Volkswagen Touareg 3.0 V6 TDI 4Motion 2018 : better than its predecessor
With the new Volkswagen Touareg, however, the boot’s on the other foot, you’ll know that the cars this third-generation luxury SUV is related to are mostly more expensive cars: some of them, a lot more.
The new Touareg certainly handles better than its predecessor, but it’s a long way from having the agility and poise of a Porsche Cayenne; and while the interior has high-quality materials and high-tech ingredients, as a whole the Touareg is a country mile from having the richness or design appeal of either a Range Rover Velar or a Volvo XC90.
The car had two-chamber air suspension, active anti-roll bars and four-wheel steering too, which are likely to be optional fit at least at the bottom end of the Touareg range – but its centre diff-based four-wheel-drive system and eight-speed automatic gearbox will be standard.
The Touareg’s a five-seater with a boot that’ll swallow up to 810 litres of cargo before you start flopping over backrests. It has plenty of room even for larger adults in both rows, and up front the cabin looks and feels solid, classy and expensively hewn, though it retains a functional, slightly unadorned ambience. It’s luxurious without being lavish or ornate, as modern Volkswagens tend to be.
The wow factor comes from the Touareg's duo of large juxtaposed instrument and infotainment screens – the former 12in from corner to corner and the latter 15in – which butt up against each other similarly to Mercedes’ current orientation. You can configure the bigger of the two screens to your liking, to display navigation mapping, trip computer info or any number of other things, in almost any combination you want. The system’s called ‘Innovision Cockpit’, and though its complexity makes it less intuitively usable than some, it’s nonetheless very visually impressive.
On that familiar spot on the transmission tunnel you’ll find the rotary dials controlling the car’s adjustable-height air springs and its various driving modes – and, from ‘Eco’ and ‘Comfort’, through ‘Individual’, to ‘Snow’, ‘Sand’ and ‘Off-road Expert’, there are plenty of modes. Having sampled several of them, you’ll find that ‘Normal’ and ‘Comfort’ seem to suit the car best on the road, since they combine the Touareg’s first-rate refinement and isolation with a settled, quiet and comfortable ride; and handling that melds intuitive drivability with wieldiness and precision quite well.
In other modes, and particularly when that handling is examined with a bit of gusto, the Touareg proves quite agile in outright terms for a car of its size, but doesn’t make for a particularly enticing drive. The active suspension and variable ratio steering systems seemed to combine to take some of the predictability out of the car’s handling around tighter bends - that steering’s directness quickening quite suddenly at about a quarter turn of lock and with only artificial-feeling weight coming along with it. This made the Touareg’s chassis feel grippy but uncommunicative on mountain roads, and at its best moving at more relaxed pace.
In a pattern of use more typical of a big SUV, however, the car works very agreeably, a shortage of centre feel on that steering and an inconsistency in its weight and provision of feedback being only minor dynamic bugbears. The car’s engine is more than strong enough to haul it along smartly and with performance in reserve, and it’s quiet and smooth with it – only very occasionally being tripped up by a slightly hesitant transmission.
The VW Touareg isn't likely to be anyone’s 'must-have' of 2018, but it is a very nice car deserving of more attention than it'll probably get – and it's an even nicer one for its unpretentiousness among the ever-increasing luxury SUV ranks.
Volkswagen Touareg 3.0 V6 TDI 4Motion R Line
Where Salzburg, Austria Price £52,000 (est) On sale June Engine V6, 2967cc, turbodiesel Power 282bhp at 3500rpm Torque 443lb ft at 1500rpm Gearbox 8-spd automatic Kerb weight 1995kg Top speed 148mph 0-62mph 6.1sec Fuel economy 40.9mpg CO2 182g/km Rivals Volvo XC90 D5 R Design, Audi Q7 3.0 TDI
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