e Golf

My Nissan Leaf Forum

Help Support My Nissan Leaf Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Bouldergramp

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 15, 2018
Messages
188
Location
COLORADO
My local Nissan dealer is "big" on electric vehicles. I was waiting on my Leaf 6 month free service and noticed two VW e Golf vehicles being charged. The window stickers had a check for the "No warranty...as is" box.

I never heard of an e Golf.

I wouldn't touch one with a ten-foot pole. Based on my experience as a past owner of a VW Eurovan camper, the local VW dealer is the absolute pits for service.
 
We have a whole bunch at my work. There are at least 2 on my street where I live. It’s only available for lease/sale in a limited # of states.

VW isn’t very good at electrical systems, so I wouldn’t really want an electric car from them. And, VW isn't great from a reliability POV either. A couple MNLers have an e-Golf now.
 
LeftieBiker said:
A decent price but I'd want more info on the warranty, OR LACK THEREOF. IIRC, the Premium may be the only one with a heat pump...
Meh, "leather-ett" seating, aka vinyl and no heated steering wheel. that and VWs iffy track record on electrical systems would give me a firm pass!
 
I was considering an e-Golf for a few months in 2018. I've never driven or even seen one in person, but after stalking the myvwegolf forum for a couple of months, this is the gist of what I gathered about the car from current owners. @RonDawg is, I believe, a former Leaf owner and current e-Golf owner, and perhaps he can correct me if I mis-state anything:

PROs

1. Range - it seems to be quite underestimated, and should really be closer to 150 miles. Owners report averaging 5+ miles/kWh in moderately warm weather with minimum effort (mostly, just driving the speed limit).

2. Performance - sporty, precise, probably not as good as a Tesla but better than the Leaf.

3. Battery - also without liquid cooling, but made by Panasonic, so supposedly a better chemistry than the Leaf's AESC batteries. From what I can tell, current e-Golf owners average about 3.5% battery capacity degradation per year, and that's with A LOT less care and effort than MNL Leaf owners put into protecting their own batteries.

4. Price - at least on the coasts, it is not uncommon to see e-Golfs sold for $10,000 off msrp, so after federal and state tax incentives, some are reporting buying new 2019 SE's (the base model) with DCQC capability for around $15,000 total out of pocket.

5. Looks - not as bulbous/clown-car-ish as the Leaf (a subjective point, I realize, but I agree)

6. Cargo capacity - roughly comparable to the Leaf, but allegedly more useable because the trunk space is more rectangular.


CONs

1. Maintenance - it's not so much that the e-Golf suffers from poor build quality or an unreliable drivetrain, but that when parts do need to be replaced, they are significantly more expensive than American or Asian parts. As others have alluded to here, the parts that most commonly break in the e-Golf are minor but electrical - power windows, infotainment/instrument cluster problems, back-up camera and headlight/break light issues, etc. And so when these go down - which they will - they're not cheap, plus VW service can be both rude and time-consuming. One of the main reasons I chose the Leaf over the e-Golf was that a lot of these reported problems seem to negate a lot of the maintenance/repair costs savings in owning an EV. I liked how much I've heard from Leaf owners that, besides tire rotations, or the 4 year brake fluid change, they really haven't had to do any maintenance on the Leaf. I didn't hear anything close to this from e-Golf owners when I asked about maintenace, and in fact, what I got was a long list of things which frequently break.

2. Battery warranty - while VW doesn't play the same games as Nissan with their infuriatingly vague "capacity bars" - the e-Golf's capacity warranty is 70% over 8 years/100,000 miles - there is some unfortunate wording in this warranty to the effect that "frequent and consecutive" fast charging "may" void the battery warranty; the e-Golf owners manual also advises owners to (and I'm paraphrasing here) "always follow each DC charge with an AC charge". Some e-Golf owners have interpreted this to mean that if you ever, even once, DC fast charge twice in a row, then this will void your battery warranty. Others say that it's probably OK to fast charge twice in a row occasionally, but it's not clear was occasionally means. Personally, I think the wording is vague enough that VW can't really legally void your warranty if you wanted to take the e-Golf on a 250 mile drive once a month, fast charging twice, consecutively, on each drive. But this vagueness was also disconcerting enough to me that I didn't want to mess with it.

3. ride - a little firm/harsh (as per its "sportiness")

4. seats - stiffer/less comfortable than the Leaf's.

Personally, OP, I wouldn't spend $13.5K on a used, 83-mile-when-new e-Golf, if only because you can allegedly buy new 2019s with 125 miles of range in a lot of regions of the US for $15-20K. But there are of course a lot of subjective variables that go into that yes/no decision.
 
I know that I looked at an eGolf, probably around 2016 when my first lease was ending (I extended it several times). I know I walked around the car, and sat in it, and I THINK I drove it a bit, but it wasn't memorable enough a drive for me to remember it now, believe it or not. The deal killer for me was the lack of a heated steering wheel, and having to take leather seats, IIRC, to get a heat pump...
 
cwerdna said:
We have a whole bunch at my work. There are at least 2 on my street where I live. It’s only available for lease/sale in a limited # of states.

VW isn’t very good at electrical systems, so I wouldn’t really want an electric car from them. And, VW isn't great from a reliability POV either. A couple MNLers have an e-Golf now.

I'm one of those and in the nearly 4 years I've had mine, the only issue I've had was a failed A/C pressure sensor. Other than that, it's been flawless.

The eGolf was largely a compliance car, though 11-state availability made it more accessible than your typical compliance car which is generally limited to CA, or CA + a couple of other states (the Spark EV comes to mind).

One thing that the eGolf has done better than the Leaf it replaced is that the materials are MUCH better quality. The interior still looks like new and shows almost no signs of wear after 27k miles. My Leaf which I returned with similar mileage was showing significant wear and sagging of the upper side bolster and had I kept the car would probably have worn a hole in by now. Same with the Leaf's "spray on" carpet which showed signs of wear where the factory floor mats didn't protect them, like near the left front seat mounting point.

VW includes an 8 yr/100k mile battery warranty to include a minimum of 70% capacity for that entire time. While it's not as easy to measure battery capacity on an eGolf as it is on a Leaf, I've found that degradation doesn't seem to be as much of an issue as it was with my Leaf. I can still get 75+ miles on each charge, something that I would struggle to achieve on the Leaf towards the end.

And despite its more boxy appearance the eGolf seems to be more efficient at highway speeds than the Leaf was. It's easy to achieve 4.5 miles kWH on the eGolf which was also a struggle with the Leaf.
 
Kieran973 said:
I was considering an e-Golf for a few months in 2018. I've never driven or even seen one in person, but after stalking the myvwegolf forum for a couple of months, this is the gist of what I gathered about the car from current owners. @RonDawg is, I believe, a former Leaf owner and current e-Golf owner, and perhaps he can correct me if I mis-state anything:

PROs

1. Range - it seems to be quite underestimated, and should really be closer to 150 miles. Owners report averaging 5+ miles/kWh in moderately warm weather with minimum effort (mostly, just driving the speed limit).

2. Performance - sporty, precise, probably not as good as a Tesla but better than the Leaf.

3. Battery - also without liquid cooling, but made by Panasonic, so supposedly a better chemistry than the Leaf's AESC batteries. From what I can tell, current e-Golf owners average about 3.5% battery capacity degradation per year, and that's with A LOT less care and effort than MNL Leaf owners put into protecting their own batteries.

4. Price - at least on the coasts, it is not uncommon to see e-Golfs sold for $10,000 off msrp, so after federal and state tax incentives, some are reporting buying new 2019 SE's (the base model) with DCQC capability for around $15,000 total out of pocket.

5. Looks - not as bulbous/clown-car-ish as the Leaf (a subjective point, I realize, but I agree)

6. Cargo capacity - roughly comparable to the Leaf, but allegedly more useable because the trunk space is more rectangular.

1. The range of 125+ miles is only applicable to the 2017+ models which have a 35.8 kWH battery. The 2015 (mine) and 2016 models have the same size 24 kWH battery as the Leaf.

2. MUCH better than the Leaf. Much better than most if not all econoboxes (except another Golf of course). Far less body lean.

3. Correct. As I stated above, it seems to suffer from far less degradation under similar climate and driving conditions.

4. Yes, ever since Tesla announced they will finally release the (not so easy to obtain) $35k Model 3, VW dealers have significantly dropped the price.

5. BEST FEATURE OF THE CAR. If you're not familiar with the few details that differentiate the eGolf from an ICE version (mainly the rims, but also the C-shaped DRL's and of course eGolf badging), you wouldn't know it's electric.

6. Cargo capacity is actually less. The Leaf has a deep trunk well that the eGolf lacks. However the eGolf from the factory has a flat-ish load floor when the seats are folded down.

CONs

1. Maintenance - it's not so much that the e-Golf suffers from poor build quality or an unreliable drivetrain, but that when parts do need to be replaced, they are significantly more expensive than American or Asian parts. As others have alluded to here, the parts that most commonly break in the e-Golf are minor but electrical - power windows, infotainment/instrument cluster problems, back-up camera and headlight/break light issues, etc. And so when these go down - which they will - they're not cheap, plus VW service can be both rude and time-consuming. One of the main reasons I chose the Leaf over the e-Golf was that a lot of these reported problems seem to negate a lot of the maintenance/repair costs savings in owning an EV. I liked how much I've heard from Leaf owners that, besides tire rotations, or the 4 year brake fluid change, they really haven't had to do any maintenance on the Leaf. I didn't hear anything close to this from e-Golf owners when I asked about maintenace, and in fact, what I got was a long list of things which frequently break.

2. Battery warranty - while VW doesn't play the same games as Nissan with their infuriatingly vague "capacity bars" - the e-Golf's capacity warranty is 70% over 8 years/100,000 miles - there is some unfortunate wording in this warranty to the effect that "frequent and consecutive" fast charging "may" void the battery warranty; the e-Golf owners manual also advises owners to (and I'm paraphrasing here) "always follow each DC charge with an AC charge". Some e-Golf owners have interpreted this to mean that if you ever, even once, DC fast charge twice in a row, then this will void your battery warranty. Others say that it's probably OK to fast charge twice in a row occasionally, but it's not clear was occasionally means. Personally, I think the wording is vague enough that VW can't really legally void your warranty if you wanted to take the e-Golf on a 250 mile drive once a month, fast charging twice, consecutively, on each drive. But this vagueness was also disconcerting enough to me that I didn't want to mess with it.

3. ride - a little firm/harsh (as per its "sportiness")

4. seats - stiffer/less comfortable than the Leaf's.

Personally, OP, I wouldn't spend $13.5K on a used, 83-mile-when-new e-Golf, if only because you can allegedly buy new 2019s with 125 miles of range in a lot of regions of the US for $15-20K. But there are of course a lot of subjective variables that go into that yes/no decision.

1. I've spent an average of $20/year on maintenance, primarily due to tire rotations. Yes VW service can be expensive, primarily due to the hourly rate. As mentioned above, I've only had one problem with it.

2. To be fair, Nissan used to recommend limiting DCFC as well.

3. Yes a sporty ride, but no harsher than a Tesla Model 3.

4. Yes seats less comfortable but hold you better in cornering.
 
LeftieBiker said:
IIRC, the Premium may be the only one with a heat pump...

The SEL (top trim level) is the only one with heat pump. The LE (2015 only) and SE (2016+) models don't have one.
 
My problem with the eGolf is that it was too low to the ground. The goilf is a sports platform and I did not fit. Otherwise it was fune. I do fit into my IoniQ and I really like all of the safety nannies, The Mercedes B was a minimum effort CARB car.
 
1. The range of 125+ miles is only applicable to the 2017+ models which have a 35.8 kWH battery. The 2015 (mine) and 2016 models have the same size 24 kWH battery as the Leaf.

2. MUCH better than the Leaf. Much better than most if not all econoboxes (except another Golf of course). Far less body lean.

3. Correct. As I stated above, it seems to suffer from far less degradation under similar climate and driving conditions.

4. Yes, ever since Tesla announced they will finally release the (not so easy to obtain) $35k Model 3, VW dealers have significantly dropped the price.

5. BEST FEATURE OF THE CAR. If you're not familiar with the few details that differentiate the eGolf from an ICE version (mainly the rims, but also the C-shaped DRL's and of course eGolf badging), you wouldn't know it's electric.

6. Cargo capacity is actually less. The Leaf has a deep trunk well that the eGolf lacks. However the eGolf from the factory has a flat-ish load floor when the seats are folded down.




1. I've spent an average of $20/year on maintenance, primarily due to tire rotations. Yes VW service can be expensive, primarily due to the hourly rate. As mentioned above, I've only had one problem with it.

2. To be fair, Nissan used to recommend limiting DCFC as well.

3. Yes a sporty ride, but no harsher than a Tesla Model 3.

4. Yes seats less comfortable but hold you better in cornering.


All great points. Thanks for chiming in.
 
Weird... I keep getting FB ads for *2019* e-Golfs, so I finally bit and took a look. First off, the text which I ignored says:
"Receive an $11,000 Dealer Discount and $1,500 Clean Fuel Reward Rebate on a New 2019 e-Golf SEL Premium with navigation at Stevens Creek Volkswagen. MORE Selection = MORE Savings!"

It leads to https://www.stevenscreekvw.com/egolf-specials/ which has:
New 2019 Volkswagen e-Golf SEL Premium With Navigation
$39,925 /MSRP
$11,000 /Dealer Discount
$1,500 /CA Clean Fuel Reward Rebate
$27,425 /Sale Price
5 at this Price

VIN KW908307, KW911117, KW913986, KW911293, KW910485
Strange.

Are they crazy? Even with $7500 Federal tax credit, not so sure this is a great deal for a 125 mile EPA range rated EV when new Bolts and 40 kWh Leafs are going for petty cheap.
 
I'm still receiving FB ads for the above. A few more people chimed in with comments. :lol:

The dealer's link still says they have 5 at this price. LOL
 
Back
Top