[highwaypatrol]

I second what thad has said above. Polo in its current squarish avatar will never look dated atleast for next 10 years. The moment VW brings in all the curves and flares in their polo design with their next refreshed version, iam afraid it will start looking outdated in just few years down the line. I could only think of first gen honda city as a classic example for that. For me it still looks so stylish and flashy among all those curvy new gen cars available in the market now a days.

[itwasntme]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

Never! A timeless classic design that will always look good.

(Signed: a fanboy )

But seriously, their designs do have more longer life than all the curves and flares, which tend to look dated the very next year.

(Did I mention, I'm a fanboy?)

Classic, yes - I used to own one. Timeless, am not so sure.

The current face-lift with chrome, lovely headlights etc. is what they should have got in the first place given their massive parts bin. Also that wretched 3 pot motor sealed their fate.

However, I DO wish them all the best but in terms of the overall package, Hyundai tends to beat them hollow. The TSI is a gem though!

[torquing_points]

I really feel sad and even frustrated at the way that they have completely squandered the opportunity they had in the Indian market. The Octy's success at the turn of the millennium had given them such a strong base and market validation.

Then Skoda issues started. And people soon realized that VW is similar, and now place Skoda and VW in the same boat of unreliability. Whereas the problem all along has been that their dealers don't know how to fix it.

Poor leadership, the tendency to evade responsibility and not trying to go after lost customers has cost the company dearly.

It frustrates me because the best car in the market sub-30 is the Octavia right now. But there's no way I would go near the dealership because I've been bitten once by Skoda.

They've given Honda and Toyota a license to overcharge and have not fulfilled their responsibility as a competitor to keep honda/Toyota on their toes. No one is worried about vw/Skoda. Except people who own one.

[volkman10]

Originally Posted by 2500cc

None of the current offerings in the market excite me and have been hearing a lot about such mini offering (T-Cross) from VW. Does anyone here have near accurate info about this launch ?

Just a coincidence, VW's C/SUV is now caught on test. For India a replica of this could be made available on the speculated PQ26 platform or the T Cross as is will be answered soon. More in below link.

Link

But for sure there will be a compact SUV coming in late 2018 for India. after the arrival of the next Gen Polo.

[motorworks]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Whatever it is they smoke when they gaze at the VW India crystal ball is pretty powerful! . In my opinion, not upgrading the current PQ25 Polo/Vento to the global MQB platform will be disastrous in the medium to long term. The Polo is already starting to look dated even after the long-overdue styling tweaks.



I fear India will be left with a "emerging economy" version (i.e. the PQ26) which will remain a poor cousin of the MQB platform and be long overtaken by Hyundai and Maruti.

The article actually says that VW will launch a new
Polo and Vento on a modified PQ25 platform. I think it's not a bad idea at all. How many Indian consumers know what's MQB? Secondly, MQB as such is meant to benefit VW more than the consumer due to savings in cross sharing and ability to accommodate all engine options. Agreed it's a newer Generation and may be better overall, but the current PQ25
is good enough and smaller changes could ensure it has a further life of around at least 3 years. I just hope VW is able to sufficiently differentiate the newer model from the huge number of refreshes that they have done over the years. It also means that the polo and Vento will continue to be priced very competitively since the MQB platform is said to be very expensive to start with and may take longer to be localised, so the retail prices could have been very high as well.

[RajaTaurus]

^^ Exactly my view too. MQB is no space ship thing.! It is just standardization of assembly parts across models to increase interchangeability and production costs. Japanese did that long time ago for peripheral parts and VW is trying to apply it to core assembly as well. Like you say, benefit to VW more than customers.

[ajmat]

The problem with MQB is you need volume. You need to invest in around 800 robots costing around $200000 each. That is around $160 million. India just does not justify the volume at the moment.

Assuming MQB based cars, VW would only reach a volume of barely 7500 cars per month. Skoda produce around 4000 cars a day from its two factories in the Czech Republic. China providesv olume to justify and MQB factory there.

[dark.knight]

PQ or MQ, it really doesn't matter.. its more a detail which concerns the production department and sharing components between models which would benefit costs at the production end.

Personally, the Polo will never succeed until they solve its interior space problem. Currently the Polo has a very short wheelbase, and to add to it a very low slung stance, both give it an extremely claustrophobic interior. If VW can up the headroom by a little, reduce bonnet length by a LOT (they're anyway using 1.2 3 cyl units/turbocharged petrol engines which are smaller in size, they can start making proper 1.1 3cyl/1.2L 4 cyl diesels as well) and use both to liberate interior room then I think Polo can cover ground in sales pretty quick. The problem is at Rs.8-11 L on-road prices, people expect better legroom inside, a great TSi engine cannot be the sole redeeming factor for years on end.

They could've worked on that instead of the Ameo. That one looks very disproportionate from the back (my neighbour has it) and the rear 3 quarter angle reveals its weakness - a very visible rear wheel-well/suspension due to the stumpy boot and straight lines which make matters much worse by depicting an abruptly flat back.

[volkman10]

Originally Posted by dark.knight

Personally, the Polo will never succeed until they solve its interior space problem. Currently the Polo has a very short wheelbase, and to add to it a very low slung stance, both give it an extremely claustrophobic interior.

IMO, the MQB, next Gen Polo looks big and speculated to have more space in its interior and could land up in > 4m length. This could be another reason for having an Indian specific model keeping the design language / family look as its global counterpart.
In the above way the PQ25 assembly line needs tweaking rather than a whole new investment to accommodate the MQB platform which as stated before the main purpose of it is in flexibility of manufacturing a mix of models in the same assembly line .

BTW, the NEW Gen Polo is speculated to cost nearly the same(/ a bit more) as the current model and is likely to class leading features and technology when launched.

[Mad Max]

Originally Posted by ajmat

The problem with MQB is you need volume. You need to invest in around 800 robots costing around $200000 each. That is around $160 million. India just does not justify the volume at the moment.

Assuming MQB based cars, VW would only reach a volume of barely 7500 cars per month. Skoda produce around 4000 cars a day from its two factories in the Czech Republic. China providesv olume to justify and MQB factory there.

It could be expensive but VW can easily recuperate the $ 160M in a year or so.

If we take an average of 12L / car that VW group sells, then as per (my weak) math skills, they end up with about $ 1.6B each year as total sales for about 7500 cars/month.

Also, I disagee that the refreshed platform is "good enough". Why would I want to live with something that's "good enough" when there's a better platform out there?

[halfbytecode]

The PQ26 and MQB cars may seem similar superficially, but I would hate if we are stuck with old technologies. I have an example, which greatly affects the car's performance, yet the difference is subtle.

In older Polos, the suspension ball joints were installed using castle nuts and cotter pins. Torquing down the castle nut usually resulted in the inability to install the cotter pin, without overtorquing or undertorquing the nut with the hole in the ball joint.

This meant it was close to impossible to have the nuts on ball joints of both sides, to be torqued down consistently.

Even a degree of tightening or loosening the nuts results in a noticeable difference; experimented, tried, tested and learnt myself. VW now uses stretch nuts, without cotter pins, and the components are installed consistently, which translates into far better cars in terms of driving.

I would really hate if MQB brought along such changes, and we are stuck with the PQ platform and the technologies that are used with it.

[motorworks]

Folks it's not about what we ( the section of auto enthusiasts) want really. The fact is that bringing the MQB platform to India may not be a financially viable model for VW. And add to that the Indian consumer is by and large not concerned about what the MQB is or what advantages it would bring. The target audience seem to be bothered more about fancy features( touch screens, automatic mirrors etc) and that means VW can get away with refreshing the current model and adding these so called sought after features. Now what's wrong in any company thinking that any major business investment needs to make financial sense?

We speak so much about this platform change cause so much has been written in the media about this. When another manufacturer like Honda or Hyundai move from one generation to the other, do we really know how significant is that change?

[sourav.info111]

Till now it has been a dismal show by VW in India. Except the Polo, no other models did any wonder, neither in terms of sale, nor in terms of looks or in terms of features. Leave aside the engine, which also has disappointed in most of the models. Neither it is value for money, and poor dealer presence, and a not so reliable after sales service. With so many doubtful questions, I am not sure what WV India heads are thinking of Indian marketing strategy. German cars have been renowned worldwide, they want to cash in that goodwill. But they might be taking the Indian market lightly or the have made a terrible mistake in understanding the Indian market.

[halfbytecode]

People, apart from enthusiasts, may not know about the changes or benefits of the newer technologies. That would be a worldwide scenario, actually. Not really a reason to not offer new products.

There are even some manufacturers who seem to believe in dumping old outdated products in India, as you would know.

I think they should work out better strategies than relying on old technologies, for cost cutting.

[RavenAvi]

EVM Volkswagen group, Kerala, has delivered 101 Volkswagen cars in a single day - 51 from their Kochi showroom, and 50 from the rest of the 5 showrooms they have in Kerala.

Volkswagen is currently celebrating the Onam Mahotsav in Kerala, with new car owners getting a free 10 gms gold coin on every delivery.