7 ms·

Drivers still like VW

19 points by dodders 11y ago

n0mad01 11y ago
Electrocution death row contenders still like electricity. Linkbait, anyone?
- draw_down 11y ago
  Wow, what a perfectly terrible comment!
monksy 11y ago
For the most part, their cars are better and they have a reputation for long lasting cars(At least I feel that is the case when compared to the other "comparable cars") You have a happy user base. I'm not too concerned with the whole emissions scandal: 1. I don't have a diesel and 2. Its a regulation issue. If VW acted in bad faith and degraded the guarenteed performance.. I would be pissed. We haven't see a response on what is going to happen so far. Most of the responses to the finding have been snarky comments about "how vw is bad." (We need to find out what went wrong and fix it... circlejerking about the whole issue, or the negative press, isn't going to do a lot of good)
- BookmarkSaver 11y ago
  >If VW acted in bad faith and degraded the guarenteed performance Um... That is exactly what they did. They falsified their emission test results. The car you are driving is NOT the same as the one that passed the tests. The fact that it was possible to deceive the tests does not change the fact that they were blatantly and illegally falsifying them. The performance of the vehicles when they pass the proper regulations is likely to be significantly lower than the advertised performance, because the LIED about the their emissions.
  - monksy 11y ago
    It is only operating subpar when the test is being performed. Not during normal use
- dnissley 11y ago
  At least here in the US, my perception has been just the opposite. VWs not only cost more, but are less reliable than comparable vehicles. They seem to have the street price of a Honda/Toyota, but the reliability of a Nissan/Chevy/Chrysler, and their maintenance costs have a reputation of being about the same as a German luxury car (high). Hence their comparatively small market share here (3-4%). The one redeeming factor for VW seems to be powertrain options and selling a station wagon that isn't an SUV or a Subaru (Golf Sportwagen).
  - superuser2 11y ago
    Volkswagen has excellent interiors. The $18k Golf feels in many ways like a $40k BMW 3-series. Most competitors' interiors are gaudy, cheap and plasticky, ugly, or spartan. Other than BMW, the only people selling the "German sportscar" experience are luxury brands, Volkswagen AG subsidiaries, or both. Depends on the model, but Golf for the last 5 years has gotten a Very Good (4/5) for reliability from Consumer Reports. They used to be terrible in the mid-2000s, but improved drastically since then.
    - selimthegrim 11y ago
      Driven a US Jetta lately?
      - monksy 11y ago
        Unfortunately they changed the Cloth seats into Leather in the newer generation. [Leather is a problem in the warmer states]
    - copperx 11y ago
      Whoa. What? If I could use only one adjective to describe VW it would be "plasticky". I've always seen VW interiors as incredibly austere. I drive a 2006 TDI Beetle and I find my 1991 Honda Accord to be more comfortable.
      - superuser2 11y ago
ufmace 11y ago
I'm not terribly surprised, considering that the whole scandal is basically meaningless to the consumer experience. I wonder how many people who report on stories like this are aware of how little the average consumer actually cares about deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government regarding changes in emissions characteristics that they will probably never notice.
- Zhenya 11y ago
  The problem with this view is that emissions are a function of engine management. As with any engineering decision, trade-offs have to be made to hit goals. Adjusting the code to lower emissions will absolutely impact power output and fuel efficiency. This impacts the consumers directly. And anecdotely, was the reason most people bought TDIs - the amazing combo of power, efficiency and percieved "greeness"
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > I'm not terribly surprised, considering that the whole scandal is basically meaningless to the consumer experience. Right: the scandal is about VW fudging a test to mislead on the scale of an externality; unlike government tested fuel economy (which is about consumer information, so deception on that hurts primarily the direct purchaser), emissions testing is about protecting the public at large from paying (through environmental impacts) for benefits received by the particular consumer of the vehicle (and, in the form of profits from the trade, the vehicle manufacturer.) So, on the VW scandal, drivers and the company are the beneficiaries of the deception, so its unsurprising that drivers qua drivers would not be angered by the company's deception.
  - roymurdock 11y ago
    > drivers qua drivers This is a silly distinction. You can't sensibly divorce "drivers" from all the other various functions of human beings who drive. Many drivers are also people who enjoy living in a clean city with minimal pollution. Many more do not enjoy being lied to by a company they have paid in an explicit contract to exchange money for certified goods. Some of these drivers are also angry that they are being disrespected by their elected officials who are unable or unwilling to represent them in an appropriate manner. Sure, drivers get a cheaper car in a vacuum. But this vacuum doesn't exist and is merely an academic distinction/rhetorical argument.
mordocai 11y ago
As an anecdote, I still plan on my next car being a TDI VW Golf, assuming they are available in the US by the time I'm looking in a couple years. As another commenter said, I really don't care about "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government".
- slantyyz 11y ago
  >> As another commenter said, I really don't care about "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government". Well you should care a little, because the result of the "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government" can impact you financially in both a positive and negative fashion. On the positive -- the financial incentives that VW is offering as a result of the scandal -- IIRC, up to $6K -- make it a great time to upgrade or buy. On the negative -- public perception of the scandal could lower the resale price of any diesel VW you might own.
- joshkpeterson 11y ago
  I only buy clothes made in sweatshops by 6 year old children because it's cheaper, and as another commenter said, I really don't care about "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government"
  - LesZedCB 11y ago
    That's not a fair comparison. Environmental externalities are not the same as children being exploited for labor, no matter how you frame it. I do think that it is highly naive to say one doesn't care about the deals and tricks that big corporations pull off. Especially with the rampant consumer economy in the US, being an uninformed consumer is irresponsible. However, I have to agree with the GP, I was just saying yesterday that I also would still be willing to buy a VW. they are really (subjectively by some measures, objective by other) good cars, despite the recent scandal.
    - justizin 11y ago
      > Environmental externalities are not the same as children being exploited for labor, no matter how you frame it. Beyond a sufficient level of terrible, relative comparison is unnecessary.
OopsCriticality 11y ago
"Drivers still like VW" at the moment, before any fixes have been applied. It's a bit abstract right now. Let's see what happens after the fix is rolled out, the owners need to schedule their appointments for the recalls, deal with (possible) lower fuel economy and performance, and (possible) lower resale values.
- PantaloonFlames 11y ago
  lower economy, lower performance, and possible higher maintenance costs too. Some of the proposed fixes involve retro-fitting Urea-based SCR systems, which need to be maintained more than "no filter at all". But those effects are long-term and therefore less quantified and immediately apparent. Seems to me, the major influencer on how drivers feel about VW is the news items about how bad VW is.
  - CodeWriter23 11y ago
    They're not going to retrofit an SCR system on to cars proven to meet emissions standards when the software is running in compliance mode. They're going to reflash the ECU with software that doesn't cheat. The result for the consumer: a minor drop in fuel economy and more frequent cycling of the Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) will have a little more noticeable impact on performance than when in cheat mode. The DPF is like a muffler with a trap to catch the soot and ash from the exhaust. That black stuff you see coming out of a truck but never from a TDI even when in cheat mode. When the DPF is cycling, the engine passes unburned fuel from intake to exhaust on every fourth stroke. The unspent fuel lands on the trap, and when the hot exhaust from the next stroke ignites that fuel, the soot and ash are reduced, which in turn reduces NOx emissions. If they are smart with the software, they'll try to run the DPF when the car is cruising not accelerating, and the impact on performance will be hardly noticeable at all. Cycling the DPF more often will likely result in a longer lifespan for that unit. Currently they need to be cleaned when they become fouled. Cycling the DPF more frequently, thus burning the soot out of the trap more regularly will likely reduce fouling.
- exw 11y ago
  > deal with (possible) lower fuel economy and performance, Not clear if these results will hold up, but CR ran some tests that seemed to indicate that running the car in "cheat mode" had a relatively small impact on performance - "both cars added less than a second in the 0 to 60 mph time. The Jetta saw fuel economy drop from 53 to 50 mpg, and the Sportwagen went from 50 to 46 mpg." http://www.wired.com/2015/10/vw-diesel-cheat-mode-mpg-performance/ http://www.wired.com/2015/10/vw-diesel-cheat-mode-mpg-perfor...
ioanpopovici 11y ago
What is amazing is the fact people don't realize is that what VW did indirectly caused disability and even death, but hey if it does not affect me I'll just buy a VW anyway. I'm really sick of these TBTF corporations doing whatever they want. They do something illegal that causes a lot of harm and if they are caught they just cruise the waters of ignorance to safety and then rinse and repeat. We are just sheep...
- ekr 11y ago
  Every single car driver out there causes immense harm to the society, it's not only the car manufacturers at fault. If you can imagine a city where people ride bikes instead of cars, with no noise, pollution ,traffic jams, accidents and so on. You'll quickly realise that all car drivers are murderers. A quick reminder of Tetraethyllead should make you realise how many things most people are missing.
  - dreaminvm 11y ago
    Can you expand on why a city where people rode bikes would be rid of traffic jams and accidents? My guess is traffic will be just as bad in downtown areas with frequent lights and pedestrian crossings. While bikes would certainly result in less fatal accidents, I think the frequency of accidents would be higher since bikes can ride so close to each other and pedestrians.
    - admax88q 11y ago
      You can fit a lot more bikes into a smaller space. Next time you're in a traffic jam, look at all the cars around you, likely most of them have only one person in it. Now try to visualize how much space each of those people would take up on a bike instead of a car. All of a sudden you're surrounded by empty space. Sure its possible to have traffic jams with bikes, but that threshold is so much higher.
  - dang 11y ago
    > all car drivers are murderers Please don't post over-the-top flamebait to HN.
chrisweekly 11y ago
I own a 2011 Jetta Sportwagen TDI (my 3rd tdi, and 4th --and last -- vw/audi), and I am royally pissed. I will not buy another VW nor Audi. I loved my tdi for its combination of performance, comfort and carbon footprint (42 mpg). I try to "vote with my dollars", and am strongly pro-environment. Outrage is appropriate here, imho. I encourage everyone to boycott VW/Audi. Let's send a signal.
- HeyLaughingBoy 11y ago
  I suspect that what will very likely be the case is that VW will have to drastically drop prices to maintain sales. The result will be that they become more popular as an inexpensive car and sales will shoot back up, but with less total revenue for VW. Some will be outraged, but a bunch of other people will be happy. It will be interesting to see which group is larger!
- blacksmith_tb 11y ago
  I have an unambiguously dirty '03 TDI (though the B99 in the tank makes it less bad than it might otherwise be, and I bike to work while it sits in the driveway), but I certainly only intend to buy electric/hybrid vehicles going forward. But VW is heading that direction, too: http://qz.com/522844/volkswagen-is-pegging-its-fate-to-a-major-bet-on-electric-cars/ http://qz.com/522844/volkswagen-is-pegging-its-fate-to-a-maj...
- CodeWriter23 11y ago
  The TDI, even when in cheat mode, continues to be among the lowest carbon footprint of any vehicle. The cheat mode causes NOx emissions to climb up to that of a diesel truck, think a 16' box truck. And the car is capable of complying with NOx emissions. Some rogue engineers made a hack to have the MPGs come out as 31/40 instead of 29/38. That's what happened. VW will take corrective actions across the board, right down to fixing your vehicle to comply with emissions regulations.
arprocter 11y ago
1/4 of the US VW inventory being 2L diesel is a lot higher than I would've guessed
forgotmypassw 11y ago
Even if they cheated during the tests, they were exactly the same cars before and after the reveal of that fact, so I don't see why people would suddenly stop liking their cars.
- neogodless 11y ago
  As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, the cars will be "fixed" via a recall of some sort, which will likely reprogram the ECU to reduce emissions, which will in turn reduce performance and gas mileage. Now that might be voluntary - I don't know if laws will compel people to do that, though emission testing might start requiring such updates. Plus, the new cars released will not be able to "have great gas mileage, performance AND low emissions" without technology advances since the cheating is caught and disallowed going forward. So they might be less competitive, initially (though in the US, there isn't really much diesel competition.)
- lgieron 11y ago
  Since these cars exceed emission tresholds, they shouldn't be on streets. It's likely that owners will be forced to hand in their cars for a firmware upgrade after which they will be much slower and/or with worse mpg.

19 points by dodders 11y ago

n0mad01 11y ago

Electrocution death row contenders still like electricity. Linkbait, anyone?

draw_down 11y ago
Wow, what a perfectly terrible comment!

monksy 11y ago

For the most part, their cars are better and they have a reputation for long lasting cars(At least I feel that is the case when compared to the other "comparable cars") You have a happy user base. I'm not too concerned with the whole emissions scandal: 1. I don't have a diesel and 2. Its a regulation issue. If VW acted in bad faith and degraded the guarenteed performance.. I would be pissed. We haven't see a response on what is going to happen so far. Most of the responses to the finding have been snarky comments about "how vw is bad." (We need to find out what went wrong and fix it... circlejerking about the whole issue, or the negative press, isn't going to do a lot of good)

BookmarkSaver 11y ago
>If VW acted in bad faith and degraded the guarenteed performance Um... That is exactly what they did. They falsified their emission test results. The car you are driving is NOT the same as the one that passed the tests. The fact that it was possible to deceive the tests does not change the fact that they were blatantly and illegally falsifying them. The performance of the vehicles when they pass the proper regulations is likely to be significantly lower than the advertised performance, because the LIED about the their emissions.
- monksy 11y ago
  It is only operating subpar when the test is being performed. Not during normal use
dnissley 11y ago
At least here in the US, my perception has been just the opposite. VWs not only cost more, but are less reliable than comparable vehicles. They seem to have the street price of a Honda/Toyota, but the reliability of a Nissan/Chevy/Chrysler, and their maintenance costs have a reputation of being about the same as a German luxury car (high). Hence their comparatively small market share here (3-4%). The one redeeming factor for VW seems to be powertrain options and selling a station wagon that isn't an SUV or a Subaru (Golf Sportwagen).
- superuser2 11y ago
  Volkswagen has excellent interiors. The $18k Golf feels in many ways like a $40k BMW 3-series. Most competitors' interiors are gaudy, cheap and plasticky, ugly, or spartan. Other than BMW, the only people selling the "German sportscar" experience are luxury brands, Volkswagen AG subsidiaries, or both. Depends on the model, but Golf for the last 5 years has gotten a Very Good (4/5) for reliability from Consumer Reports. They used to be terrible in the mid-2000s, but improved drastically since then.
  - selimthegrim 11y ago
    Driven a US Jetta lately?
    - monksy 11y ago
      Unfortunately they changed the Cloth seats into Leather in the newer generation. [Leather is a problem in the warmer states]
  - copperx 11y ago
    Whoa. What? If I could use only one adjective to describe VW it would be "plasticky". I've always seen VW interiors as incredibly austere. I drive a 2006 TDI Beetle and I find my 1991 Honda Accord to be more comfortable.
    - superuser2 11y ago

ufmace 11y ago

I'm not terribly surprised, considering that the whole scandal is basically meaningless to the consumer experience. I wonder how many people who report on stories like this are aware of how little the average consumer actually cares about deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government regarding changes in emissions characteristics that they will probably never notice.

Zhenya 11y ago
The problem with this view is that emissions are a function of engine management. As with any engineering decision, trade-offs have to be made to hit goals. Adjusting the code to lower emissions will absolutely impact power output and fuel efficiency. This impacts the consumers directly. And anecdotely, was the reason most people bought TDIs - the amazing combo of power, efficiency and percieved "greeness"
dragonwriter 11y ago
> I'm not terribly surprised, considering that the whole scandal is basically meaningless to the consumer experience. Right: the scandal is about VW fudging a test to mislead on the scale of an externality; unlike government tested fuel economy (which is about consumer information, so deception on that hurts primarily the direct purchaser), emissions testing is about protecting the public at large from paying (through environmental impacts) for benefits received by the particular consumer of the vehicle (and, in the form of profits from the trade, the vehicle manufacturer.) So, on the VW scandal, drivers and the company are the beneficiaries of the deception, so its unsurprising that drivers qua drivers would not be angered by the company's deception.
- roymurdock 11y ago
  > drivers qua drivers This is a silly distinction. You can't sensibly divorce "drivers" from all the other various functions of human beings who drive. Many drivers are also people who enjoy living in a clean city with minimal pollution. Many more do not enjoy being lied to by a company they have paid in an explicit contract to exchange money for certified goods. Some of these drivers are also angry that they are being disrespected by their elected officials who are unable or unwilling to represent them in an appropriate manner. Sure, drivers get a cheaper car in a vacuum. But this vacuum doesn't exist and is merely an academic distinction/rhetorical argument.

mordocai 11y ago

As an anecdote, I still plan on my next car being a TDI VW Golf, assuming they are available in the US by the time I'm looking in a couple years. As another commenter said, I really don't care about "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government".

slantyyz 11y ago
>> As another commenter said, I really don't care about "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government". Well you should care a little, because the result of the "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government" can impact you financially in both a positive and negative fashion. On the positive -- the financial incentives that VW is offering as a result of the scandal -- IIRC, up to $6K -- make it a great time to upgrade or buy. On the negative -- public perception of the scandal could lower the resale price of any diesel VW you might own.
joshkpeterson 11y ago
I only buy clothes made in sweatshops by 6 year old children because it's cheaper, and as another commenter said, I really don't care about "the deals and tricks between giant corporations and the Government"
- LesZedCB 11y ago
  That's not a fair comparison. Environmental externalities are not the same as children being exploited for labor, no matter how you frame it. I do think that it is highly naive to say one doesn't care about the deals and tricks that big corporations pull off. Especially with the rampant consumer economy in the US, being an uninformed consumer is irresponsible. However, I have to agree with the GP, I was just saying yesterday that I also would still be willing to buy a VW. they are really (subjectively by some measures, objective by other) good cars, despite the recent scandal.
  - justizin 11y ago
    > Environmental externalities are not the same as children being exploited for labor, no matter how you frame it. Beyond a sufficient level of terrible, relative comparison is unnecessary.

OopsCriticality 11y ago

"Drivers still like VW" at the moment, before any fixes have been applied. It's a bit abstract right now. Let's see what happens after the fix is rolled out, the owners need to schedule their appointments for the recalls, deal with (possible) lower fuel economy and performance, and (possible) lower resale values.

PantaloonFlames 11y ago
lower economy, lower performance, and possible higher maintenance costs too. Some of the proposed fixes involve retro-fitting Urea-based SCR systems, which need to be maintained more than "no filter at all". But those effects are long-term and therefore less quantified and immediately apparent. Seems to me, the major influencer on how drivers feel about VW is the news items about how bad VW is.
- CodeWriter23 11y ago
  They're not going to retrofit an SCR system on to cars proven to meet emissions standards when the software is running in compliance mode. They're going to reflash the ECU with software that doesn't cheat. The result for the consumer: a minor drop in fuel economy and more frequent cycling of the Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) will have a little more noticeable impact on performance than when in cheat mode. The DPF is like a muffler with a trap to catch the soot and ash from the exhaust. That black stuff you see coming out of a truck but never from a TDI even when in cheat mode. When the DPF is cycling, the engine passes unburned fuel from intake to exhaust on every fourth stroke. The unspent fuel lands on the trap, and when the hot exhaust from the next stroke ignites that fuel, the soot and ash are reduced, which in turn reduces NOx emissions. If they are smart with the software, they'll try to run the DPF when the car is cruising not accelerating, and the impact on performance will be hardly noticeable at all. Cycling the DPF more often will likely result in a longer lifespan for that unit. Currently they need to be cleaned when they become fouled. Cycling the DPF more frequently, thus burning the soot out of the trap more regularly will likely reduce fouling.
exw 11y ago
> deal with (possible) lower fuel economy and performance, Not clear if these results will hold up, but CR ran some tests that seemed to indicate that running the car in "cheat mode" had a relatively small impact on performance - "both cars added less than a second in the 0 to 60 mph time. The Jetta saw fuel economy drop from 53 to 50 mpg, and the Sportwagen went from 50 to 46 mpg." http://www.wired.com/2015/10/vw-diesel-cheat-mode-mpg-performance/ http://www.wired.com/2015/10/vw-diesel-cheat-mode-mpg-perfor...

ioanpopovici 11y ago

What is amazing is the fact people don't realize is that what VW did indirectly caused disability and even death, but hey if it does not affect me I'll just buy a VW anyway. I'm really sick of these TBTF corporations doing whatever they want. They do something illegal that causes a lot of harm and if they are caught they just cruise the waters of ignorance to safety and then rinse and repeat. We are just sheep...

ekr 11y ago
Every single car driver out there causes immense harm to the society, it's not only the car manufacturers at fault. If you can imagine a city where people ride bikes instead of cars, with no noise, pollution ,traffic jams, accidents and so on. You'll quickly realise that all car drivers are murderers. A quick reminder of Tetraethyllead should make you realise how many things most people are missing.
- dreaminvm 11y ago
  Can you expand on why a city where people rode bikes would be rid of traffic jams and accidents? My guess is traffic will be just as bad in downtown areas with frequent lights and pedestrian crossings. While bikes would certainly result in less fatal accidents, I think the frequency of accidents would be higher since bikes can ride so close to each other and pedestrians.
  - admax88q 11y ago
    You can fit a lot more bikes into a smaller space. Next time you're in a traffic jam, look at all the cars around you, likely most of them have only one person in it. Now try to visualize how much space each of those people would take up on a bike instead of a car. All of a sudden you're surrounded by empty space. Sure its possible to have traffic jams with bikes, but that threshold is so much higher.
- dang 11y ago
  > all car drivers are murderers Please don't post over-the-top flamebait to HN.

chrisweekly 11y ago

I own a 2011 Jetta Sportwagen TDI (my 3rd tdi, and 4th --and last -- vw/audi), and I am royally pissed. I will not buy another VW nor Audi. I loved my tdi for its combination of performance, comfort and carbon footprint (42 mpg). I try to "vote with my dollars", and am strongly pro-environment. Outrage is appropriate here, imho. I encourage everyone to boycott VW/Audi. Let's send a signal.

HeyLaughingBoy 11y ago
I suspect that what will very likely be the case is that VW will have to drastically drop prices to maintain sales. The result will be that they become more popular as an inexpensive car and sales will shoot back up, but with less total revenue for VW. Some will be outraged, but a bunch of other people will be happy. It will be interesting to see which group is larger!
blacksmith_tb 11y ago
I have an unambiguously dirty '03 TDI (though the B99 in the tank makes it less bad than it might otherwise be, and I bike to work while it sits in the driveway), but I certainly only intend to buy electric/hybrid vehicles going forward. But VW is heading that direction, too: http://qz.com/522844/volkswagen-is-pegging-its-fate-to-a-major-bet-on-electric-cars/ http://qz.com/522844/volkswagen-is-pegging-its-fate-to-a-maj...
CodeWriter23 11y ago
The TDI, even when in cheat mode, continues to be among the lowest carbon footprint of any vehicle. The cheat mode causes NOx emissions to climb up to that of a diesel truck, think a 16' box truck. And the car is capable of complying with NOx emissions. Some rogue engineers made a hack to have the MPGs come out as 31/40 instead of 29/38. That's what happened. VW will take corrective actions across the board, right down to fixing your vehicle to comply with emissions regulations.

arprocter 11y ago

1/4 of the US VW inventory being 2L diesel is a lot higher than I would've guessed

forgotmypassw 11y ago

Even if they cheated during the tests, they were exactly the same cars before and after the reveal of that fact, so I don't see why people would suddenly stop liking their cars.

neogodless 11y ago
As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, the cars will be "fixed" via a recall of some sort, which will likely reprogram the ECU to reduce emissions, which will in turn reduce performance and gas mileage. Now that might be voluntary - I don't know if laws will compel people to do that, though emission testing might start requiring such updates. Plus, the new cars released will not be able to "have great gas mileage, performance AND low emissions" without technology advances since the cheating is caught and disallowed going forward. So they might be less competitive, initially (though in the US, there isn't really much diesel competition.)
lgieron 11y ago
Since these cars exceed emission tresholds, they shouldn't be on streets. It's likely that owners will be forced to hand in their cars for a firmware upgrade after which they will be much slower and/or with worse mpg.