Team-BHP (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/)

-   Official New Car Reviews (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/official-new-car-reviews/)

-   -   Volkswagen Polo 1.2L GT TSI : Official Review (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/official-new-car-reviews/135550-volkswagen-polo-1-2l-gt-tsi-official-review-64.html)

Agreed , there is a strong cost element to it but unfortunately 95 as a specific grade which would be cheaper is not available. I have seen some pumps especially on the old Delhi - Gurgaon road now starting to advertise 95 specifically but nothing in South Delhi area yet.

I've been driving a turbo petrol for well over a year now. I can confirm that a turbo adds no gain to fuel efficiency in a petrol engine. You gain two things in a turbo petrol, lots of torque and power from a much smaller capacity engine. When driven with a steady right foot, you can achieve, possibly exceed the manufacturer claimed fuel efficiency. All of this goes for a toss even in the slightest of stop and go traffic. No highway in our country allows you to hit the free way/express way straight out of your house. Depending on the time you leave/return, you have to deal with traffic and this throws efficiency out of the window. All that light footed highway driving goes for a toss very easily. Please don't try too hard with the fuel efficiency thing in a turbo petrol. Do a dedicated fuel efficiency run to check mileage and don't make it a part of a road trip.

Yes.

I do not own a GT. Having test driven one, the little I know is what I can share. You have the option to switch to Tiptronic or Sport to get engine braking. You have full (almost) control of the gears in Tiptronic. You can go up and come down the gears as you like, just like in a manual. In Sport, the shift points are at normal engine speeds when driven sedately and at 6000rpm when driven with a heavy right foot. Sport will give you more car control and a lot of engine braking but its still the system that is in charge. Sport will in no way aid fuel efficiency too. Tiptronic is better. You have some control of the system and can choose a lower gear if engine braking is required. Else, just shift to a higher gear.

While I do agree with you on the power and torque gains that a turbo brings about, I am not completely in agreement about the the first part of your quoted post.

The primary purpose of the turbo is of course to boost power and torque, but there surely is some fuel efficiency gain also. I don't mean to say that a 1.2L 105 PS TSI would be necessarily more effecient as a 1.2L 70 PS NA engine. But a 1.2L TSI will certainly be more efficient than 1.6L 105 PS NA engine.

Car companies market small turbo charged engines as delivering the power of a large engine, with the fuel economy of a smaller one. What the maker claims or advertises is not always entirely true. For example the turbocharged engine may not be really as powerful as a much larger V6/ V8 engine and it may not be as frugal as a smaller engine as well. But in reality there will some power gains compared to equally sized NA engine and some efficiency gains compared to a larger engine putting out similar power.

I've been driving a turbo petrol for over two years now and I have experienced that when I drive a certain distance keeping the engine in its turbo zone, say in a lower gear, and give throttle input only when the speed drops, you get better overall mileage figures than slotting into higher gears and driving at lower rpms, where the turbo is not spooled up, with constant throttle input.

The key to driving turbo engined cars, is staying in the right gear and understanding the power band characteristics of your car, giving the right amount of throttle, managing the turbo lag etc... It took me a while too.

That is left to be seen. I've come from a 1.6l Ford and compared to this naturally aspirated motor, my Fiat isn't any better in terms of efficiency. I think its more sensitive due to the presence of the turbo and that you need to drive within the optimum rpm band which is really difficult to do all the time. Why drop a gear when you have all that torque but then this is not the ideal region of the turbo and that is when it guzzles gas. No such thing in a NA engine. In the city cycle, my turbo petrol car has not managed better efficiency even once over my NA Ford. I feel a NA engine is a lot less sensitive to varying throttle input. I no longer own the Ford but in the time I did, it used to return no less than 9kmpl in the city cycle. My Fiat goes down to under 8kmpl.

The point I was trying to drive was, the gain in efficiency is nowhere in the league of diesels. Petrols are super sensitive to throttle input. In a diesel, the impact to efficiency is nowhere as bad.

My experience comes from owning the 1.8 Toyota Corolla in the past and the 1.8 Laura TSI now.

You are quite right about the city mileage. My Laura has shown no gain in the city. If anything its about 1/2 a km down on an average. But on the highway the efficiency gains are quite evident. At similar speeds the TSI is easily about 15 ~ 20% more efficient. But then again these two engines are completely different in character, just like your ford and the T-jet. Its not a proper apples to apples comparison. I mean if a 160 PS high torque motor gives about the same efficiency as 125 PS NA engine, I'd take that any day.

To all Polo TSI owners, I suggest you wait till you complete about 3~4,000 kms to assess the fuel effeciency. My Laura TSI's mileage really improved after about 5,000 kms. In any case, a city mileage of 10 kmpl with AC is not all. My i10 AT struggles to go past 8 kmpl :Frustrati

I checked with the VW dealer in Whitefield yesterday and he gave me a feeling that they really cannot commit any delivery date. He said "at least" 3 months. Then I asked him when are people who booked cars in the month of May getting their cars, he said not sure, might be delayed. He said no TSI cars are produced after the first batch.

If VW is not producing any TSI at the moment, are they looking for some minimum number of bookings before starting production. What about people who booked in May and early June. Have they received any likely delivery dates.

They are expecting 12 to 15 cars per dealer for July at least in Bombay. How that is without production is beyond my understanding. Perhaps they have some stock being dished out slowly. Can some BHPians with connects in VW please throw some light on this subject.

What you really need is a Sprint Booster! :)

Best gift a man can make to his car and himself, if available! !

All Drive By Wire acceleration systems come with a lag in time between pedal pressed and cars response. Sprint Booster will cut out the time lag, making your car feel faster and peppier!

If the Polo GT has drive-by-wire, then surely the SB will be available.

I know what you are saying, but if a gearbox takes a second or so to downshift even the sprint booster is not going to help much. What the sprint booster helps with is throttle response once you are in gear. BTW not seen you posting for a long time.


Guys I'm getting really tempted to ditch the Accord and pick this up as my daily drive. I want a small car, which I don't have to worry about. But if I do buy it the mods will be as follows, tell me what you think.

1) 205 tyres, possibly on stock or even 16" rims.
2) Paddle shift steering wheel from the Jetta, maybe even a flat bottomed one.
3) Stanley leather interior. I would want red, but don't know how it will go with the beige all over.
4) Petes remap
5) Bilstein shocks and Tarox pads (At a slightly later stage)
6) Replica GTI style projector headlamps with LED DRLs
7) Front arm rest and dead pedal retrofitted
8) Badge delete, everywhere
9) Milltek or Supersprint catback exhaust
10) Blaupunkt Philadelphia (The one made for VW) and transfer the speakers and amps from the Accord.
11) Auto dimming interior mirror, and rain sensor retrofit.

To hell with warranty, do you think it will be a good daily drive? I know it will be much slower than the Accord, but then its not like the other cars at home won't keep me entertained.

Awesome Akshay! Thats exactly whats in the pipeline for my car. Should happen in a weeks time? :)

Are you really doing everything I mentioned?

Please start a thread, and document it all. I'll be watching it closely.

Well almost, except for the replica headlamps( I found them a bit too tacky and aftermarket) and the exhaust(which I may get eventually). I already have an ownership thread, will update it soon.
Cruise control, auto headlights maybe as well

If you are going to get the 16" rims with low profile tyres than I think you won't really feel need of Bilsteins. The stock shocks in the VWs are really made of higher grade. I am not sure about the Polo but some of the VW cars have suspension from Bilstein and some other reputed brands. Similarly some VW cars have alloys made by brands like Borbet.

I am curious to know how much possible is to make those Paddle shifters function properly?

Here you have no bar, you can go as far as you want :D

Do they have remap for the 1.2 TSI? AFAIK not yet.

It depends on your personal liking disliking.

If you manage to install a dead-pedal than please do post the details of the process how you got it fitted. I am sure there would be many who are interested to install one in their cars.
lol:

De-badged Polo really looks cool, especailly without that long 'Volkswagen' titling at the hatch door.

Exhaust note of the TSI is really interesting, and a good exhaust system will definitely make it sound more sporty.

This depends on your choice.

Accord maybe faster than Polo GT but you can't drive the Accord to it's full blast everywhere like how you can drive a car like Polo due to it's small size and confidence inspiring manners. IMO you can extract much from a car like Polo compared to a big sized car like a Accord.

As you can its quite mod friendly like the other VAG cars. The only hindrance being the reliability questions of the DSG box and the poor after sales service.

This is absolutely brilliant. Please do keep our thread updated. I am looking forward to it as well as some advice a little later down the line.