2011 VW Jetta TDI Sportwagen: Oppo Review

"Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To" (murdersofa) 11/15/2014 at 17:21 • Filed to: oppo review, volkswagen, jetta TDI, sportwagen

5

20

Sportwagen let me drive his Sportwagen today! Here are my impressions:

Appearance (7/10):

Not a bad looking car. Being based on the Jetta, but still being a wagon gives it an awkward mid-ground between the Passat wagon and a Golf, placing it about the overall size of a mid-sized sedan. The paint is nothing terribly special, the wheels are quite nice, and the lower grille gives it a charming wide grin.

Interior (7/10):

Surprisingly comfortable. I say "surprisingly" because this is a German car and every other German car I've been in has resulted in back pain, shoulder pain, and "oh my god get me out of here". That being said, the Jetta TDI is far from a luxury car, but it's not an altogether horrid place to be. The steering wheel is adequately sized, with functional but not boyracer pistol grips, and SO MANY BUTTONS. The seats were supportive and had a decent amount of bolstering. They're not Recaros, but they don't need to be. Something odd: the pedal position. The brake pedal isn't in the center of the wheel well where it seems to be in other cars. All of the pedals seemed squished over to the right slightly, with the clutch and brake just to either side of the centerline. I would have preferred the clutch be a bit farther to the left.

Engine (8/10):

I'm calling this "engine" instead of "performance" because despite being a "sport"wagen, this is by no means a sports car. It gets up from 0-60 in about 8.8 seconds or so, and makes most (aka all) of its power between 2500 and 3500rpm. Stick it in 5th gear (I never tried 6th) at 30mph and bury the pedal and you are rewarded with absolutely nothing, but if you manage to keep it in the power band it is pretty reasonable. Will chirp the tires in 1st and 2nd gear. Will do all this while getting pretty incredible mileage— around 38mpg.

Transmission (8/10):

I might be biased because the last manual I drove was a truck, but the 6-speed row-your-own in the Jetta is pretty damn good. Shifts are smooth, mechanical feeling, with minimal effort required. Throw distance is whatever. Not super short, but not a stretch by any means. Clutch pedal travel is... eeeeh. It's pretty damn long, but the engagement point is *very* well defined to the point where I was able to hop in an drive it immediately with very little manual-trans experience.

One gripe: There appears to be a 1st-gear lockout when over 40mph, meaning I can't just push in the clutch, toss it into 1st, and idle up to a light. It has to be in neutral or a higher gear.

Handling (8/10):

I sound like a broken record with these ratings.

Handles good, not great. There is body roll, but it is predictable and for the most part seems rather composed. Flooring it through a corner resulted in mild understeer and a bit of complaining from the front tires. I didn't exactly carve any corners, so I can't go more in depth.

Audio (6/10):

I heard very little of the stereo, but I'm pretty sure it's good-not-great but not bad enough you'd want to put the time and money into upgrading it. In a word: adequate.

The engine itself sounds a lot less like a diesel than earlier VAG TDIs (I'm lookin' at you, B5) did, with an unintrusive engine note that was still loud enough you could hear what it's doing from inside the cabin.

Makes a nice noise while decelerating in gear.

Overall (45/60):

Good car. Great fuel economy, practical, but not soul-crushingly boring.

MylesD > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 17:34

1

The first gear lockout thing..WHAT?! That sounds frightening to me that someone would put the car into first at 40 mph. I get that you have the clutch down, but still. Not trying to be a jerk, but does anyone else do this?

EDIT: nice write up nonetheless

Dr. Zoidberg - RIP Oppo > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 17:44

0

fuel economy, wagon, correct number of pedals, it's a good honest car.

Tom McParland > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 17:57

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Nice writeup. It looks better because it's not actually based on the Jetta. It's based on the Golf, in Europe it's called the Golf Variant or Golf Sportwagen, just a streatched version of the hatch. This is why the upcoming MK7 Sportwagen will drop the Jetta name.

Sportwägen, Driver Of The Red Sportwagen > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:03

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You didn't have the radio turned up ;) also, I leave the audio settings at exactly neutral :)

Thanks for the write up :D

Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To > MylesD 11/15/2014 at 18:08

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I was at 40 coming to a right run at a stop light, so it was going to be a quick stop-and-go. Thought I'd put it in 1st early so I could just let the clutch out and have my hands free to work the steering wheel.

I'm a bit of a MTX noob.

Big Bubba Ray > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:10

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1st gear lockout is extremely common. In place to save your engine/transmission. The only car I've ever driven without one was my Baja Bug.

bwp240 > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:12

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I test drove one of these a while back and it was pretty good. The one I drove had power recline and manual seat back and forth (can't remember what that is called right now) which was weird. Would be a good little car for typical suburban driving as well as a decent highway car. I actually like buttons, I prefer them much more over touchscreens.

The sales person I worked with remarked how he was surprised that I (a college student) was looking at it because the typical clientele he had for the car were older/elderly people lol.

Sportwägen, Driver Of The Red Sportwagen > bwp240 11/15/2014 at 18:16

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Radio is touchscreen... However I can completely control it from the steering wheel ;)

bwp240 > Sportwägen, Driver Of The Red Sportwagen 11/15/2014 at 18:24

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yeah I can deal with the radio being a touch screen, but the heat/ac, defrost, and all that other stuff I like being buttons.

Sportwägen, Driver Of The Red Sportwagen > bwp240 11/15/2014 at 18:26

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...which is how they are!

twochevrons > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:31

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It's not something I'd make a habit of – even with the clutch out, you're going to be spinning the input side of the transmission much faster than it was intended to go (think about how fast the engine would spin if you let the clutch out in first at 40mph), and the speed differential between that and a near-idle makes it very hard on the synchromesh.

Generally, I downshift until about third or so (good for down to about 20mph in my Scirocco), then just let the clutch in instead of shift down to second. That way, the input shaft gets plenty of time to stop spinning, so as soon as the car comes to a stop, first will engage without any fuss. Not sure if that's the right thing to do, but it's the habit that I picked up from driving cantankerous old cars with worn synchromesh and 'uncooperative' gearboxes. I'd only ever go for first while on the move if I was really pushing it.

HammerheadFistpunch > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:32

2

dump those hankooks and put some better rubber on there and the handling wakes up

MylesD > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:33

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Fair enough. I won't act like I know the exact mechanics behind it, so I can't say it's necessarily a bad thing to try/do on a modern car. Just made my mental transmission grind when I read it. I'm typically staying in gear to utilize engine breaking and I usually do a soft down shift if I have the time.

twochevrons > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:36

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Great writeup – I've never driven one, but if I hadn't ended up with the 850R, I'd have probably bought myself a Sportwagen TDI. The tuning potential of the turbodiesel engine appeals, and I love me a good station wagon.

MylesD > twochevrons 11/15/2014 at 18:42

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Yep, I was gonna throw out the synchro thing but I really only understand it in the abstract. Me and my dad have a 72 VW Westfalia (wait, why have I never done an OppoReview?!) that I started driving stick on when I was 16 and it would probably blow up if I put it in 1st at speed. Regardless of clutch being down.

PetarVN, GLI Guy, now with stupid power > Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To 11/15/2014 at 18:51

1

appear to be a 1st year lockout....

SO THAT'S WHY MY GLI DOESN'T ALWAYS GO IN TO FIRST. HOW THE HELL DID I NOT KNOW THIS

twochevrons > MylesD 11/15/2014 at 18:52

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OPPOREVIEW. DO IT.

My father-in-law is a big VW fan, and daily-drives a late-model (water-cooled) Vanagon – I've driven it a few times, and it's quite the experience. Its predecessors must be even more so!

It's pretty amazing how synchromesh works, and even really that it works at all. The first car that I drove (a 1976 Triumph 2500) had a well-worn manual transmission, and although the synchromesh was fine if the engine and road speeds were roughly matched, it would balk and grind and crunch if you tried anything too extreme on it. I very quickly learned how to double-declutch as a result, and I think that it really helped me to get a handle on what goes on in the gearbox, since it wasn't possible to just jam it into gear and ignore it.

MylesD > twochevrons 11/15/2014 at 18:58

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It sits in my parents driveway in NJ and I'm in Philly so I don't get to drive it as often as I should. Look for a review come spring. I did bring a girl to Junior prom in it (her parents let me?) and I've had a whole bunch of fun bringing it to tailgates, sleeping in it, used it as a float for my college homecoming, and doing...well, all sorts of other stuff.

While I still can't fix shit on command, it was a great thing to have when I was that age. I could tinker around on it and put it back together without consequence because it was so simple.

Jake - Has Bad Luck So You Don't Have To > twochevrons 11/15/2014 at 21:29

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Yeah, the owner said that a tune could get him 40 more horsepower . That would be insane.

Sportwägen, Driver Of The Red Sportwagen > HammerheadFistpunch 11/15/2014 at 22:15

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They're not Hankooks... they're BFGoodrich Touring T/A 205/55R16's with 25% tread left...