How the Tiguan puts a smile on my face every time I step inside

The 2.0L TSI engine, DQ381 DSG gearbox and VW's 4Motion AWD system of the SUV is a touring combination made in heaven.

BHPian Maky recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

It has now been six months since I purchased the Tiguan. Six glorious months.

Every single day I've stepped into the car, every single drive has put a smile on my face. Whether a slow daily commute or those wonderful out-of-city blasts.

Since I brought her home half a year ago I've put in about ~3,500 kilometres. Not as much as I thought I'd have run by now but life, routine and travels.

I've written down the experience thus far in a manner that I hope will be informative and helpful to most.

Daily commute

Excellent sound insulation from the hustle and bustle of Bombay's peak hours. I had originally mentioned in my post that T-BHP/others had perhaps gotten it wrong when opining on the stiff suspension of the vehicle, I'll very much take that back. The vehicle definitely rides stiffer than ideal, but not to the point of great discomfort. A last-gen Octavia-like suspension tuning balance though would have been perfect.

Factory tints, excellent seating position and cushioning paired with Auto Hold make for effortless bumper-to-bumper days. I would like to mention that the AC has largely been sufficient but during the hottest days I do find myself moving the fan blower speed to the 3rd position out of 7, otherwise it sits in a very silent 1st position.

Highway runs

For a raised ride height 'SUV' vehicle the Tiguan sure has felt car-like on the highways. One switches lanes seamlessly accelerates ferociously and brakes with immediacy. I now realise why those big German cars would just blast past me on the highways so confidently, they just don't realise the numbers they're doing. The earlier mentioned slightly stiffer suspension is a non-issue on the highways. Absolutely flat ride, again being an SUV I was surprised by the next to nil amount of body roll in this vehicle's highway manners.

Ghat climbs

Most of what I've written earlier was to be expected, though what was not expected is what I experienced on the ghats, so I've dedicated a paragraph.

One cannot do high speeds on the twisties yet I found myself just effortlessly going past all cars big and small, cheap and expensive even at sedate speeds. On my first ghat run in the Tiguan, I thought perhaps they had been full of people and luggage but on following climbs, I decided to have a look at the cars I was just cruising past, a lot of those vehicles had either two persons or less and presumably similar luggage load as mine. I realised it's the car, the sheer grip with the 4motion system which offers full-time AWD in D1 and D2, following which drive to all 4 wheels offered in any gear if it feels a wheel(s) is losing traction.

The 2.0L TSI engine, DQ381 DSG gearbox and VW's 4Motion AWD system is a touring combination made in heaven.

Moving on, in the original post I had mentioned that later I'd put a thorough review of the excellent IQ Matrix headlights that came with this car. But now I don't think a review is needed as such so I'll just share some of the pictures. These were taken in certain stretches of Aamby Valley in Lonavala where there were no street lights.

The above pictures might not do justice given the limited patch of road where I took them but believe me the I.Q. matrix LEDs on the Tiguan are fantastic. They spread when they see the road widen, narrow and sharpen accordingly on smaller lanes and the throw is great. There are times when the ambient light sensor(?) doesn't calculate the environmental lighting correctly and the low beam throws a much-faded beam than is ideal thinking the road is adequately lit but that's rare. I am considering getting the front camera module retrofit as some Tiguan owners have gotten, after which the lights will automatically dip as an individual/car comes in front of you so as not to blind them.

So now that the main ownership experience has been largely covered, I would like to mention a small incident I had on the road.

Slow-moving traffic ahead of me, nearly none behind me. An imbecile biker, of the kind who likes to swerve sharply left and right when changing lane to lane was behind me. The vehicle in front of me braked so did I, at this point I imagine the said moron tried to swerve to my adjacent lane expecting me to keep moving even though the car in front had braked and rammed my rear bumper while trying to overtake into a narrow gap on the other lane. The noise I heard was a loud thud. I got out and this was the 'damage'

What you see in the first image is the chrome lining in perfect alignment, this is the left side where the biker did not hit my car

I was very surprised by the negligible damage. Given the loud thud I heard I figured both holding clips would be gone on either side of the bumper with a nice bend in the middle and I'd have a claim merely 3 months into ownership. While you expect the exterior metalwork and interior plastics to be top-notch for such vehicles, Volkswagen's CKD import products seem to compromise nowhere. Absolute master race.

And now finally to some just criticism. The service experience

After the 1st service(VW Downtown, Sewri workshop) which wasn't a service I believe but a check-up of sorts post the first month of delivery. No issues with the service/check-up but then they delivered my car unwashed and tobacco spat on. The interiors also appeared not properly vacuum cleaned.

After the 2nd checkup/service the past week, they returned my car this time well washed and cleaned although I had mentioned to him in advance my previous experience on that point.

However, post drop off no mention verbally over the phone on what checks were done on the car by the service advisor. And unlike the first time when the service advisor(a different person) asked me if I wanted to fill the air in one of the tyres which was showing low pressure which I declined to do as they did not have Nitrogen and only Air. This time around the service person just went ahead and filled my Nitrogen filled tyres with air. I had to completely deflate and reflate with Nitrogen at a pump, safety aside the TMPS readings went wonky showing all kinds of strange numbers because of this mix.

Also, after the person dropped the car back home I saw that two sunblinds were just kept in the dickie instead of being placed back on the window and one of the sunblinds, the rear right quarter one was bent. This was a paid-for accessory.

I called the service advisor immediately and said he'd get back to me. The next day he got back to me with no desire to replace the bent one with a new one giving laughable reasons. Great buying experience, and ownership experience thus far. But VW really needs to have a look at their post-sale service quality and training.

Mr. Ashish no amount of marketing or Ad spend will ever be as good as word of mouth.

6 km/l in Bombay and a respectable 14 km/l on highways are the honest figures. I think I've covered most things of my Tiguan Ownership. If anyone has any questions please feel free to ask : )

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