Suffering neglect is one thing. A major fail due to a flawed design is quite another. I guess if you do the research and are proactive it'll be ok, but the casual buyer is usually caught unawares to the tune of mucho dinero.
I bought our Tig on the strength of my many past experiences with Vdubs. Little did i know how flawed they had become in the 10 years since my last one.
KyAllroad (Jeremy) said:As a previous owner of the most notorious VAG product to ever exist (see screen name) my 2007 B6 VR6 Passat wagon seems positively Buick-like in its reliability. Bought in 2012 with 65k on the clock it’s suffered from one compressor failure, one blown fuse in the fuel system, and one catastrophic timing chain failure (hydraulic chain tensioner failed and took out the valve train).
Aftermarket extended warranty took care of the compressor and the engine. Car now has 149k on it and we drove it to Florida and back last month. It’s awesome!
That's an awesome car, but you got lucky. For some reason my dad bought a B6 wagon and it was hilariously expensive to maintain. Despite costing something like $4000 per year to maintain he was sad when he sold it! Electronics gremlins galore but what a fun wagon!
Was there ever a good year ?
poopshovel again said:cdeforrest said:1967
Literally came here to say THIS
67 is my favorite year, but 68-71 is not that bad (IRS is nice). NOT a fan of 72 plus though.
The newer ones seem to be put together okay. Mrs. Dx has had a run of later Jettas and I've told her get ones with minimal options as possible.
iceracer said:Was there ever a good year ?
Funny how, when i started reading GRM you couldn't find an issue that didnt have an A1 or A2 Rabbit, Golf or GTI on the cover or in a feature article. It led me to be an enthusiast for them, and I put all my kids into Rabbits, Jettas or even a Scirocco as their first car.
Folks these days seem to forget when they were the hot hatch and they could do no wrong. Or maybe its just a different generation of GRM folks.
swampyankee said:I'm getting that VWs are just not the quality product that they were when I was working on mid-80's and early 90's cars. My last "cool" VW was a 2001 Jetta GLi VR6, but I also ran into bad "German engineering" with a '96 Passat VR6.
So, what was the last classic era for the GTI and GLi? If I was going to find one to drive reliably, and tinker with, what years and models would be best?
Curious question. My wife's 2001 Jetta was a massive piece of E36 M3. Problems all over the place. It looked decent and drove well, but we got rid of it after only two years since it was constantly in getting warranty work.
We had sworn off VWs entirely since then, but I recently bought a 2018 GTI and it's been great so far (15k miles), and VW actually has a legit long-term warranty now (6 years/72k bumper to bumper) so a bit more confidence-inspiring than previously. Plus for ~25k it has LSD, 6MT, massively awesome brakes, and all the tech gizmos people need these days. YMMV as to what "good" means to you. I wouldn't personally consider any 90s or 2000s VW "good" but that's just my own view.
ae86andkp61 said:There was a good year for VW?
I just typed up a seventeen paragraph post to articulate the finer points of things. However, this would be the conclusion. "Total garbage, fun to drive," should be their motto. Though our 15 Jetta TSI has been trouble free.
And this definitely seems to apply to VW ownership. My experience is based on my -ex's B3 1996 Passat VR6 and my own Mk IV 2003 Jetta TDI Wagon. The experience with the VR6 damn near made me not by the 2003 and I vowed that after the 3rd warranty visit the car would go straight to an Acura dealer for a new RSX. But 329K miles later, that never happened.
I am more familiar with the TDI world and to me the 2003 is the best year to buy - the last of the ALH engines with minimal emissions controls and towards the end of the Mk IV production run. Both the engine and chassis were fairly well sorted by then.
I’ve owned almost 20. I’ve found mk4’s to be almost as reliable as mk3. Mk3 and 5 seem to be the worst for rust.
For a daily who knows it’s a dice roll, but for an enthusiast second car I’d prefer pre 93.
With VW's, in my experience, you have to be careful what you pick.
Don't buy Auto's, don't buy Gas Turbocharged engines, don't buy high end stereo, etc. KISS.
I don't get all the bashing on here for VW's, Subaru's and GM. Research well, ask the right questions before you buy and you will be rewarded. If you don't like the answers walks away.
My mkiii git vr6 was the worst car I’ve ever owned, followed only by my a4 avant- and my b5 Passat 1.8t. Every single vag product I’ve owned has been an absolute piece of E36 M3. Worst cars ever. Never again.
And I put almost 200k miles on our b6 passat 1.8t and b6 a4 avant with only normal maintenance. In other words, timing belt/water pump at 60k miles and brakes/tires/gas/oil for both.
swampyankee said:Funny how, when i started reading GRM you couldn't find an issue that didnt have an A1 or A2 Rabbit, Golf or GTI on the cover or in a feature article. It led me to be an enthusiast for them, and I put all my kids into Rabbits, Jettas or even a Scirocco as their first car.
And how many years ago was that? 
At my age I tend to think the same way (my brother bought a new Rabbit in 1976, my college roommate had a 1979 Scirocco) but then I remember that was 40+ years ago. Time marches on.
In reply to stuart in mn :
I'm thinking I started reading GRM in the early-mid 90's. Not that long ago... Here's the kind of stuff I'd see all the time.
swampyankee said:
I'm thinking I started reading GRM in the early-mid 90's. Not that long ago... Here's the kind of stuff I'd see all the time.
Say what?? That is about 25 years ago. The magazine was less than 10 years old at the time. A number of the members on this forum weren't even born yet. Including some that currently work at the magazine.
Ian F said:swampyankee said:
I'm thinking I started reading GRM in the early-mid 90's. Not that long ago... Here's the kind of stuff I'd see all the time.
Say what?? That is about 25 years ago. The magazine was less than 10 years old at the time. A number of the members on this forum weren't even born yet. Including some that currently work at the magazine.
I suppose youre right. As the frog says, Time's fun when you're having flies. Hehe
The wife's '10 Tiguan has been at the dealers for cam chain tensioner failure and related head damage. 3 weeks and 2 factory replacement heads later and the thing still isn't fixed. They finally offered a free rental. While we were there we looked at used inventory. A late model Jetta Sportwagen, maybe TDI, may be in our future... some people never learn eh
2.5 engine = good. A few easily fixed issues mostly involving oil leaks.
2.0T = bad. Major catastrophes await. My local independent VW guy won't even sell anything with that engine in it.
My frame of reference is late 90s to mid-late 2000s.
In reply to swampyankee :
I can recommend the TDI. VW extended the powertrain warranty on them to 10 years. Ours gets good mileage and makes nice torque.
Uhhh.....that would be 1973.
How about '89? I saw a nice GTI 16V for sales, just like my old one that my son still owns. I recall only minor problems you'd expect to have with an older car, but nothing I couldn't diagnose and fix myself, unlike modern cars.
Take the first year they were manufactured then subtract one year, and that's the last year they were good.
All kidding aside. I'd drive many vws but I'd never recommend them to someone.
A good friend is a BMW tech and he complains about his 5 year old gti all the time, saying it's super unreliable.
There’s no such thing as a reliable vag product. Just varying degrees of unreliability
Oh, I forgot to mention about my B6. I was in a minor accident in it several years ago (bumped an Accord in traffic), did literally no damage to my car and collapsed the back of the Honda so badly he couldn't open the trunk.
It's been the "learn to drive" car for a couple of teenagers and endured almost 2 years of abuse and neglect from the elder teen who only pointed out that something might be wrong with the cooling system when the needle pointed all the way over and the car started dinging at her (cooling fan internal relay had failed, new fan assembly cost me $105 online) so who knows how many times it got hot but runs perfectly.
I autocrossed it 7 years ago when I was getting into the sport and while I was DFL that first event, with less crap tires and a few events under my belt it got up to "not embarrasing" when I switched to a Miata.
I think a lot of the internet lore is just that and we just don't hear about the good cars, only the problem children.
Its true, that there is an internet schoolyard thing that happens ,especially when the question is phrased as to invite criticism. I suppose if i used reverse psychology and asked, "are all VWs total crap?" I would've heard alot more from the vocal defenders.
Anyway, the Tig has been fixed by the dealer, meanwhile we're negotiating a trade for a buy-back program TDI Sportvagen. And maybe an A2 GTI if i can find a good one.
Damn the torpedos, full steam ahead!
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