1990 Volkswagen Golf GTi 16v review from UK and Ireland

Just general maintenance.

Plugs replaced etc.

I have owned two GTi 8v's and one GTi 16v so I can say fairly that I can point out the differences between them.

The 16v comes with electric windows as standard, this is the only major difference inside of the car, apart from the little red 16v badge on the glove box (how pretty).

Performance wise the two cars are very different. The 16v comes with better brakes than the 8v and is lowered an extra 10mm over that of the 8v, meaning it stops better without melting the brakes, I've had brake fade in my 8v's a few times, which is scary approaching a corner at 110mph and its just making a humming noise and not slowing down! I've also shattered a brake disc on an 8v. The difference in cornering is only slight.

Now we come to the engines. The standard 8v produces 112bhp, whereas the 16v produces 139bhp! Although there is a much larger amount of horsepower in the 16v, the 8v actually feels quicker. This is due to the fact it has so much torque at low revs and has good power distribution throughout the rev range.

The 16v however feels like a 1.3CL off the line, a completely different experience to the feeling from the 8v that its going to rip its self in half! But do not dismay, it doesn't continue this way, as soon as the revs build up the power keeps increasing dramatically and at 4500rpm it really starts to move, then again at 6000rpm your thrusted back again before you change gear at about 6600rpm.

It should, when driven properly, beat the 8v to 60mph by a good 1.5 seconds. This will only happen if your willing to drive it the way its designed to be driven, right up into the revs. Don't even consider racing a Skoda if you daren't take it above 4000rpm.

Overall from a real drivers point of view the 16v is the better car, but its hard to brush aside the awesome fun you can have in the 8v, it's a much more fun car to drive in most aspects, power is available whenever you want it, on demand. Unless you drive your 16v like a Formula 1 car, the 8v will disappear into the distance every time.

Two awesome cars.