Reliability

[kil0watt]

Hi,

Looking at buying a golf gti Mk5 for the girlfriend as she loves the look at them however i'm a little concerned about reliability of their turbo motors. To anyone who owns a gti have you been getting a solid run out of them? Also to those who have chipped and have a TBE fitted to thier gti any problems there?

[h100vw]

I don't have one myself but I read plenty of forums and if there were any major problems with them I believe I'd have read about it.

Chipping doesn't appear to affect reliability of any VWs as long as you keep them serviced per the book.

Gavin

[Guest212]

the engine and car themselves are solid things.

its the little bits and pieces attached to them which cause issues.

[livingthedream]

the engine and car themselves are solid things.

its the little bits and pieces attached to them which cause issues.

Yet i would still put them above all there competitors in terms of build quality and reliability.

[Russ59]

Yet i would still put them above all there competitors in terms of build quality and reliability.

x2 on that.

[Mr Messy]

Hi,
Looking at buying a golf gti Mk5 for the girlfriend as she loves the look at them however i'm a little concerned about reliability of their turbo motors. To anyone who owns a gti have you been getting a solid run out of them? Also to those who have chipped and have a TBE fitted to thier gti any problems there?

Turbos are pretty reliable these days, I aouldn't worry about buying a second hand GTI. The VW/Audi/Skoda/Seat 2.0T FSI has won the independently awarded ''International Engine of the Year'' for four years straight and has gone into more than a million cars. The GTI motor is in a pretty sedate state of tune that won't really push the motor's limits.

I'd say you're safe (provided the car hasn't been driven by a 17 year old for 200,000km!)

http://www.autounleashed.com/pr-sect...-for-2008.html

[kil0watt]

Yeah sounds good, sorry for the questions or if it sounded like I was bagging the gti's motor (which I wasn't) just after some opinions that's all. I've only ever brought japanese cars before. Also what's the general price for a service on a gti? Would $350 be around the mark or am I under. Cheers

[Russ59]

Yeah sounds good, sorry for the questions or if it sounded like I was bagging the gti's motor (which I wasn't) just after some opinions that's all. I've only ever brought japanese cars before. Also what's the general price for a service on a gti? Would $350 be around the mark or am I under. Cheers

I've just been quoted $250 on a TDI for an oil change and filter at my local VW dealer, so I would expect a basic oil and filter change on a GTI would be similarly priced depending on where you have it done. Can't comment on the full service pricing as yet (ie - coolant change, brake fluid etc....) but no doubt if all the other fluids are as expensive as the genuine oil (liquid gold) it would be pretty costly. That is of course if you go to a VW dealer for services.

Russ

[LiFers]

I like it how no-one posts that VW routinely fall into the very lowest echelons of the JD Power quality survey year after year after year.

VW's are not reliable or well built cars - they're fun and luxurious. If you want reliability buy a toyota or honda.

Looking at the results from 2006 onwards, VW has been improving faster than the industry average, but when you're close to the bottom of the 'offenders' list, that's not hard to do.

[KWICKS]

Nothing like a bit of empirical data to even out the ledger, especially on a board such as this where you'd expect the noise to be typically in favour of personal purchasing decisions.

[Maverick]

I like it how no-one posts that VW routinely fall into the very lowest echelons of the JD Power quality survey year after year after year.

VW's are not reliable or well built cars - they're fun and luxurious. If you want reliability buy a toyota or honda.

Looking at the results from 2006 onwards, VW has been improving faster than the industry average, but when you're close to the bottom of the 'offenders' list, that's not hard to do.

And how many features do the VW's have compared to the Toyota?

Of course if you have more features you're going to have more "problems"

And let's not forget that a lot of the "problems" with the VW are actually caused by users who don't understand the car, can't work out how to turn settings on or off and can't be bothered reading the manual.

The cars are reliable and well built, they can have some niggly little problems but they are unlikely to leave you stranded. The problem with the JD power surveys is that they don't differentiate between minor cosmetic issues and major issues like broken down at the side of the road.

The expectations of someone buying a VW are going to be way above those of someone buying a Hyundai so of course they are going to take the car back for a rattle whereas the Hyundai driver won't care.

[zz2]

unless you buy my old mk5 lemon GTI then you shouldnt have too many troubles

[Golf Houso]

I like it how no-one posts that VW routinely fall into the very lowest echelons of the JD Power quality survey year after year after year.

VW's are not reliable or well built cars - they're fun and luxurious. If you want reliability buy a toyota or honda.

Looking at the results from 2006 onwards, VW has been improving faster than the industry average, but when you're close to the bottom of the 'offenders' list, that's not hard to do.

That survey, like all reliability surveys are based upon consumer perceptions of the product, not an actual measure of reliability. For example is a Toyota or Hyundai any more reliably than a VW, not likely, is it cheaper to repair, most definately. You will often see premium brands such as Mercedes near the bottom of these lists as often customers are deterred by the higher than average repair costs and the often disgruntled customers who pay 80+k for a car and maintain the unrealistic expectation that nothing will ever go wrong during their period of ownership.

"Reliability" is just an intangible opinion of quality...

[Transporter]

I like it how no-one posts that VW routinely fall into the very lowest echelons of the JD Power quality survey year after year after year.

VW's are not reliable or well built cars - they're fun and luxurious. If you want reliability buy a toyota or honda.

Looking at the results from 2006 onwards, VW has been improving faster than the industry average, but when you're close to the bottom of the 'offenders' list, that's not hard to do.

I don't agree with you.
These surveys don't prove to me that car at the top is more reliable than car at the lowest position. If you include bicycle in that, it would be the most reliable and at the top position.
I rather have a small faults than my engine fallen out of the car or something like that.
You can also check how many recalls have Japanese cars compared to VW.
I think that some Japanese car have more recalls than VW.
Like Maverick said when the car has more features and when it is more sophisticated you can expect to have some minor issues and unfortunately they go onto “the reliability” contest.
Also when people buy cheaper car like Hyundai they don’t go to the dealer to fix every rattle or squeak from the dashboard (it is made with the squeaks and rattles and therefore nothing to complain about) but when they buy the car, that cost 2x or 3x more they want to have everything repaired.

[Russ59]

Isn't that particular survey sponsored by Toyota