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Golf Mark VI limited to three year product cycle

 
2 12,498 views Oct 6, 2008

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A Golf that weighs about 30% less than the current model is believed to be in development

A Golf that weighs about 30% less than the current model is believed to be in development

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Volkswagen’s Mark VI Golf has just made its world debut to much fanfare at the recent Paris Motor Show but confidential papers leaked from the carmaker’s Wolfsburg headquarters reveal that the car has already been marked for ‘End of Production’ by December 2011.

The new Mark VI essentially rides on a warmed over Mark V platform but VW is working on a much more efficient platform and engine lineup that will be ready in a couple of years. It is for this reason that VW is planning to speed up the introduction of a new Mark VII.

A three year cycle for a car is short by any standards, and this hastily planned shift reveals the defensive tack VW is taking with the Golf in light of the struggling car market. According to the same confidential papers, VW is expecting to sell less than 1.6 million units of the Mark VI. The Mark V, which has been on sale since 2003, has already racked up more than 2.3 million sales, reports Automotive News Europe.

This new Mark VII will feature a clear emphasis on environmental cleanliness, a theme that will carry throughout the Golf lineup. Its platform, known internally as the MQB (Modular Querbaukaste - denoting small to midsized family cars with transverse engines), has been described by the carmaker’s chief of development, Ulrich Hackenberg, as a major turning point for the Golf. He revealed that it will allow engineers to implement a much broader range of drivetrains, hinting at the possibility of alternative fuels playing a role in the next Golf.

VW recently showed off a new plug-in hybrid powertrain called Twin Drive, which is expected to enter production in the middle of next year and will likely appear in the Golf. Other future powertrains already previewed by the carmaker include a new hybrid as well as an ultra-efficient diesel.

Further improvements in efficiency will come from size freezes, meaning new models will no longer get continually larger than their predecessors, as has been the de facto program throughout the industry for a number of years.
VW Golf BlueMotion concept
VW Golf Mark VI official photos
2009 Volkswagen Golf Rabbit GTI Mark VI

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HI-RES GALLERY: volkswagen golf mark vi 4motion awd 001

HI-RES GALLERY: 2009 volkswagen golf rabbit gti mark vi 013




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Comments (2)

  1. ma_NaBUru38 avatar NaBUru38 Posted: 9/29/2008 5:34pm PDT

    Size is much of less importance to decrease fuel consumption than aerodynamics and weight. And I still can't believe that bigger cars result in smaller cockpits (eg Ibiza IV, 207, 407).
     
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  2. ma_Snick97223 avatar Snick97223 Posted: 5/27/2009 11:35am PDT

    NaBUru38,

    That is incorrect. Aerodynamic drag is the product of Cd (shape coefficient of drag, IOW: how slippery a given shape is) TIMES frontal area. aero drag = Cd*A

    In our times, most passenger sedans have a drag coefficient of 0.4 or better, thus, cross-sectional area is the predominant factor in total drag. The shape factors can't really be improved upon without sacrificing useful interior package space, safety, and useful habitable 'people space', but the cross sectional area can. What's sad is that boxy cars from the 1980's have less aerodynamic drag than our swoopy candy-bar shaped blobs of cars now: simply because these modern blobs are so bloated and huge. Oddly, the boxy shapes of the 1980's also had more useful package and people space!

    Modern car design has itself in a bind of its own making with the obsessive devotion to Cd and also blingy, disgusting looking large wheels. Both are horrible for fuel economy.
     
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