Dealership:
I had visited capital vw dealership in mohan cooperative estate as well as the dealership in mgf mall and bikaji kama place. I found capital vw to be the best out of them in terms of customer centric experience.
The SE was polite and did not push or call again and again to book the car. I really appreciated that. The dealership staff were friendly. I exchanged my grand i10 and got the price that I asked for which was impressive. Didn’t get discounts on the car except for some discount on the insurance. The dealer gave mud flaps, mats and body cover for free. The dealership experience was at par with Hyundai dealerships. Can’t comment on maruti as I didn’t visit a maruti Suzuki dealership. The SE had come to my house for signing papers, financing the car and other million documents that need to be signed so that on the day of delivery I had to worry about minimum paperwork. Booked the car in red colour on the 13th of may 2016.
Took the delivery on the 1st of June 2016. The delivery was short, not quirky and made us (I and my wife) feel special. The whole process was completed in 45 minutes. The lamination sticker on the hood and the roof was taken out in front of me as requested by me. I also got to do my pdi of the car before the registration at the dealer’s workshop where they do their own pdi. If such is the attitude of dealerships towards customers then I believe vw is tightening the belt to improve its customer satisfaction. It took 15 days for the RC to arrive at the dealership as compared to Hyundai which took more than 2 months.
How is it like to drive?
It’s an amazing car. The car is a jack of all trades and does its job well. I have covered roughly 400kms and the car has returned an average of about 11.5kmpl in city (Delhi) driving with 100% use of a.c. I have been driving the car in ‘D’ mode mostly and it’s good for city usage. I will compare the polo with elite i20 and grand i10 as these are the 2 cars I’ve driven extensively. Some specifics to follow:
Engine:
The Tsi engine is a very impressive engine. I read a little about tsi engine tech online. It’s a unique engine that incorporates direct fuel injection like the diesel engines hence the torque is available from as low as 1800rpm. Being a petrol engine it revvs up to 6k rpm and the torque is spread till 4k rpm I think. I get the best of both the engine types with this tsi engine. It’s a sohc engine.
Gearbox:
It’s a dual speed gearbox (dsg). It is the best gearbox available in cars below 20 lakhs. The shifts are lightning fast. I love manual cars and when I test drove the polo GT for the first time I didn’t like the automatic gearbox. Once I understood how it works and responds I developed appreciation for the dsg and now I enjoy it. It is a quick learner and understands my intentions with the throttle input. While in ‘D’ mode if I depress the throttle a little more than half the car downshifts and brings it in the turbo zone. However it takes a second or so for the gearbox to downshift. The best way for quick overtakes is to put the mode into “tiptronic” mode and downshift two gears and the car is in its turbo zone and shoots forward. I have not faced the famous D3<D2 jerk. When the car comes to a sudden stop the yes, I can feel gearbox downshifting but definitely not what has been complained by some owners here. Maybe vw has updated its mechatronics software? The car quickly upshifts from D1>D2. D2 is pulled almost till 2k rpm in D mode under sedate driving conditions. At 60kmph the car is in D7 and at around 1500 rpm. The upshifts are really smooth. I haven’t tried the ‘S’ mode yet as I haven’t completed the engine break in period which I imagine is 1500kms. I don’t feel the need for ‘S’ mode as most of my drive is in the busy roads of delhi and for the occasional overtakes there is always the tiptronic mode.
Suspension, steering and handling:
Coming from a Hyundai I must say the the suspension if better. It’s better in absorbing potholes, undulations of the road as well as better around corners and in high speed stability. However, please don’t misunderstand this as Hyundai cars have a bad suspension setup. Trust me their cars have come a long way in the suspension dept. (courtesy. Elite i20). If I give polo a 10 for suspension I would give i20 an 8.5. Yes the grand i10’s suspension and steering isn’t as confidence inspiring as the polo or even the i20. I would say that vw has a setup the suspension very well both for city and highway drives.
The steering of the polo is heavier that Hyundai at low speeds and stays heavy at higher speeds as well. There steering responsiveness is not as good as a Fiat. There is definitely a difference between a hydraulic and an electric power steering. In the i20 the steering is light at lower speeds and weighs up at higher speeds.
The car handles very well thanks to its suspension, steering and the chassis. I must say that the chassis of the polo is designed for safety as well as speeds. It might come as a surprise to many of us here but even the high floor hump of the polo, which is criticized, does actually contribute to the agility of the chassis as well as structural integrity. I did some research on vw’s atrocious floor hump and why they have that when other manufacturers have almost no hump. I did realize that it’s not due to bad designing but on the contrary good designing. I personally don’t mind the high floor hump as I believe a hatchback is designed for 4 people and not 5. If a 5th person does sit, it’s at his/her inconvenience.
Practicality:
Well this is where Hyundai is definitely better.
- The polo doesn’t have bottle holder on the rear doors whereas both i10 and i20 have an option to store 1 litre bottles at the rear in addition to the front.
- The cup holders on the polo are placed in front of the gear stick which makes it really impractical to keep your tea/coffee while on the go. I tried it once and I almost spilt it as the gear stick makes it difficult to take it and put it back.
- Polo doesn’t have an armrest nor a rear a.c vent. Both of them are present of the i20 even though it’s manual. I’m not complaining about the rear a.c vents though as the a.c is quite powerful and cools the cabin in minutes.
- IT DOESN’T HAVE A BOOT LIGHT!! This is a glaring cost cutting measure by vw and I fail to understand the logic behind it.
- It doesn’t have the rear view camera even though the Ameo with the same infotainment system does, probably vw is saving it for in the next face lift.
- I miss the auto folding ovrms feature in the polo which is there in the i20.
- It has the sunglass holder option in the glove box, I would have preferred it near the map lights as in the i20.
- The rear seat space is less however that’s due to the large boot space. The front seats as scooped out to give additional millimeters of knee space. The rear bench in itself is comfortable and bucket seat like unlike the flat seats found in many cars.
- The rear windows don’t roll down all the way. Again that’s not an issue with me as 99% of the time I keep the windows rolled up thanks to the dusty delhi environment.
Now for some good part:
- All the windows have one touch auto up and down function, a very useful feature
- Speed sensing auto door lock adds to the convenience. It locks at 15 kmph.
- Front seats a comfortable and provide good horizontal and lateral support.
- The car has a dead pedal
- The MFD has some useful features that I missed in Hyundai like distance to empty, instantaneous mileage and average mileage
- The nvh levels are really good. The hood has cladding on it that contributes to it.
- The double barrel headlights do a good job at illumination. I had bi xenon hid projector setup in my grand i10 and the throw was amazing. However, I don’t miss it.
- Automatic rain sensing wipers. I tried it and they work great. They are speed sensitive as well as when I go fast the wipes are more frequent.
- Cruise control works great too. Turn the cruise control on and press the set button and the current speed will be set as the cruising speed. You can toggle between the speeds to increase or decrease the cruising speeds.
- Lights in the front footwell.
- Auto dimming ivrm. Again it works as its intended to.
- The car lets you set the speed limit. If the speed is above the set limit there is a buzzing sound to remind of over speeding.
- The paint quality is great. A notch better than Hyundai. No orange peel effect.
- The doors are heavy and close with a solid “thud”
Car entertainment system RCD 330G
This is the infotainment system by vw which was a part of their latest update which came along with the rain sensing wipers and auto dimming ivrms.
- It has a 5 inch touch screen interface. The touch is good. It doesn’t have navigation built it which would have been great. It has option for radio, aux, usb, cd and Bluetooth connections.
- The sound quality is much better than the old rcd 220/320. I had an alpine head unit in my grand i10 and loved the sound and was apprehensive about the head unit’s sound quality in polo but I am satisfied with the sound quality and don’t miss the alpine head unit.
- The radio is clear with minimum loss in frequencies.
- It comes with 3 band equalizer with bass, mid and treble
- It can play music via aux, usb or cd even when the phone is connected via Bluetooth.
- It imports your phonebook into the head unit whenever a Bluetooth connection is established and enables one to scroll through their phonebook, call log and even go through their sms on the infotainment system as well.
- Mirrorlink: This is a fairly new technology incorporated by vw in this head unit. It is supposed to mirror some apps (apps authorized by mirrorlink consortium) to the head unit screen. However there are many prerequisites for it. Firstly your phone should have mirrorlink feature on it. Mine doesn’t. If your phone does have it, you need apps that specifically are authorized by mirrorlink to display on the head unit’s screen. Check out mirrorlink.com and see how limited the options of apps and phones are. This feature is more of less useless. I wish vw just gave navigation instead of mirrorlink.
I haven’t planned any mods yet. I’m quite happy with whatever is offered in the car except the boot light emission. I may in the future get bitten by the modification bug – we will see as it comes
. I got JK Vectra tyres on it. They are ok. Road noise is on the lesser side. I am not going to drive on tracks nor do illegal speeds hence I don’t see the need to upgrade tyres. As of now I have done a little over 500kms and I am enjoying the ownership experience. I have not taken extended warranty yet, I will before the car completes a year as after that the warranty is slightly more expensive.
Will keep the thread updated.