This year is a significant time for Volkswagen in
New Zealand, because it is the 60th anniversary
of the German marque's presence here.
It was way back in 1954 when Jowett Motors
began assembling Beetle cars and Kombi vans at
the former Passenger Transport Company's bus
depot in the Auckland suburb of Otahuhu.
Despite the fact the Volkswagens were hit with a
45 per cent tariff for being sourced from the non-
Commonwealth country, they quickly went on to
become the biggest-selling non- British vehicles
in New Zealand.
The Otahuhu assembly operation - a new facility
was soon built there - went on the produce
30,000 Volkswagens before it was shut down in
in 1986 in favour of the vehicles being imported
in fully built-up form from Europe.
These days there are no import tariffs and no
assembly industry in New Zealand, and as a
result in real terms new vehicles are far less
expensive now than they were when the Otahuhu
assembly operation closed its doors. And an
excellent example of that is one of the most
important models on today's Volkswagen fleet -
the Passat.
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I don't think Passat was ever built here, but when
the first- generation model was launched in
Germany in 1973 there would have been plenty
of Volkswagen executives who would have been
very pleased to see its arrival.
That's because the model can lay claim to being
the car that rescued Volkswagen. In 1964 when
the company acquired Audi, it was building old-
style, air-cooled rear-engined and rear- driven
cars such as the Beetle that were increasingly
being seen as having a limited future. But the
company's acquisition of Audi and NSU instantly
gave it access to technology that allowed it to
develop product powered by water-cooled
engines and with front-wheel drive.
The first such car - launched in 1973 when
Volkswagen was in real financial strife - was the
Passat, which was developed off the Audi 80. It
proved an instant success, and Passat has since
gone on to become one of the world's top 10
best-selling cars.
The Passat continues to be an important member
of what is now a formidable lineup of
Volkswagens sold in New Zealand. Polo, Beetle,
Golf, Tiguan, Touareg and the Amarok ute are
among the various models that are all
contributing to a combined sales effort that is
making VW the country's most popular European
marque.
This year Volkswagen New Zealand is celebrating
all of this by initiating a programme of offering
60th anniversary special edition models.
And, given the fact that it was Passat that sparked
the big turnaround of Volkswagen's financial
fortunes in the early 1970s, it's appropriate that
this model is among the first to get the treatment.
What Volkswagen NZ has done is get rid of the
former Trendline and Comfortline levels of
specification and replaced it with a new R-Line
package that is giving each model upgraded
interior styling, sports seats, a premium driver
information display, rear camera and the parking
pilot system which audibly warns the driver of
the proximity of obstacles while reversing, and
18-inch alloy wheels.
Depending on the Passat model, all of this is
combining with new prices - several of them
substantially reduced - to add up to $12,560
worth of value to the vehicle.
For example, the Passat TDI Comfortline with a
130kW turbodiesel engine used to retail for
$60,750. It now retails for $54,990 and has also
had $750 worth of value added to it via changes
to specification, which means it has a total value
advantage of $6510.
Obviously this particular Passat offered a high
level of specification anyway which explains why
the amount of value added to the car was in the
hundreds rather than thousands of dollars. But
right down at the bottom of the Passat selection
are the models that really benefit from this 60th
anniversary exercise.
One such car is the least expensive Passat - the
TSI sedan powered by a 1.8-litre direct injected
and turbocharged petrol engine. With the
Trendline specification it used to retail for
$47,750, and now that it has had the R-Line
treatment it has gone up in price by $1000. But
because it is the base model Passat it has had
$10,800 worth of value added to it which means
it boasts a total value advantage of $9800.
And that makes the sedan very competitive
against all the Japanese, Korean and mass-
market European product currently on offer in
New Zealand.
Step into this Passat and settle into its clean
almost spare interior, and one of the first things
to be noticed are the new seats. The former cloth
versions have been replaced with sports seats
that are upholstored in a black fabric and with
light grey side sections. The seats combine forces
with quite heavy use of silver inserts on the
dashboard and doors to immediately give this
Volkswagen a premium feel. Helping things along
is a nicely designed multi-function sports
steering wheel with decorative alloy inserts and
the R-Line logo.
I do like the interior of a Passat. It all feels so
efficient. The driver information display, audio
and climate control are all nicely located, and our
test model was fitted with a $750 optional extra
for the park pilot called park assist, which puts
lines on to view from the reversing camera to
help with parallel parking.
Our Passat's exterior boasted body-coloured door
handles and R-style rear spoiler, there were
chrome strips at the front, side and rear, and
these all combined with the larger 18-inch alloy
wheels - they replace 16-inch versions - to give
the Volkswagen a performance look. The car also
has a sports suspension which lowers the vehicle
by about 15mm.
But is it a performance sedan? Well - no, but
despite the fact it is powered by "only" a 1.8-litre
petrol engine it does turn on a surprisingly good
turn of speed
It's all because the direct- injected engine is
turbocharged. This means the top power is 118
kilowatts, and more importantly the top torque is
250 newton metres from just 1500rpm right
through to 4500rpm. With the automatic
transmission in Drive the performance is almost
sedate, but move the gearshift into an Sport mode
and the car can light up. This Passat can also be
operated manually by either using paddles on the
steering wheels or by operating the gearshift
tiptronic style.
The Passat sedan's official acceleration time to
100kmh is 8.5 seconds, and combined fuel
consumption is 7.1 litres per 100 kilometres.
My only real gripe about this car is its seven-
speed DSG twin- clutch automatic transmission.
It's a wonderful auto when the Passat is in
motion, but at takeoff from a standing start the
electronic transmission seems to hesitate before
moving the vehicle away.
But that criticism aside, the Volkswagen Passat
continues to be one of my favourite vehicles, and
this latest value-added entry model appeals as an
excellent part of it all.
Obviously the addition of all that specification for
not much more money is not only designed as a
marketing exercise to help celebrate the marque's
60 years in New Zealand, but also to keep the
Passat relevant until a brand-new model is
launched here in about a year - production starts
in Germany in November.
All I can say is it's going to have to be a very good
car to be that much better than this generation
model.
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