Phaeton Volkswagen Phaeton Facelift (Spy shots & info)

[Human]

And it feels like a Passat on the inside too. Quality and luxury feel is quite an arm's lenght behind the A8, S-Class and 7-Series. So the car is in no-mans land really. Too expensive for a VW and a bit too lacking in quality to be a true alternative to a Mercedes or even an Audi.

My thoughts exactly. I like the car too, but it simpy has the wrong badge on it.


M

Yes, you all said it and it's true...though the car was ahead of it's time. Very understated and because of the VW badge 'ingored'.
Fact is under the skin the Phaeton was and is a Bentley Continental GT/Flying Spur @ a 1/3 of the price. Ferdinand Piech's swan song as head of the VW group and he was certainly one of the best engineers of his time. So in the end the Phaeton is a brilliant piece of engineering

 

[Wunderkind]

Generally speaking, the rise in sales in China for VW and Audi are pretty much driven by sales to government entities. I'm sure many of you have seen news reports that Audi outsold Mercedes for the first time last quarter in China, but most of these sales are government sales (especially for the Expo in Shanghai) and are low and mid range models. I'd be very surprised if Audi sold more A8's than Mercedes sold S-Classes.

 

[Mr. M]

I'd hardly call 1500 cars (if the numbers in the above post are correct) a success, and worldwide the car is a flop. Brilliant car, wrong badge. I doubt they'll be a totally new one, the numbers just don't make a good business case, hence this extreme facelift. The A8 is all new, the VW is not. They'll facelift it for minimal expense and then sell it for as long as it makes financial sense IMO. If they do engineer a totally new one, it will be extremely A8 based. The car simply doesn't make sense and VW needs to just quit it and get back to delivering on the basics. Fun to drive, well built German cars for a little bit more than their Japanese, American and Korean competitors.


M

Like Luw said... It is a halo car, and despite it being not a success, its primary function will be as such.

 

[Turboholic]

God, the pre-facelift looks much better. The new front is so ugly...

 

[Merc1]

Like Luw said... It is a halo car, and despite it being not a success, its primary function will be as such.

That may be true, but it doesn't make much sense as a sedan intended to sell in volumes. Especially when they built a brand new factory for it. VW just needs to give this one up. It will never be a sales success and I seriously douby anyone is buying a Passat because of the Phaeton. If the car ever is a hit, then the Audi A8 is going to suffer.


M

 

[ree]

It's official now:

http://www.germancarforum.com/phaeton/33033-official-volkswagen-phaeton-facelift.html

Thread closed…