This forum make me think vw,s are defects

[nomodlowkmgti]

I would have had a second thought if i got on here before i got my polo gti in 2006 .I don,t do may km and do a dealer service every year and have no warranty work done to date so my polo experience is trouble free but from what i read like the gearbox problems suspension and other stuff im thinking with no mods care full use ill be ok .I suspect if ya look for problems they may appear drive hard may be the car cant take it.Im not going to do any mods as im starting to believe from all the faults you guys find that vw cars may not be as reliable as mine has been.

[jasn78]

mate the reason u read more faults here then anywhere else is we are basically fussy so and so's also we post faults so when some1 else has the same prob we know wats going on, i can honestly say i have a fairly well modded GTI and the only thing it has been back to vw for is a leaky radiator which was easily fixed. So use this forum as more of a guide and not something to worry about as such.

[Jmac]

Ill add to the mix , mate remember if you read about faults man it may be 1 in 100. You will get that with ANY vehicle . Use the forum as a learning and enthusiast tool and not a Negative tool.
My 2c
Jmac

[nomodlowkmgti]

Ill add to the mix , mate remember if you read about faults man it may be 1 in 100. You will get that with ANY vehicle . Use the forum as a learning and enthusiast tool and not a Negative tool.
My 2c
Jmac

I think i may use the forum and another forums to sort of way up two different car companies products sort of seeing what im getting into before putting cash down.Help me make me feel better knowing the product a little better.Im taking care with my gear box no fast shifts and giving a pause between shifts so i dont have it wear out.

[Buller_Scott]

i dont think the issue is that vw's are unreliable.

look at this forum. there are, at most, slightly more than a handful of polo owners, across the whole range, who post here.

and the only reason that ANY of us are here is because we sought this place out [i typed in "australian vw enthusiast websites] into google.

the kind of people who would seek this site out, are meticulous about their cars, fussy, OCD, etc. any tiny thing that goes wrong, people will tell you about, because part of this community is education about the cars we drive.

that's why we're here.

i dont think that its a case of vw's being unreliable. i think its more a case of people being loud and forward about any problems they may encounter, as scrutinous obsessive compulsive vw owners, so that should anyone else encounter that problem, it gets sorted YESTERDAY. that, and helping to prevent these issues.

cheers.

scott

[s1831559]

i totally agree that reliability isnt a big issue for pog.

anyhow, just got my ford feista fix today.
it has been mis-firing. new coil been fitted. all good again.

cap for the water btl was cracked. i ask for a new one.
then was told to buy the whole water btl...wtf!

Ford dealer aint really helpful too.
it seems like i always hav issue with dealers,
no matter its toyota, vw or ford.

imo, i think a helpful dealer is far more important than reliability...

[DaveMack]

I've had my Polo GTI for nearly 3 years (33,000ks) and had no major problems - gearbox has been fine ... the single problem I did have was an aircon compressor failure ... but that could happen with any vehicle. All in all ... very happy with the Pog.

Dave

[Bubu]

I agree about fussy people on here, I am one of them...

As for problems, I dont think its an issue.

I have made mods to mine and the only problem I have had is a stuck (in dash) cup holder. I dont recall anyone else complaining about a stuck cup holder.

It also depends how you drive the car, most of the guys on here are enthusiast who like to push their cars a bit. A few of the guys have even raced them.

[Sharkie]

I now have a fair few mods to my car and to date have had no problems with it.

I remember thinking after taking it to the track that this was 1s of the many cars I have ever had that I could take to the track, drive it hard and then drive home with no issues at all.

I have had many other brands and have had issues irrespective of brands over time. For instance ... had 2 BMWs warp their front brake discs within 20000kms. Had a BMW M3 burst its oil cooler (twice, but that was at over 8000rmin). Had a Golf VR6 seize rear wheel bearings whilst driving, had a Toyota Corrolla snap a timing belt (and not damage the valves or head), had a Mazda 2.5V6 626 suffer endless electrical problems. Had a Opel Corsa (Holden Barina) snap half its gearbox bolts while driving (and this was before it got modified) Had a Hyundai Getz break down 3 times to be towed to the dealer ... etc etc etc

So .. NO, VWs are no worse than any other brand in my experience. In fact better than most.

[gerhard]

The OP has really scraped the bottom of the barrel with this thread.

He has a car which has had Zero problems and is now worried because VW has a service division which carries out repairs to VWs, and some (a very small, concentrated, unrepresentative sample) people on here have had occasion to use the service division for more than an oil change.

If you choose/reject a car on the basis of random posts on an enthusiast's forum, you're very close to crazy.

[marko]

As everyone has said, you are getting a skewed result taking the words of people from this forum. we are all enthusiasts and post any small problems that arise. but I really don't think these things are limited to VWs.
Last year my folks bought a brand new turbo-diesel pajero. By the time they got it home it had done about 150km and already had an oil leak from one of the gearbox seals. You will never hear about that on the pajero forums though because my dad can hardly use the interwebnet-machine thingy anyway

[The_Hawk]

You need to remember that you don't tend to get alot of people, especially on an ethusiast web forum, sign up to post daily about how good their car is and how few problems they have had.

Mods aside, I would suggest that as a group we subject our cars to more stress than the average user, although we probably take much better care of them too.

In my MK3's case, if I wrote up a list of commonly broken parts it covers three quarters of the car... but then you will most likely find a similar list on a Toyota Camry or Holden Commodore forum of a similar age and I can tell you which I would rather drive

[pixl]

*raises hand*

Fussy, OCD and general pain in the arse over here!

Having a Polo GTI has just raised my standards so I'm even more picky than I was with my old car. Any noise I hear and I'm like, "WTF is that??!"

[Chuck]

had mine flash tuned, major stereo mod too...i kick that bad boy in the guts daily - 15000km and the only thing i could complain about was the A/C not being cold enough (back to the dealer for check/refill - all good now)

the build quality is good..the Germans engineer winners..and one must remember a stock GTi is actually a detuned version in Australia - VAG20V Engine is tried and tested bulletproof

Now go and start some abuse of your car...and post any probs you come across to enrich this already AWESOME forum

[DaveMack]

If you choose/reject a car on the basis of random posts on an enthusiast's forum, you're very close to crazy.

I'm with Gerhard on this ... try sampling other car enthusiast forums ... I think you'll find it's the same everywhere. Enthusiasts are, by definition, more than a little OCD about their vehicles and each new member tends to raise the same 'problems' without first doing a search to see if the topic has already been covered. Then it looks like the 'problems' are multiplied and 'common' ... when they're not.

The Dub is IMHO one of the best put together mass produced vehicles in the market place ... but no one claims perfection.

Dave