Volkswagen E-Golf Review | Perfect EV for City Commuting or a Missed Opportunity?

Sa. This is a 2019 Volkswagen E Golf, the first electric car that I've ever driven, but not the first Golf that I've ever driven. Now, I could have chose any electric car to drive, but I chose this because I actually happen to like Volkswagen Golfs a lot. And I figured if you had an electric version, might as well give it a try. Now, to the normal person, this is just a normal Volkswagen Golf. There's things that give it away are the badges everywhere, the blue pinstripe on the grille and the built in LEDs into the bumper. But now let's take a closer look at what makes this thing really different from the regular Golf. Here it is in all its glory, the electric motor. Now, this thing does produce 134 horsepower and 214 foot pounds of torque, all sent through the front wheels. Remind you, this thing does weigh 3,450 pounds. And I'm no electrical engineer here, but I feel like we could have probably put in a bigger motor, probably squeeze out a few more kilowatts, but curious to see what this thing drives like. Let's go. Everything is pretty familiar on the inside of this car. You get your normal gear shifter here, the H vac here, a screen, a dashboard. Everything is where it's supposed to be. Nothing crazy, no fancy screens. The only big difference I notice in this car is that instead of the tachometer, we have more of a power meter, if that's what you want to call it. And the build quality is normal. Golf, very sturdy. So if it feels like a Golf and it looks like a Golf, does it drive like a Golf? Let's find out. This car, despite wearing heavy ass batteries and being £400 more than the gasoline, Golf is still a lot of fun to drive. Now, the center of gravity is quite low on this car, but you get a significant amount of body roll. And at the limit, you're going to catch some understeer. And there's really no way around that. Under 20 miles per hour, however, though, you'll break this thing loose. But after that, not much is happening once your foot's all the way to the floor. Yes, even though the instant max torque will briefly put you in your seat, this car is ultimately pretty damn slow. You can go watt, which is wide open throttle for you foreign people, and not worry about being arrested. But I guess that's a part of the charm. The ride quality is pretty supple too, and it eats up all the bumps. Now, this car is definitely daily drivable as long as your Commute's short because for long trips I can't recommend this car, seeing that on a full charge you only get 125 miles. But I guess I'll be able to test that out later too. So if you're using any of the electronics in this car, you're definitely going to lose at least five to ten miles of range. Now, I've been using the air con and I've actually lost 10 miles of range from the get go. But the second I turn it off and put it in ECO plus, I'll gain mileage back. But that's not ideal if you need the heat. I like some of the accents in this car, mainly the blue stitching on the steering wheel. By the way, the steering wheel is flat bottom, which I like. Feels nice in the hands, and the blue stitching here on the gear shifter. Other than that, pretty basic interior. So the part I find really funny about this car is that in most German sports cars or sporty cars, I should say, there's usually a normal mode, a sport mode, or sport plus mode. In this car you get eco and then eco plus. And then in ECO plus, what happens is it cuts basically all power and you can only go max 60 miles per hour. But let's find out how it does in our acceleration test. And to do that, I have to hand it over to our resident. You know what? I think I'm qualified enough to do this myself. 30, 60, Quarter mile.

A few moments later.

I'm pretty sure I'm the official record holder for the fastest E Golf because here are the times that I got 0 to 60 in 8.36 seconds. Seconds, which is definitely faster than car and driver's 8.5 seconds. And we all know car and driver just gets ridiculously fast. Times 0 to 100 didn't happen well because the car maxes out at 85 mph. But I'm pretty sure I hold the record for the standing quarter mile, which happened at 16.29 seconds at 82.8 miles per hour. That's a whopping 3/10 of a second faster than car and driver. I think this is the start of my racing career. Now, here's one test that I'm sure no one else has done. The standing half mile in an E Golf. And we did it in 26.98 seconds at 84.67 miles per hour. I think if the top speed wasn't limited to 85, we couldn't have gotten a faster time. I can almost bet that these Times aren't getting beaten because no one is going out racing their E Golfs like that. So I'm sure everybody's wondering about the range. I did a bunch of mixed driving today. Highway cruising, sitting in traffic, spirited back roads, and of course the four full throttle half mile pulls. I was able to get 110 miles to a charge with 10 miles left on the tank, so the claims are pretty accurate and I'm pretty sure I can push 150 if I'm dedicated to saving. Now. The problem was I did all these pulls and driving with the heater off and mostly every electronic off just to make sure that I have enough range to make it back home. If I'm honest, the E Golf probably isn't the best way for me to experience my first electric car, but I had a good time nonetheless. It's an electric car designed for a specific purpose. It's a city commuter or for anyone that wants a compact electric vehicle. If you live about 50 miles from where you work, this car will make sense for you. Just don't rely on the 110 wall charger because it will take over 30 hours to fully charge this thing and it would definitely give you tons of range anxiety. On the other hand, the base model 3 is the gold standard of electric cars and it costs eight grand more but has double the range and is significantly faster. The Golf has the advantage of being a foot and a half shorter though. The Chevy Volt in my opinion is the happy medium. The price is right, the performance is there and the range as well, and it sits in between both of these cars. At the end of the day, even though I love the design of the Golf and love the way it drives, I can't recommend this specific Golf to anyone. Just knowing that there are better electric cars out there. Especially with mini's new electric Cooper coming out. That should be a real blast to drive. I just hope the next time I get into one of these things it's more electrifying to drive than this. Oh, I got you. I got you. Oh, I got you.

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