Volkswagen Beetle 1.8T Car Review

Facts At A Glance
Car: Volkswagen Beetle 1.8T range
Prices: £16,155-£19,670 – on the road
Insurance Group: 14
Emissions: 197g/km
Performance: Max Speed 126mph / 0-60mph 9.0s
Fuel Consumption: (urban) 25.7mpg / (extra urban) 44.1mpg / (combined) 31.4mpg
Safety: Twin front & side airbags / ABS / ESP
Dimensions: Length/Width/Heightmm 4081/1836/1498

BUILDING A BETTER BEETLE

Our Rating: 6.4 / 10

All Things Considered, Volkswagen’s Beetle 1.8T Is Probably As Good As It Gets From This Fashionable Little Car. Jonathan Crouch Checks It Out

At one time or another, almost every other Volkswagen model seems to have benefited from the Volkswagen Group’s ubiquitous 150bhp 1.8-litre turbocharged petrol engine – so why not the Beetle? Why not indeed.

In theory at least, this could be just the engine to exploit the obviously impressive abilities of the MkIV Golf-based chassis. These are limits that you’ll certainly never find behind the wheel of the standard 115bhp 2.0-litre model. And, priced from £16,155 as a hatch or £19,670 as a Cabriolet, its only just over £1,000 more.

A good compromise model then, particularly as the £1,200 or so premium you’ll pay for the 1.8T over the standard 2.0-litre also entitles you to front foglights, leather for the steering wheel, gear knob and handbrake and a speed-dependent roof spoiler. Performance? Well, the rest to sixty sprint occupies 9.0s (compared to 10.9s for the 2.0) on the way to 126mph (115mph for the 2.0).

Despite this, fuel consumption is actually better in the 1.8T, with 25.7mpg (compared to 23.7mpg) available on the Urban cycle and 34.9mpg (as opposed to 32.5mpg) on offer as a Combined figure. On a run, you may even hit 44mpg. The C02 emissions figures are lower too, whether you opt for the the five-speed manual or the four-speed automatic. In other words, this is probably the best all-round Beetle variant you can buy.

The car has been recently mildly facelifted but the changes haven’t amounted to much. There are revised bumpers and wheelarches, with sharper edges than before, plus subtly restyled headlights and front indicators, and tail lights with white circles inside the red circles. The ‘VW’ emblems have also been modified at the front and rear. In addition, there’s a new range of colours and alloy wheels, complemented by fresher fabrics for the interior. Chrome now adorns the air vents and surrounds the instruments, for what Volkswagen reckon is an even higher quality feel inside.

All this apart, the recipe is much as you’ll find it in the 2.0-litre Beetle, a car which has been on offer here in right hand drive form since early 2000. It comes surprisingly well equipped: expect to find air conditioning, an alarm/immobiliser, electric front windows, powered heated and adjustable mirrors, remote central locking and 16" 8-spoke alloy wheels. You can get all these things in a Golf of course – or indeed in any other sensible family hatchback. But you don’t buy a Beetle to be sensible.

On paper, at least, the latest incarnation has little in common with Hitler’s original air-cooled people’s car, being a Golf in everything but name and shape. Not that this matters, of course. Volkswagen’s crude, noisy and comfortless rear engined, air-cooled original is the last thing that modern buyers would want. For them, the new Beetle must be anything but the basic, functional transport envisioned by the original’s creator, Dr Ferdinand Porsche, back in 1945.

Modern Beetles are bought as fashion accessories, as second or third cars for the weekend jaunt or the trip to the squash club. Early US buyers included Beverley Hills celebrities, a president’s daughter and exclusive car rental establishments. In the UK you see them zipping about with advertising agencies’ names on the doors. Or parked outside fashionable restaurants and nightclubs. And in the parking slots of exclusive gated resident