[Vwdiesel] Polo TDI

[Keith Family]

Nawh, never happen.

TPTB (The powers that be) are doing everything they can to 
prevent Americans from getting on the diesel bandwagon.   From 
EPA "clean diesel" rules to NOx treatment to less than optimal 
head geometry (to reduce NOx) to additional 8 cents a gallon 
Federal Tax to sulfer removal to tax credits to hybrid green cars 
(which is where the 8 cents is probably going)...

Need I go on.  Oh yeah, the one year moratorium on diesels while 
the big three foreign diesel producers (VW, Mercedes, 
Daimler/Chrysler) got together with the EPA on a direction for 
the American diesel market to go.

And the  VW and world view of American motoring is that Americans 
want BIG, fuel hungry, jazzed up tricked out power behemouths. 
If you can't do 0-60 in less than 4 seconds, Americans don't want 
it.   At least that's VW's view of the our motoring marketplace. 
The VW marketing campaign with the little devil creature belies 
their perception.

Certainly the push at VW for the years since the VW Rabbit has 
been "upscale marketing."   From non-recoverable check engine 
light trips to power windows to Monsoon Radios to sunroofs to 
over the top engines mated to an automatic transmissions, to the 
Toureg that can compete head to head with the Ford Expedition, VW 
has missed the vast marketplace boat they ignored when then 
dropped the A2 VWs and adopted the GTI as their pet project.

And yet the market they have left survives in an "underground" 
modified form.   The VW Caddy pickup (that was made in Germany) 
survives in the USA today with vehicles held highly esteemed and 
typically selling for upwards of 50 percent of their original 
value.   And although that value includes inflation, it still 
tells you something about the market acceptance of a "bare bones, 
function before form" sort of vehicle.    And it's an American 
market that VW continues to ignore.

There maybe some change in direction on the horizon.   The "new" 
VW Rabbit (Tricked out but simplified A4) is rumored to be coming 
in a 4 cylinder TDI and intended to compete in a market with the 
hybrid Honda Civic, the gas Rabbit supposedly competing with the 
gas Civic.   But still there is that upscale drift with the '08 
TDIs being offered first as option in the Passat - their first 
pitch - and they'll wonder why it will become a foul ball when 
all the 50 somethings who are the primary market for this car 
pass it up because they see diesel at 50 cents a gallon over 
gasoline?   How can you make a frugal statement when you drive a 
Passat and how can you make an ecology statement when driving one 
of those dirty diesels.   Passat with diesel is a no-statement. 
Only niche motoring such as where the VW diesel has been 
relegated in America since 1986 will buy it in that 
configuration.

I just don't see the Polo or it's little sister the Lupo coming 
to our shores.   Like the 1985 TD 1.5NA, you'll see them in 
Canada before they ever get here.

Ford, who was the model for the "People's Car" made their 
fortunes pre-WWII mass producing "acceptable" forward looking 
cars.   Not behemouths, not cars for the velvet glove set, nor 
cars for the Fortune 500.   The Model A Ford produced as a 
chauffer driven car (The Town Car) and marketed at the height of 
the depression at 4x the cost of the entry level Model A, flopped 
miserably.   No doubt there were better cars - Ford themselves 
occupied that seat with the upscale Mercury line in later years, 
but there were few cars more widely sold - nor more widely 
appreciated.

Today that position has slipped first to Honda and now to Toyota, 
with Hyundai giving them a run for their money in that market. 
And despite VW being poised to give all three of them a run for 
the money in America - especially considering their expertise in 
marketing "peoples cars" to a non-American market - I see yet 
another miss and a strike.

And yes, the non-hybrid "econobox" is coming back.  Aveo, Echo, 
and the others are pushing the 40 mpg threshold pretty hard.

VWOA is missing the boat as we speak.

Best,
Joe
03 TDI Golf
Gosh I wish I still had that 80 Westmoreland Diesel.  No body 
squeaks on it - just a bit of rust - here and there and .....