Volkswagen’s seventh-generation Golf line-up continues to grow in
Europe, and now the German automaker has unveiled the car’s latest iteration,
the e-Golf. We Americans, of course, are being forced to wait until late next
year for the premium hatchback’s solid goodness, but at least the e-Golf will arrive stateside alongside the standard Golf, the sporty GTI, and the ultra-hot Golf R. And this is a good thing, because the e-Golf looks
like it could be a decent contender to the likes of the Nissan Leaf, the Ford
Focus Electric, and even the smaller Chevrolet Spark EV, Fiat 500E, and Honda
Fit EV.
e-gad! What a (Non) Surprise to See You
The fully electric e-Golf is many things, but a surprise it
isn’t. Volkswagen has been toying with the idea of a battery-powered Golf for
some time, even building a prototype over three years ago. We drove that car and found it to work as advertised,
good news given that despite utilizing a sixth-generation Golf body, the
prototype’s hardware specs roughly mirror the production e-Golf’s. (Thankfully,
that prototype’s clumsy name—Blue-E-Motion—was left on the drawing board.) A
front-mounted electric motor produces 114 horsepower and 199 lb-ft of torque,
and is fed by a 24.2-kWh lithium-ion battery. All the electric components are
produced by VW in-house. Although these specifications so far pertain only to
the European-market e-Golf, we’re confident they’ll carry over to the car we’ll
get here.
Volkswagen claims its electric hatchback can accelerate to
62 mph in 10.4 seconds and on to an electronically governed (how else?) top
speed of 87 mph. The slightly torquier Nissan Leaf managed to hit 60 mph in 10 seconds flat in
our testing, so depending on how much the battery-laden Golf weighs, VW’s
estimate seems right on target. As for the all-important driving-range
estimate, VW thinks the e-Golf is capable of a substantial 118 miles of
motoring per charge. That’s quite a bit higher than the EPA’s official range
estimates for the Leaf, Focus Electric, 500E, and Fit EV—75 miles, 76, 87, and
82, respectively.
Drivers can tailor the e-Golf’s behaviour to their particular
driving style via two driving modes, Eco and Eco Plus, as well as four (yep, four)
regenerative braking settings, D1–D3 and B. The more aggressive the regen mode,
the higher the chance that the e-Golf’s total driving range can be extended—at
least in heavy urban traffic. When the battery does run out of juice,
Volkswagen says that it can be juiced to 80 percent capacity in as little as
half an hour when a DC quick-charger is utilized.
Outwardly, the e-Golf looks pretty much like a regular
Golf—albeit one that sits on aerodynamic-looking wheels. Up front, there is a
largely blocked-off lower intake and grille, as well as a pair of C-shaped LED
running lights. Following VW’s color-coded grille-trim theme for special Golf
models—a spicy red hue for the GTI, cool silver for the diesel GTD—the e-Golf wears a bright blue stripe from headlight to
headlight. At least in Europe, the e-Golf’s peepers will be LED-lit, but we
can’t imagine such a high-tech (and expensive) feature would make it to the
U.S., where the e-Golf already will be pricey. Still, fielding an electric car
is in vogue these days, regardless of cost. The best we can hope for, then, is
that the electric Golf will do its best impression of the gas-fed model, whose
excellent driving manners and upscale interior have us fidgeting in our seats
waiting for it to arrive.
source: http://www.caranddriver.com/news/2015-volkswagen-e-golf-photos-and-info-newsby Alexander Stoklosa
http://www.boscheuropean.com
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