A Very Sad Day For The What Is At Present Toyotas Best Effort At A Hot

[boozehound]

Well its happened. After going for a test drive in a Skoda Octavia VRS DSG Auto petrol today i came out of the vrs and looked at my auris in the parking lot thinking my little T180 has been buried. The octavia was quicker, felt much much more of a better build quality, the engine was more responsive and the auto box was a sheer delight. You dont even know that you have changed gear. For the same price as what the t180 auris was in 2007 you could have got yourself a manual version of the octavia vrs which i have to say is a much better car. For the extra 20hp you get a 0-60 time quicker by 1.2 seconds then the auris and a car which is more fun to drive and i promise you is so much better built i cant stress that enough. You get combined 40mpg in the octavia compared to the auris's 45mpg but i am willing to bet when the weather is cold it would be very close between the two cars regarding mpg. I have to make my mind up about what car i have to upgrade to in 2 weeks as the octavia vrs dsg petrol takes up to 16 weeks to order due to the model and nature of the car. I have yet to test drive a vw sirocco with the same engine and dsg gearbox but for an extra 7grand i know it wont be worth it, because i dont buy a car just on the Badge. Dont get me wrong, i loved my auris and will love it until the day it goes back to the dealership but i think its really sad that im leaving toyota after 8 years of dealing with them. Ive had a 1.0litre cdx yaris (that was my first) then a 1.6 T3 corrolla, then a 2.0 rav4 3 door before the T180 auris. I think it is totally wrong that toyota do not have a proper hot hatch or powerful saloon car to offer people. The celica TTsport and the corolla TTsport were wonderful cars. It would be great as well if they could do an avensis with a nice 2.0 or 2.5 turbocharged petrol engine as an alternative to their rubbish diesel and petrol versions, but i feel the green silly people have somehow brainwashed toyota and changed them into tree hugging hippies. The T180 auris is definitly a hot hatch for a diesel and a powerful motorway cruiser no doubt but it lacked what i had test drove today, there was something i could just not quite put my finger on, but whatever it was it has certainly helped me make my mind up.

[Rick D4D]

A good review but to be very fair I think for the foreseeable future the days of hatches are numbered due to the government taxation on new cars set against emissions and the ever higher fuel costs we have again not helped by government tax and I feel Toyota's car range shows this. I feel that hybrids will the future new generation of so called hot hatches maybe fitted 1.3 - 1.6 turbos and using the electric motor to boost performance as it is already being acknowledged that small turbo engines are the better way to go for emissions and fuel economy. Maybe the Honda CRZ could be a sign / taster of things to come http://www.honda.co.uk/cars/cr-z/?s3campaign=Cars_Model_CRZ&s3advertiser=Google_PPC&s3banner=honda_crz

[don21]

By all accounts the DSG box is indeed a wonder to drive but also an extremely expensive one to repair if it goes wrong out of warranty.

By what I hear it does go wrong now and then.

Pays your money................... etc etc etc

[boozehound]

goin to test drive the sirocco either tommorrow or thursday.2.0 gt dsg, should be fun :)

[Mooly]

Reminds me of me a few years back... I wanted to buy another Toyota... but at the time the Carina E didn't appeal, my old Carina XL was much nicer, so I ended up defecting to VAG. A new A4... and what a nightmare that was... there's a thread on here somewhere but I couldn't find it. Anyway, being totally mad (I must have been), after 6 years or so ordered another Audi, an A2, and that blew up after 3 weeks.

So I wouldn't touch any German car now... and from the reports I see in "Honest John... Daily Telegraph" not much has changed.

[Mooly]

Found it, post #2 here,

http://www.toyotaownersclub.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=102760

It's put me off for life.

[Rick D4D]

So I wouldn't touch any German car now... and from the reports I see in "Honest John... Daily Telegraph" not much has changed.

I could not agree more, I once bought a Mercedes A Class top of the range Avantgarde never again that is for sure http://www.aclassinfo.co.uk/mypage.98.htmb I was stuck with a £7k car worth around £3k or a £3k repair bill from Mercedes, in the end (around 1 month) with a lot of hard work and begging at a local engineering company to get some one off studs made and around £600 I got this going again. This was just icing on the cake for a car full of design faults and expensive problems what I had to pay for so around 1 month later I traded this for a 2 year old 6k Civic Type R what was like new, TBH if it was not for jealous scum in car parks who kept hitting their door etc on the CTR and the high fuel costs I would still own the Civic for sure. The CTR was one hell of a fun car and was awesome on the odd B road and by far the best car I have ever owned, the T180 is a sensible cruiser not an hot hatch and never will be :( I recently looked at buying a new play thing (Aerial Atom) but even 6 year old ones fetch stupid money.

[GregP]

My current Auris is plagued with major faults. Previous Golf had few too. I had Toledo 20V 2001 and not a single issue after 100k miles. In my case only my old Fiat scored lower in reliability than Auris. The Statement that German cars are less reliable than <...> doesn't make sense in my case.

Skoda VRS is great car to drive and I could get one for myself. Is it going to be reliable- I think not less than Auris I drive.

[boozehound]

well i would obv get the extended warantee which covers the car and parts up to 60k miles, but indeed after that you are nakered but not so. I seen on tv that there is a company that now offers further warantee protection when your car runs out of warantee so its worth a look, cant remember the company. Test driving the sirocco by the end of the week, cant wait.

[boozehound]

Test drove the sirocco gt dsg today and ive ordered one. Going to be ready by the end of this month. Cant wait. 210 bhp mated to a 6speed dsg auto box. Gonna be the bombay

[caveman_si]

Test drove the sirocco gt dsg today and ive ordered one. Going to be ready by the end of this month. Cant wait. 210 bhp mated to a 6speed dsg auto box. Gonna be the bombay

Glad you liked it, what did you think of the boot? Everyone I know that has tried them says great car more stylish then the golf its based on just lacking in practialcality when compared to the same golf especially as the golf is a lower price.

[boozehound]

thought the boot was big enough for my needs. i dont have kids nor a wife telling me what to do like all the other wives of the world so im not really ubikd bout practicality. It is what it is, a 4 door 4 seater sports coupe. The button to select the suspension and throttle sensitivity settings is another great bonus.

[Jarod]

Where do you have 4 door in scirocco :) Access to the back is terrible.

[boozehound]

i beg ur pardon, a 2 door

[OldSkoO1]

No wife, no kids

e46 M3!

[boozehound]

sorry?

[boozehound]

e46 m3? bmw?