Toerag R-Line v6 TDi review

[DeskJockey]

As mentioned on the Facebook group I’ve won the hire car lottery this week when my “Focus or similar” (it never is a Focus, have had close to 150 hire cars over the last 3-4 years and not once has it been a Focus. Most often Renaults, Kia/Hyundais or Vauxhalls) turned up in the form of a 66 plate Toerag R-Line v6 TDi.

This is not only the biggest upgrade (previous best was a Volvo S40), but also my first experience with a premium SUV and the most powerful car I’ve driven on UK roads, and the second most powerful one ever.

With 20k on the clock it was still a very nice place to be and nothing was broken, rattled or worn out (based on experience I would suggest that one hire car mile is equal to seven normal miles).

It immediately feels like a plush thing, with the heated leather seats and steering wheel and very efficient heating keeping me toasty and warm in the rather nippy temperatures this morning. The opening glass roof helped making it feel light and airy and at low speeds it was quiet and comfortable.

I am immensely impressed with the DSG gearbox, shifts really are seamless and only the rev counter needle dropping gives a shift away. The engine has a pleasant large capacity rumble when pressing on and with some judicious use of the paddles it can be made to shift smartly, although it isn’t properly quick. It does pile on the speed unobtrusively and at a decent rate of knots though, so caution is needed.

It has an interesting feature. When the car is stopped it holds it still without needing to have a foot on the brakes, as soon as you press the accelerator it releases and starts creeping forward. If the stop/start has activated, it also (duh!) starts the engine. I like the idea, but the execution is a bit lacking. On a number of occasions, it makes for quite jerky getaway with the car surging forward on a very small throttle opening.

Driving it is as you’d expect. Steering is completely without feel and you pilot it by trust, not any sense of what is happening under the wheels. It is very heavy though, which feels odd. The amount of effort to get it to change direction is at odds with how light all the other controls are.

The Toerag is large and numb through and through, but rolls a fair bit which is quite disconcerting. It does grip and go, no issue there. Firing it down one of my local stretches (left turn followed by a long lefthander that turns to a shallow righthander before turning into a shallow left again and finishing at a roundabout), I found myself braking for the roundabout much sooner than expected, but apart from the fun of the rumble and the push in the back, the rest is joyless. It is very much an efficient way of driving, not a fun one. The way the car (doesn’t) communicate does not inspire confidence when pushing on and the gearbox, smooth changes aside, seems often to find itself in the wrong gear and jumping up and down. But that could well be down to a learning algorithm that is baffled by being abused by hundreds of hire car drivers.

Finally, it is mahooosive and feels it. There is no “shrinking around you” sensation as car journos often describe the best cars do. It is a beast, but not very large inside and likes a drink. Without pushing on a lot (mostly cruising on the M25) it still only did 30ish mpg.

[Alex_]

* Touareg

[DeskJockey]

* Touareg

I know. For teh interwebz lolz, innit?

[Alex_]

* Touareg

I know. For teh interwebz lolz, innit?

[Rich B]

the most powerful car I’ve driven on UK roads, and the second most powerful one ever.

258bhp? you need to work on this fact matey!

[JLv3.0]

Yeah that was shocking wasn't it!

Side note - what's the most powerful car you've driven? Guess it has to be my mate's GT3, 997.2 so 435 bhp. Doesn't sound like much nowadays, does it.

[Rich B]

Yeah that was shocking wasn't it!

Side note - what's the most powerful car you've driven? Guess it has to be my mate's GT3, 997.2 so 435 bhp. Doesn't sound like much nowadays, does it.

much like you, I can’t think of much “big” power stuff I’ve driven (AMG Mercs (450bhp ish)), but also like you my daily driver has 414bhp!

[JLv3.0]

Yeah they really didn't hide who they were competing against, did they

[DeskJockey]

the most powerful car I’ve driven on UK roads, and the second most powerful one ever.

258bhp? you need to work on this fact matey!

I know! Have driven more powerful cars, but on a closed track (6th gear experience).

[DeskJockey]

Yeah that was shocking wasn't it!

Side note - what's the most powerful car you've driven? Guess it has to be my mate's GT3, 997.2 so 435 bhp. Doesn't sound like much nowadays, does it.

That'd be the Dodge Ram 1500 with a 5.7 Hemi I had as a hire car in Canada. All of 345hp tasked with moving something the size and weight of a small moon.

[dinny_g]

Audi A8 4.2 V8 on the road - 360hp I think

Merc CLS 63 Black Edition at Brooklands - 577 hp

Edit - honourable mention to the 2000ft lb Actros I drove for maximum torque...

[mikeyb]

I don't think the Touareg of that vintage used a DSG box. I think it's an Aisin 8 speed auto. They are an SUV I'm interested in so thanks for the write up. There were some good lease deals on the R-Lines a few years ago, so there's plenty available on the used market. I'd personally like a spec'd up Escape (selectable locking diffs, bigger fuel tank, more clearance etc) or a V8 TDI. You can get them with air suspension too, which might help the wallowy-ness (?!).

Most powerful car driven on the roads - an 800bhp Gen-F GTS

[JonMad]

So you wouldn't get one then?
Guess it would have to be the older V10 as per Sundayjumper, for maximum comedy value.

Aside from an LP-640 on track for 3 or so laps of 6th Gear Experience, the most powerful car I've driven is still my Merc. Nothing with a 4 or higher at the start

[Jimmy Choo]

I think the most powerful for me is Matty's old 147GTA 3.7 Autodelta. That was supposed to be 310 ish bhp. The second is my Saab 9-5 Aero that started with about 250bhp.

I'm aiming for 300+ for the next car.

[DeskJockey]

I don't think the Touareg of that vintage used a DSG box. I think it's an Aisin 8 speed auto. They are an SUV I'm interested in so thanks for the write up. There were some good lease deals on the R-Lines a few years ago, so there's plenty available on the used market. I'd personally like a spec'd up Escape (selectable locking diffs, bigger fuel tank, more clearance etc) or a V8 TDI. You can get them with air suspension too, which might help the wallowy-ness (?!).

Most powerful car driven on the roads - an 800bhp Gen-F GTS

I assumed DSG because VW, you could well be right. Either way the shifts were imperceptible. With a few more options I can see one being a very nice place to be. If it was my money I'd want a reversing camera, more supportive seats, better quality leather and auto wipers. It was quite noisy on the poorer bits of the M25, but I've yet to drive anything that can mute that rubbish surface.

I don't think it is lacking in power unless the air suspension makes it more fun to drive. But the V8 probably sounds better.

[JonMad]

It was quite noisy on the poorer bits of the M25, but I've yet to drive anything that can mute that rubbish surface.

That section would be a good test in my Dad's C4 Picasso, which wafts along reasonably nicely on normal roads.

[DeskJockey]

It was quite noisy on the poorer bits of the M25, but I've yet to drive anything that can mute that rubbish surface.

That section would be a good test in my Dad's C4 Picasso, which wafts along reasonably nicely on normal roads.

That'll be good consumer advice right there!

[GG.]

* Touareg

To be honest I'm surprised they haven't changed it to Toerag by now given the actual Touareg are not exactly a pleasant bunch. Excerpt from a 2012 article below:

The "strong character" of the Tuareg — as it’s more typically spelled — has been in the news lately. Tuareg rebels, formerly brought to Libya to be mercenaries for Muammar al-Qaddafi’s regime, have been steadily advancing though Northern Mali, capturing several military bases as well as the ancient city of Timbuktu. Believing themselves inadequately equipped to take on the heavily armed Tuareg fighters, a rogue group of Malian army officers overthrew the country’s president last week.

The nominally Muslim Tuareg are reportedly working with local Islamists who have instituted Sharia law on some of the captured towns. Oxfam says that in some parts of the country as much as 70 percent of the population is facing "acute food insecurity."

I was curious as to whether, with the Tuareg in global headlines, Volkswagen was reconsidering its, in retrospect, odd, decision to name an SUV after an ethnic group that has been involved off-and-on in a low-level insurgency against the government of Mali and Niger since the 1960s.

"I cannot comment on whether we would consider changing the name of the car. We are not politically involved with this tribe. We don’t have an opinion on this yet," said Christian Buhlmann, a spokesman for Volkswagen AG. "I wasn’t even aware of that situation until you told me about it," he added.

Ron Sowell, a salesman at Martens Volvo and Volkswagen in Washington, DC, hadn’t heard the news in Mali either, and doesn’t think it will affect the car’s sales to its target audience, which he describes as "people pretty well educated, degrees, making more than $100,000". He added, "I just think that an automobile and what a tribe does elsewhere doesn’t have anything to do with the car they’re driving."

What about VW customers a bit closer to the action? A salesman for Volkswagen based in Accra, Ghana said that "now everyone is hearing about the Touareg, but it hasn’t affected the popularity of the car." People in Ghana "aren’t concerned with what is happening in other countries," said the salesman, who wished to remain anonymous.

Buhlmann added that he could only comment on "what kind of engines we have in the car and where the name came from." He said the name comes from VW’s view that people living in the desert are "peaceful," and that "our vehicle would be a very good desert vehicle."