2002 Volkswagen Golf GTi Anniversary from UK and Ireland - Comments

Car was supplied with finger tight passenger seat mounting bolts, misaligned headlamps and a loose gearknob.

Various trim rattles.

Air conditioning compressor failed

Two ignition coil failures resulting in two breakdowns within the first month.

Driver seatbelt slow to retract

Fuel gauge erratic

Engine management light sometimes came on and all performance disappeared. Switch off ignition and back on again and it would be fine. "No fault found" according to dealer.

Airbag light came on and stayed on

Idle speed erratic when the engine was hot

Front suspension started knocking at 13,000 miles.

Driveshaft joint failed at 16,000 miles. Car stranded (again!)

Gearbox became obstinate when cold.

Dreadful car. Looks the dog's danglies in the showroom with its classy interior, gorgeous alloys and body kit. I was sold before I took it on the test drive, but it drove even better than it looked. Smooth, punchy turbo engine, tidy handling, refined etc etc. I bought it there and then.

Within a week and 300 miles of taking delivery, a creak had developed from the trim on the B-pillars, and there was a slight misfire. This persisted (dealer "could not find fault") until one of the coils failed 1500 miles later and the car coughed and spluttered to a halt. This was fixed, only to have it happen again less than 600 miles later. Two breakdowns within 3,000 miles!

From then until I sold the heap, it was just constant visits to a dealership which didn't want to know, and fruitless phone calls to the customer service department who were even worse. VW as a company, and the supposedly high quality Golf model are both drastically overrated. The attitude is very much "we can sell as many cars as we can build anyway, so we don't need to look after our customers". Fine, you've just lost one. A friend who was about to order a V6 4 Motion has also gone off to talk to the competition.

My wife drives a base spec 1.6 litre Ford Focus which she bought new two years ago, and it hasn't missed a beat in nearly 40,000 miles. I had to really work on her to justify my spending nearly £19,000 on a car at the time, and my excuse was "It's a VW and it will run forever". I'm still wiping the egg off my face. Hopefully, the Focus RS I've just taken delivery of will be similar. I've had it four weeks and nothing has gone wrong, so it's already one up on the Golf. Much more fun to drive too, but the interior isn't a patch on the Golf's.

The really sad (literally) part is that I was running around in a 120,000 mile MG Maestro 2.0 for two months before this which was loaned to me by a trader friend as a stopgap, and it was rusty, it rattled, it squeaked and it smoked. But it worked. Oh dear VW, you really need help. Your nigh on £19,000 hot hatch flagship is less reliable than a £100 rusty Maestro.

I honestly loved the Golf as a product. It was fun, quick and handsome. But as a car, to live with daily, it was plain crap. There is no other word for it. I will never buy another VW, or allow anyone I remotely like to do so either.

Sad to hear of your troubles, sounds like your car was a 'Friday Afternoon' car.

I must agree with you though about VW as a brand, they really do over charge for the products. They rely upon their image way too much. I have previously owned a MK3 Golf GTI Colour Concept, while a nice car, it simply was not worth the money when compared to other brands offerings. VW's really are not any better than the current products on sale from Ford/Vauxhall.

VW should learn that clear advertising will not 'blind' people into ignoring the other brands out there.

Welcome to the "Happy Golf Owners' Club". Sadly your experience is not untypical. Yours must have been a 1.8T like mine. I also had coils fail twice in 10,000 miles. Also had rain water leaks, rattling trim, leaking air con system and leaking rear dampers. I think that VW currently have at least three Friday afternoons in every week.

I sold my 1.8T for a year old Volvo S60. A much nicer car all round.

I sold my 2.0 after a litany of faults including various electrical glitches, massive oil consumption and various bits falling off. I also had a Lambda sensor fail twice in 6 months (there is a recall on these in the USA). The front suspension welds failed - according to the dealer because I took road humps too fast! Have since found out that this is a known fault. Permanent and incurable pull to the left - also a known regular problem. Central locking played up for months - dealer found no fault. Had two air flow sensors and a new water pump after the impeller fell off!

The MkIV Golf is one of the worst engineered cars I have ever come across (and I am an engineer). The build quality is simply appalling. The engine will probably do 250,000 miles, but the bits around it won't. There are so many known design faults with the Golf that I am surprised that VW have kept it in production for so long.

Add to that poor dealer service (I tried all 4 in our area) and disinterest from VW and you have a wonderful package for ownership and customer satisfaction.

Incidentally mine was new - I relied on it for work and sold it just after the warranty was up because I couldn't afford to rely on it any more. I now drive a Rover 75 - lovely, comfortable and also reliable.

I have owned my Golf 25th Anniversary for over a year now, it is a wonderful car to drive, always gets looks of admiration from the general public and even though it was an expensive purchase I would argue there is nothing else out there at the moment in it's class for the same or less money! I would however agree with a few of the comments made about the poor customer service at the VW dealership, if they cannot complete work on customers cars within the agreed time they need to at least keep their customers informed and not take a 'I don't care' attitude purely because they have provided them with a crappy bog standard VW polo 1.2!. Just to re-cap the product is splendid, it looks good, feels good and has a fantastic residual value (i have only lost £1000 - £2000 in a year), but VW do need to seriously improve customer service!

My experiences with a Golf were totally at odds with the comment above. My '99 GTI was a complete dog! It used £40 worth of oil between services, had dodgy suspension, brakes and electrics and the interior rattled and squeaked.

As for the dealers, I cannot repeat my comments here for fear of libel laws. Suffice to say the words "incompetent", "uncaring" and "expensive" spring to mind.

I would discourage anyone from buying an overpriced Golf when there are much better cars available. The primary purpose of a car is to get you from A to B. Any car which doesn't is a failure. The Golf doesn't stack up to the opposition in reliability or price.

I bought my 1.6 manual Golf IV S in Canberra, just over twelve months ago. It has been by far the best car I have ever had. It has followed a Volvo Estate, and Audi A4, and a three series BMW. All of which I was satisfied with, but not so much as my Red Golf! I have had fantastic service from my local dealer and from the sales staff. I have heard of cars with similar nigly problems, but I haven't found them at all. In my opinion my Golf IV is fantastic and I will continue to recommend the VW brand to my friends and colleages.

It springs to my mind when reading these comments all non uk cars seem to be fine, including most tdi engines. Seems everyone else gets friday afternoon lemons?? I'm currently getting rid of my 1.6 se 2002 (see great car sadle very let down) for a hyundai coupe/similar. Least the don't break down on my way to work... and again...

I have a '99 1.6SE Golf IV, I bought it second hand from a VW dealer and paid around 7800 for it. I was very pleased with the service at the time and the car was immaculate. It had done 30000 miles and came with a brand new MOT, tax and a service. All mod-cons and a velour interior, I was happy. It's a lovely car, if a little sloppy in the corners, and I got some 17" Alloys to help remedy this. In the future I was hoping to upgrade to a GTI turbo, ultimately a 25th anniversary model. But with my experiences since buying the car last june, I am thinking about looking elsewhere.

Firstly, I had serious overheating problems. After running the car for just 3 weeks, the Temp gauge shot up to Max, and kept doing so every time I went above 30 mph. The VW assistance could not diagnose a problem and my local dealer (not the dealer I bought it from) could not figure it out at all. I phoned the dealer I bought it from and they instantly said,

"may be the water pump"

I passed this on and sure enough, it was. Surely the first thing you'd check!? After that a had many other problems:

Central door locks both went,

Electric window regulators both went, one causing the drivers window to drop and smash in the door!!

The engine was idling very erratically when warm and this apparently needed the throttle body cleaning! which didn't work.

And then, to top this all off, the clutch stopped working, no gear. New clutch plate said the man from VW.

Not so, apparently, eventualy after 6 days in the shop, with no courtesy car they tell me its the Differentials gone, and that its my fault for having "those alloys". Too much grip!! those alloys, the size recommended by VW. This turned into a massive fracar and resulted into an internal investigation or some such hassle.

Luckily this all happened in the first six months!!! that's right, six!! So was all in warranty. But still, that's appalling. And during this time, one of the Reps at VW suggested I stop complaining or the warranty request may be rejected!! No VW's for me next time. Really want a Seat Leon Cupra R, but they're pretty much VW anyway aren't they?

Gone on long enough now. Unlike my Golf.

VW do rely on their rep, not their engineering skill.

I've had my red 25th Anniversary Golf GTI (180bhp) from new and have now just clicked over 30k in her. Before this I drove a standard 1.8T GTI (150bhp), which I loved so much that when I had to re-new my company car, I went straight for the 25th Anniversary GTI, never even having driven one or even seeing one! When I got it wow! I was blown away by how much better it was than the 150bhp GTI. Only 2 small niggles a lose gear stick and no limited edition badge. But that was fixed in one dealership visit and I had the badge posted to me. The car was a piece perfection until after had 8k of dream driving the gear box suddenly went bang. I just about drove it home and VW picked it up at took it away to be fixed, leaving me with... yes a Polo 1.nothing for 2 weeks. When I got my car back I found the once silky smooth gear box was now so notchy it even had 2 neutral positions. I could put it into gear, but still have as much play in the gear stick, as if it was in neutral. As well as this the gear would often just jam, not good when overtaking! I complained and VW looked at it and returned it saying it was within specification. I have complained to different dealerships on numerous occasions and it's been in and out of the VW garages over this issue. But the out come has been, they will not replace the necessary parts to put this right. I've had to drive this car in this state for over 20 thousand miles. But in the last week the gearbox has now started crunching when changing up to 3rd at over 5000 revs. I'm taking it in VW on Tuesday and it better be outside specification!!

Other issues I've had have been with all of the seats. Both front seat mechs have failed. And both rear seats have had some impressive rattles in them. Rear seats needed tightening twice by VW? And one seat needed to be completely replaced after VW broke it! Leaving me with a 3 seater for 2 weeks!

It also had continuous knocking from inside the dash. After 3 visits to VW it was found to be a sticking heater box, which had to be replaced. They removed the dash to do this, but of course have not put it back properly. The passenger foot well is now nicely light and I just have now more rattles!

Just don't buy one. A great car if it had the dealer support!

I helped a friend (an older woman) find a car, she chose the Golf 4 door made in Brazil. It's had a dead battery, and was towed to the local dealer twice in the last month. They can't duplicate the problem and charged her for the first visit, even though it's under warranty still. What made me angry, we called the Volks Wagon customer care line and have ever dealt with any business so rude, antagonistic and anti-customer oriented before. You can't just deal with one person. They won't transfer you to the person you just talked to, and when you ask for a supervisor, they refuse, refuse to let you talk to anyone else. Where else can you call and be refused to speak to a supervisor? When we asked about the California lemon law, they said if we want to find out about it, we can do that on our own. It's the last Volks Wagon I'll let any of my friends buy, and I won't think of it either! It's a shame, the car is really nice, and drives well, when it's running.

I think the reason why some Golfs may be unreliable is that some are made in Brazil, and others in Wolfsburg, Germany. The Brazilian cars from what I've heard are terrible compared to the ones made in Wolfsburg.

I am very sorry that so many people have had bad experiences with vw. I have just bought a 25th anniversary golf and I have to say I think its the best thing since sliced bread! it looks sexy and it drives like a dream. Although we've only had just over a week I can't fault it, I really can't find any thing wrong with it all. its every thing I was hoping for and more!

My 25th Anniversary golf just hit 3 years old last week. Since having it I have had only a few problems. The flywheel cracked and had to be replaced... As long as you can find a good dealer it's great. Only other problem has been the known corroding wheel issue, but apparently it is now fixed... To be honest there isn't a better car for the money and I still love it 3 years on.

I've owned a 1.8 t gti 2000 plate 4 a year only dump valve

gone and back bushes paid 5900 for it 46900 on the clock wen I bought it and full service history there is slight creaking noise in the cockpit, but that's only due to tight plastics! I have owned numerous cars fords nissans vauxalls bmw and vw and in my honest opinion I would av to say vw is best I av owned a polo 1989 1300 ranger and a golf 1.8tgti 2000 and I can only describe it as you can just tell as soon as you jump in a vw you feel safe even the small vws feel big.ya know the waay the door closes the way the car takes a bump in the road them types of things! I appreciate the vw for style simplicity and strength I will always love the vw long live the king of cars!!!

I have owned a Mk3 2.0 Gti for 16 months. When I first got it, it was the car of my dreams, the car I wanted since I was sixteen, but shortly after, little by little, the noises started and things started to go wrong.

I have had to replace disks and pads, recondition the gearbox, put a new clutch, both regulators went, thrust bearing was making a horrible sound, and on the day I part exchanged it in, it decided to splutter like crazy on the motorway. I'm just glad I have got rid. Have now replaced it with a newer hopefully more reliable Seat Leon. Fingers crossed I'll have better luck with this one.