is everything that is proposed for class D models, and much from the segment E, which includes prestigious business sedans.

 

And what about the quality? The situation is this. There are no complaints about the materials and assembly: everything is at the highest level. However, there are punctures especially noticeable both the background of the general achievements of the car, and in comparison with much more affordable Japanese. The doors are closed with effort, the windows buttons are tight. Say, nit -picking? The disadvantages are fixable, but there is not so little car.
 
The golf germination in the upper classes of Volkswagenovites are amusingly trying to compensate for the line of motors, which is quite complies with the requirements of the segment C, but in no way to meet the mass of the machine. For a 1200-kilogram car, 1.4-liter engines with a capacity of 75 and 90 horsepower are offered! Nonsens! It’s good that they are not officially delivered to Russia. After all, even with a 1.6-liter 102-horsepower engine, like our car, you will not particularly accelerate. The motor pulls boring evenly, without enthusiasm, while grunting displeasedly and loudly. The 115-horsepower FSI motor expected soon with the immediate layer of fuel injection is also unlikely to solve the problem. All hope for a two -liter power unit with a capacity of 150 horses, the price of such a car from 26 thousand dollars. There are also diesel engines to which interest increases with us. According to Volkswagen, Russians unexpectedly willingly acquire golfs with a 140-horsepower turbodiesel.

 

And golf just needs a good motor! In my opinion, the main advantage of the car is amazing chassis. The smoothness of the move, the energy intensity of the suspension and, as a result, the tolerance of our roads is all with it. The steering wheel is completely isolated from irregularities: shocks and vibrations are not transmitted to it when even decent potholes pass. At high speeds, the car is amazingly stable both in line and in corners. Manage of song! Supervisory, but super -fluid reactions, the ideal saturation of the steering wheel with a feedback, complete transparency of reactive effort allow us to unconditionally trust the car from the first meters of the journey. The car goes precisely along the trajectory to which you are directed at the entrance to the turn: no forms and rudder of the steering wheel is already needed. It goes, barely rolling and tightly clinging to the asphalt. If you deliberately dashing, Golf will break, but it will be a lateral sliding with a slight accent on the front axle at the beginning and to the back in the final stage. Everything is controlled and always suppressed. You can not ignore the non-browned work of the mechanics: the reference clarity of gear shifts, the accuracy of the floor of the floor pedal and the highest brake efficiency.
 
Driving sensations indicate that by setting up the chassis, the new Golf can be put on a par with the Audi A4 and the third BMW series. Only a dead motor and mediocre sound insulation does not allow this to do this. The rustle of tires easily penetrates into the salon, it is accompanied by the already mentioned angry sound of the motor, but the denouement from aerodynamic noise is good.

 

Considering Golf in isolation from the surrounding market environment, it must be recognized that it has become more convenient, better, more perfect. This is in the absolute. And in the existing coordinate system, everything looks like a loss of control over the situation. The expansion of the internal volume, the growth of the list of standard equipment, the evolution of security systems, the progress of the running characteristics led to the weight of the machine. And there are no adequate power supply from the side of the environmental sense, there are no engines. In turn, pulling the engines to the proper level will protrude the already obvious fact: by going to the fifth grade, Golf went irrevocably. This means the expansion of golf class into a new market segment, which remains or competitors to either accept or boycotts to potential customers and competitors. The first option looks more dramatic, but preferable.
 

Autography
Volkswagen Golf v
Predecessor
Golf IV (1997)
Premiere
september 2003
Body
hatchback (3 or 5 doors)
Engines
1.4-2.0 l
Production
Germany/Belgium
Expected replacement
2009-10
 

The car was provided by Pulkovo Autocenter, the official Volkswagen dealer
During the test, the car is insured by LLC Nation Center.
 
Text: Leonid Klyuyev
Photo: Roman Ostanin
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
 
 
 

Source: Wheel magazine [No. 79/2004]