Golf R -v- Golf GTI

[SilvrFoxX]

I agree.. the real test is how it makes you feel when you drive it.. the rest is just stats on a page

[Corey_R]

What I said was, driving legally on normal Aus roads and a normal (read average) Aus driver; the AWD system will 'engage & save' a driver who would otherwise have lost control.

But this is where you, and many many people out there are incorrect.
If a person gets themselves in trouble around a corner or whatever, it's not the AWD system that will "engage & save" a driver. It's the ESP and ABS and all those other TLA's. AWD only aids in acceleration. So yes, if a driver panics and floors the car for some reason, AWD may assist, but then, so does traction control as part of the ESP in a modern car.

I really believe that much of the consumer perseption on AWD is based on them (or their friends) changing from some crappy Toyota or Holden of the 80s into a Subaru AWD when the Impreza and Liberty and Forester's came to Australia. They've gone from cars with rubbish handling and engineering and no electronic driver aids to cars with well sorted handling and engineering, and which also saw the introduction of some of these TLA driving aids.

Put these same consumers into a Golf GTI, and they are just shocked at how planted and quick that is around the round-a-bouts and corners. (This is my personal experience from having this discussion with people from work who were under the same misconception and taking them for a drive in my VW's).

[REXman]

I agree. Back to back drives to make up your mind about the GTI and R. I drove them back to back, and the R is definitely quicker and also is a louder. I liked that about the R. And the LED tail lights are standard. Obviously the turbo is bigger and you get the tougher of the 2 engines.

It's AWD but the haldex is not quite evo/sti material as it doesn't have that quick or constant awd grip, it's still a reaction for the rears to kick in.

I also like my low speed grad prix in a straight line. So to me the awd opens up more tuning possibilities in the future in terms of getting power to the ground.

I reckon simply what you can afford/prepared to spend.

But the GTI is a nice car too.

Side note: honestly give me a MY99 wrx round a track against the GTI and I'll personally smash the GTI.

The threshold for grip and control is much higher in an awd than a fwd. Agreed the rwd is the best platform when done properly on Tarmac.

It's just with awd, once you hit that threshold and it does let go, you are usually going that fast that all four wheels are sliding, so the possibility of steering the rear end to correct/ catch and point the front elsewhere, like you can in a rwd is not possible in the awd.

The gti and r are great all round cars, but for all out performance get an evo or sti or rwd sports car like the 350z.

Agree that fwd has come a long long way. But BMW Mercedes and Porsche don't even make fwd?

[amrjon]

Interesting to read the observations and preferences between these two, but do you really get to explore understeer, performance at 8/10th's, and rear end adjustability at anything like sensible roads speeds anyway? Despite the subtleties between them, both are highly capable handling cars, and to get either to the point where the tyres are losing traction and skidding while cornering is not realistic on the road.

I wonder if you have spent any time on the track. Since doing this a few times myself, I've essentially lost any temptation to push on much at all on the road. I'm not claiming I drive like a Grandma, or that I'm a great diver either, but from my experience on the track I basically came to the realisation that your kidding yourself to think that you can explore the handling limits of highly capable cars such as these on the road anyway. General balance, feel, ride, acceleration etc sure, but handling and braking limits, no way. You'll notice that pretty much all of the performance car media do their serious testing on the track these days.
Certainly my GTI won't understeer on these roads at cornering speeds speeds that are even on the higher of responsible.

I don't doubt your observations of the two cars, I haven't even driven the R myself. But you seem like the sensible type, so I wonder when you talk about understeer, etc, are you actually talking about loss of traction skidding/sliding wide, or just a feeling of the car leaning hard on the outside tyre? In motor the stock R outperformed the stock GTI in 7/8 performance criteria, including being just over 2 seconds per lap quicker around Wakefield, a significant margin. Of course these are just stats, but I'd love to re-read you review if you ever got to do something similar on a track, I wonder if you wouldn't discover a whole new level of handling limits and traits that would skew things more significantly toward the R?

[Mr_Bob]

If a person gets themselves in trouble around a corner or whatever, it's not the AWD system that will "engage & save" a driver. It's the ESP and ABS and all those other TLA's.

Additionally, in a 4WD/AWD, you're more likely to get yourself into a 4 wheel drift which is harder to recover from.
It's also harder to determine when you are approaching the limit of traction, whereas loosing control in a 2wd is fairly progressive

I believe this is why many AWD/4WD manufacturers engineer the cars with an understeer tendancy.

[Corey_R]

Yep, very true Mr_Bob.

Don't get me wrong, I don't have anything against AWD, just the miconception that the general public has.

[Happs]

But this is where you, and many many people out there are incorrect.
If a person gets themselves in trouble around a corner or whatever, it's not the AWD system that will "engage & save" a driver. It's the ESP and ABS and all those other TLA's. AWD only aids in acceleration. So yes, if a driver panics and floors the car for some reason, AWD may assist, but then, so does traction control as part of the ESP in a modern car.

I completely agree with what your saying under braking/neutral loss of traction. However how many people get into an irrecoverable loss of control without it being due to acceleration of some sort?

Aside from an emergency brake/swerve situation, most drivers lose control/traction under acceleration in or exiting a corner (and of course at take-off in a straight line, but that's less dangerous). You'd seldom lose traction going around a corner with no brake/accelerator pedal action under legal and reasonable weather driving conditions. It's when applying pedal pressure (usually mid corner acceleration) that this happens. My point being, an AWD system will lose traction after a FWD/RWD does. Which type is easier to recover from once in a skid etc is a whole other discussion. Modern tech is great, and no question the GTi's computer is brilliant at managing traction and far surpasses previous models and probably any other FWD in it's class, but I would think under acceleration between the GTi and the R, the GTi would lose traction before the R would. (And I'd hazard a guess that this would apply to almost all 2WD vs AWD/4WD comapro's).

EDIT: Should probably clarify, when I say lose traction in this context I mean 'loss of control', in a FWD (or any I suppose) you can loose traction and still have control. I'm talking spin, understeer into a curb (or worse) etc. irrecoverable loss of traction.

[Mr_Bob]

i would think the majority of crashes occur under loss of traction due to brake lockup.
this is either poor braking technique, or insufficient braking area for the entry speed.

AWD won't help you there, just ABS as coreying mentioned.

[Happs]

i would think the majority of crashes occur under loss of traction due to brake lockup.
this is either poor braking technique, or insufficient braking area for the entry speed.

AWD won't help you there, just ABS as coreying mentioned.

Possibly, mine was just an opinion but from my experience, my 'scariest' moments have been unintentional skids under acceleration (not that it's ever intentional! )

[Corey_R]

Even with a 200kw+ Stage II MKV Golf GTI (i.e. no XDS and previous versions of their TLA safety systems), it is very difficult to get an intentional skid under acceleration, even in a corner. In the wet it's still difficult to accelerate into an intentional skid. The only way to really get this to happen is to enter a corner already going too fast (which will be assisted by XDS in the MK6 cars), or to turn off the ESP (which still won't turn off the XDS in a MK6). Entering the corner too fast won't be helped with any of the drive types, and WhiteJames is stating that the XDS may actually be better than the AWD (due to R's additional weight and inability to brake individual front wheels) in several of the second scenarios.

So look, I agree with what you are saying based on even my own experience in older cars. But in a modern car such as the MK6 Golf GTI, at legal road speeds, you'd have to really be driving like an idiot to have the issues you're attributing to 2WD/FWD cars, and at that point the AWD still won't help.

[Mountainman]

But BMW Mercedes and Porsche don't even make fwd?

Don't BMW make the Mini and Mercedes make the fwd A and B class?

[Happs]

Your best bet would be to drive both cars and make up your mind because there will not be consensus about which one is more fun to drive on this forum.

I agree.. the real test is how it makes you feel when you drive it.. the rest is just stats on a page

I agree. Back to back drives to make up your mind about the GTI and R.

Thanks guys and this is certainly my intent! But unfortunately the dealers near me have sold every R they've got in for demo use within a day or so. People are offering sticker price to avoid the wait.

It means I can either wait it to do some good back to back test and perhaps delay getting my own by 6-7 months. Or I take a leap of faith and buy without test drive (though I've driven the brilliant GTi) and base my decision on professional reviews and personal feedback from forums just like this one.

I have a budget of $50k-$60k. I'm looking at either a well optioned GTi, or a reasonably optioned R. In some respects it would be easier if I had a different (lower or higher) budget!! A consideration for me is that options tend to depreciate greater than stock build and car ability.

In lieu of doing a test drive I'm leaning towards the R because my budget can extend to it and there must be value in paying $10k more than a GTi (for those than can afford to) or there wouldn't be a market for it I suppose.

[Happs]

Whether I go GTi or R, I'm keen to do a Stage I performance upgrade (the likes of the APR or Superchip Bluefin Stage I ECU upgrade).

Is one engine likely to be more robust than the other for this sort of tuning?

I'm unlikely to go to StageII/III, just a little more performance.

Given the R is detuned for Aus I'm thinking it'll handle upgrades better?

(there's pro's and cons in terms of ability to get extra power down 2WD vs AWD etc, but that's not really what I'm interested in, more interested in the mechanical longevity on the engines by modding).

[Happs]

Even with a 200kw+ Stage II MKV Golf GTI (i.e. no XDS and previous versions of their TLA safety systems), it is very difficult to get an intentional skid under acceleration, even in a corner. In the wet it's still difficult to accelerate into an intentional skid. The only way to really get this to happen is to enter a corner already going too fast (which will be assisted by XDS in the MK6 cars), or to turn off the ESP (which still won't turn off the XDS in a MK6). Entering the corner too fast won't be helped with any of the drive types, and WhiteJames is stating that the XDS may actually be better than the AWD (due to R's additional weight and inability to brake individual front wheels) in several of the second scenarios.

Yeah I do agree.

And this really caught my attention reading his review too! Bigger (or more expensive) doesn't guarantee anything is better in life. I just really want to avoid the buyers remorse!

[Corey_R]

The Golf R's engine has uprated internals as it was always meant to be a high performance (~200kw factory) engine. It's basically the MKV's GTI engine (147kw) but with larger turbo, different rods and cylinder head and this that and the other (I'm sure someone can dig up the link of specific changes... I just don't have time atm).

The Golf R Stage III goes to 315kw without needing any internals changed, whereas the MK6 GTI Stage III goes to 275kw and is right on the edge of needing upgraded engine internals (in fact, even running a higher octane fuel than 98 has a "recommendation" from APR to upgrade the engine internals).

But yeah, Stage I GTI is 189kw, Golf R stock is 188kw, and Golf R Stage I is 240kw... so if this type of thing interests you, the R is definitely the way to go...