Gadgetory

the New Beetle defined retro success when it arrived in 1998 but the shtick ran its course after 11 years or so and Volkswagen has come back with something with fewer cute curves and note but face let's drive the 2012 VW Beetle turbo and check the tech well here it is the new New Beetle 2012 they've really changed things up and let's be entirely frank they've ichika find the car it's gotten chunkier angles more strong sort of edges here and there some creases it didn't have before the biggest thing I think you notice is the roofline notice how the a-pillar comes up and now takes a turn and kinks right here to get more of a flat bar more of kind of a slammed look which takes away that big goofy iconic bubble that's a good thing to reach out to a broader market of buyers but to me it kind of starts to leave its whole purpose on earth which is to be a faithful repro of the original beetle that'll be your call but to me they're starting to get a little bit far afield let's get inside this is the top head unit as we have a top trim beetle top trim and it's a turbo this year that's got navigation first and foremost nice rendering good pitch the typefaces are good it could be a little cleaner but for a car in this price category not bad of course touch screen which I find quite responsive you've also got this knob here which depending what you're doing is going to be a rotating selector soft buttons here on the screen are echoed on hard buttons below them kind of a redundant waste of real estate but whatever you've got this weird interface of VW does where you kind of spin around the wheel sometimes there's even more choices than on the screen in which case the whole thing rotates and gives me a headache now all these new beetles come with roughly the same array of input choices for entertainment am/fm but no HD satellite radio is optional I've got an optical disc slot up here an auxilary jack is right here and then what they call the Volkswagen MDI which is this guy here you've got a pigtail in this case I've got a USB but I can change it out if I unplug it from the wall of the glovebox and put a different pigtail there we've also got bluetooth streaming on here which is a nice touch in addition to Bluetooth calling and all of those sources go out through an eight-speaker standard system or you can get this premium Volkswagen system that's the middle tier trim on these cars or if you get the turbo like this you can load it up with a Fender audio system we've got these fender badged speakers over here and this fender audio system has nine speakers including a subwoofer now because we're in a turbo we have an optional transmission beyond a manual or a standard automatic a DSG this is a dual clutch gearbox in Volkswagen parlance and you're gating is like an automatic you've got PRN D and then Sport which is a sport drive or kick it over here to get your shiftable on the paddles here you do have an upshift than a downshift behind the wheel one on each side for the different direction of shifting we'll see how that goes on the road but first let's find out what puts power into that okay now these new beetles you've got a choice of two different engines hell that's right they move that thing a few years ago while we're here though this is that fenders subwoofer the big boy now engines up here ah here it is now this car is a turbo so we have a different engine than most beetles which will have a two and a half liter inline 5 pretty garden-variety VW stuff this one is a 2-liter four-cylinder they all sit sidesaddle turbocharged intercooled they all drive the front wheels no matter what beetle you get 200 horsepower on this one 207 foot-pounds of torque gets this roughly 3,000 pound new beetle up to 60 in about 6.8 seconds while delivering 21:30 MPG if you go without the turbo the numbers look like this the non turbo beetle two and a half litre five-cylinder gets you 170 horsepower and 177 foot-pounds of torque while giving the car up to 60 in 8 seconds and delivering 1 mpg better fuel economy on both counts and as I mentioned we have the optional DSG but you can also get a six-speed automatic Tiptronic gearbox on a turbo now while we're all waiting for the new New Beetle that come available as a new New Beetle convertible which isn't available yet you got to make do with this optional sunroof which is a big ol piece of glass but the problem is when it's on the move it doesn't have a big old piece of movement it leaves basically a toaster slot open at the front while all this stuff is still covered by in our case dirty glass I don't know why there's such a limited retract on this the first thing I picked up on driving this car is that they've got the DSG really well dialed in these dual clutch gearboxes are still pretty new on the market there aren't many that are crap anymore it's a very satisfying gearbox it's automatic when you want it to be and more engaged when you want it to be that as well like a manual but as soon as I get into the power on this car if I'm going up a grade at all or anything like that or if I'm in a turn I'm getting a lot of wheelspin I'm getting some rear up on the car so that I'm losing traction on the front tires this is not a car for someone who's going to be driving seriously it's not a sports car I can feel the turbos definitely making the most of a small engine you get this real peak kind of a thing in terms of the power delivery again it's fine for a fun little everyday driver it's not a car you'd want to use in a lot of you know sort of demanding driving where you really want to modulate the power perfectly and have a good time on the road it's not that kind of power train so all in I got to tell you after a driving this turbo I'm really intrigued to drive the two and a half liter five which I also thinks a good motor that has a different kind of power delivery that I think I prefer okay let's price is 2012 beetle first of all let's go totally based without a turbo without any option packages twenty thousand five hundred I bring that up because a lot of folks look at this car to be somehow as thrifty and parsimonious as the original beetle it doesn't really occupy that same category in the market anymore but that's where it starts now on top of that the sunroof package is twenty five hundred which gets you the sunroof satellite radio touchscreen in the center of the dash and keyless access as well as of course that nice big roof sound and nav adds eighteen hundred for navigation and fender audio and some bigger wheels then we had the turbo cars those are going to add 36 to 39 hundred on top of any of those previous trim levels I mentioned and that of course get you the turbo engine a much more interesting independent front suspension different wheels you're also going to get a different front differential for getting power to those wheels and a few other engineering changes with this turbo model we have you get a choice of gear boxes either 6-speed manual or a 6-speed direct shift dual clutch like we had for eleven hundred dollars more