Piston Slap: The Waffle Iron and the Vee-Dub

Sajeev Mehta
by Sajeev Mehta

TTAC commentator Windswords writes:

Sajeev, My oldest son has been bitten by automotive wanderlust. He is about to go off to college this fall and has decided that his grandfathers’ hand-me-down 4 cylinder 2000 Accord with only 30,000-ish miles is just not cool enough. Also, it needs new tires and a battery.

So he has cast his wondering eyes on a 5-speed 2000 VW Golf GLS 2.0L hatch listed in AutoTrader. It looks like a nice enough car but then I start thinking about VW’s reputation for reliability vs Honda, not to mention the size of the potential repair bills and I start to do what any normal parent would do—worry. Should I be worried? If the B&B here can’t convince him to stay with Honda is there anything I should have him be on the look out for trouble-wise on the Golf?

Per AutoTrader Ad, here are some noteworthy facts on the Golf:

Mileage is 82,413. One owner car modified with cold air intake, honeycomb grill, fog lights, clear side-marker lenses, stubby antenna, Neuspeed exhaust, Neuspeed short shifter, RS 17″ alloy wheels, Euro headlight switch, brushed aluminum interior trim kit, Tokico sport shocks, drilled Brembo rotors, Audi TT foot pedals and foot rest, painted brake calipers and vinyl decals.

The oil changes were done every 5000 miles, tires were rotated/aligned/balanced last year, battery was replaced last month and car is current with NJ inspection (thru 09/2011). Vehicle is clean inside and out, given its age, with minor wear and tear on the interior and light scratching on the exterior. One of the fog lights was hit with a stone and cracked, but still functions normally. The lid to the armrest/storage compartment is broken, but sits in place.

One of the arms on the glove compartment broke, so it falls down on one side when opened. The interior has some staining along the door edges and light wear in heavily used areas, but nothing severe. This car has treated me well for almost 10 years and never needed serious repairs. It runs just as well today as when I drove it off the lot (better, actually, with the addition of some of those aftermarket parts). It has never failed inspection, has practically no rust, gets around 25 MPG and starts on the first try no matter the conditions. CAR SOLD AS-IS.

Sajeev replies:

When I was a little kid, my mother told me to NOT touch the waffle iron while making waffles. She was clear, but I was unbelievably hungry. And that thing was chrome plated and had an amber light on top: it was begging to be touched, dammit!

And touching that waffle iron hurt like hell. I might have cried because it temporarily crippled me: it was a pain I’d never felt before. Which leads to my question: will you kiss the owie like Moms do, or is he flying solo when selling a chronically reliable, cheap-to-fix Honda for a somewhat-drastically tweaked VW that wasn’t exactly a pillar of strength and value when it was new and unmodified?

Best of luck with that answer.

[Send your technical queries to mehta@ttac.com]

Sajeev Mehta
Sajeev Mehta

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  • Rainless Rainless on Jun 19, 2009

    I'm no American, so the perception is probably different, but to me a 2000 Golf is pretty much the German equivalent of that 2000 Accord. It doesn't get any more dreary than that.

  • Sajeev Mehta Sajeev Mehta on Jun 19, 2009
    rainless : I’m no American, so the perception is probably different, Very different, I'd say! We should put that disclaimer: the comments posted on this episode of Piston Slap only have relevance to those that live in the US (and Canada?). Or maybe any country far from Europe where VW has a more limited presence.
  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
  • FormerFF We bought three new and one used car last year, so we won't be visiting any showrooms this year unless a meteor hits one of them. Sorry to hear that Mini has terminated the manual transmission, a Mini could be a fun car to drive with a stick.It appears that 2025 is going to see a significant decrease in the number of models that can be had with a stick. The used car we bought is a Mk 7 GTI with a six speed manual, and my younger daughter and I are enjoying it quite a lot. We'll be hanging on to it for many years.
  • Oberkanone Where is the value here? Magna is assembling the vehicles. The IP is not novel. Just buy the IP at bankruptcy stage for next to nothing.
  • Jalop1991 what, no Turbo trim?
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