Volkswagen’s new soft-roader aims upmarket with computing power for navigating jungles both urban and leafy.
Sport-utility vehicle builders do well to heed the Boy Scout motto of “Be Prepared.” The question is to what extent? Honda didn’t add a factory snorkel option when it redesigned the CR-V, and focus groups voted nay on a six-inch body lift to allow for more suspension travel on the new Cadillac Escalade. Buy a Nissan Xterra, though, and you do get a first-aid kit. Obviously, someone at some point in these vehicles’ development drew lines on the conservative edge of dedication to the dusty trail.
With its upcoming Tiguan, Volkswagen has seen fit to push that line a little further to the dirty side with a Land Rover–esque catalog of off-road-slanted electronic aids and even two different front-end styles, one (called “Sport & Style”) for on-road Tigs and one (“Track & Field”) that allows for a 28-degree approach angle. Add to that a battery of skidplates, and you’ve got an impressive off-road resume for a mini-ute that is fundamentally a VW Rabbit with 7.3 inches of ground clearance. Hey, maybe the all-wheel-drive R32 will have the optional sand paddles we hear they’ve been clamoring for in Europe.
The hard-core equipment is all activated in Off-Road mode, which adjusts the intervention threshold and programming of the ABS and the mapping of the throttle, locks the differentials, and activates hill-descent and climbing features.
The Tiguan’s 30-gig touch-screen navigation/infotainment system even includes an off-road function that allows for the storage of as many as 500 memory points, so you can mark the location of every pile of droppings you pass for later analysis. If a bear poops in the woods and no one is around to smell it, does it still stink?
All of this is surprising on a practical urban vehicle such as this, although such features will no doubt be high-cost options and will not be available—at least initially—on American models.
One more reasonable technology that we will see on U.S. Tiguans—also no doubt a pricey option—is a Lexus LS460L–like automatic parking system called ParkAssist. At the Tiguan’s base price in the mid-twenties, buyers will get the same qualities that have drawn us to other Volkswagens on this platform: style, space, and engaging driving dynamics.
While European Tiguans will have a range of five available engines, here in the U.S. we’ll initially get only one—the 200-hp 2.0-liter turbo—with the 140-hp, 236 lb-ft, 2.0-liter TDI to follow at the end of 2008. Both engines will be available with either a six-speed manual or a six-speed automatic transmission, which will be bumped from the options list by VW’s brilliant six-speed DSG sequential-manual about a year after the trucklet’s launch. Tiguans will be either front- or all-wheel-drive.
Another of the Rabbit/GTI platform’s greatest traits is its wide-open interior space, which the Tig will only improve on. Within a couple of mud clods of a CR-V in all critical dimensions, early looks at the Tiguan reveal generous room front and rear for a quartet of six-footers, thanks in part to a sliding and reclining second-row seat. With just 17 cubic feet of cargo room behind the seat at its rearward extreme, that flexibility will be necessary to haul any big load.
On the SUV/crossover/not-wagon spectrum, the Tiguan rates just a few ticks further to the SUV side than a Volvo XC70, which may be a hang up for many buyers of CR-Vs and Escapes who think they need to tuck the kids’ Fisher-Price playhouse behind their second seat.
But for buyers searching for the higher seating position and capability of an SUV without the wallowing body motions, a 2.0-liter turbo Tiguan with DSG could be just the tall wagon they are looking for. With a base price we expect will start around $24,000, Volkswagen should have little trouble finding homes for the 40,000 or so Tiguans it hopes to sell per year.
2009 Volkswagen Tiguan - Car News - Car and Driver June 2007
