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Evening Standard

Lifestyle

David Williams

New Volkswagen Touareg: revised suspension and engine line-up

Volkswagen London

Sometimes it’s the little things that impress with a new car, sometimes the bigger ones. If a manufacturer gets both right, you can be sure of two things: firstly, it must be a ‘facelift’ with all the original niggles ironed out and secondly, they have got a success story on their hands

Volkswagen’s new Touareg - named apparently after nomadic people of Northern Africa - is such a car, pleasingly well designed on the macro level (looks, space, general driveability) as well as the micro (beautiful attention to detail, nicely tactile controls).

It’s the third generation and recently underwent a series of updates including revised suspension and new engine options. The first version appeared in 2002 and I remember being impressed by it then; big, capacious, capable and distinctly non-ostentatious. It’s the same concept now, only much more refined, more car-like to drive.

There are five powertrains to choose from, each with a 3.0-litre V6 power unit: one turbocharged petrol engine (340 PS), two turbodiesel engines (231 PS and 286 PS) and two plug-in hybrid drives (V6 petrol engine plus electric drive motor). The plug-in hybrid drive of the Touareg eHybrid delivers 381 PS, and the Touareg R eHybrid delivers 462 PS. All models have an eight-speed automatic gearbox and 4MOTION permanent all-wheel drive. The Touareg R 3.0 TSI eHybrid with 462 PS is the flagship model.

Not only was ours the 286 PS model, it was the Black Edition, with a long, long list of equipment taking the list price to a not inexpensive £70,460. So what do you get for your money?

Quality will out

The first obvious quality is, well, quality. From the action of the controls to the well-controlled ride, the thunk of the door, the fast efficiency of the powered tailgate, the super-smooth V6 and the crisp interior, it feels very solidly built inside and out; something all cars should aspire to.

The second - most notable - asset is its ease of driving. The light (sometimes slightly over-light) steering, nimble-on-its-toes ride and handling, the ease with which it changes direction at high speed, the way it corners - with little roll - all attest to an SUV that has been thoroughly sorted out in the design, engineering and evaluation stages. And in sport mode, the steering stiffens up a bit, too.

There wasn’t a rattle, squeak or shimmy, even over rougher roads and after this nomadic person of south London saw the car amass a thick coating of grime from winter motoring over a three-day 400-mile route over Salisbury Plain including some potholed country tracks, on to Somerset and back to London, where it purred through traffic like a sophisticate.

It’s possible to tell it’s a diesel on start-up and at idle but only just. At moving speeds it could be a petrol - except that it offers up big dollops of low-down torque; useful for safe overtaking manoeuvres and towing. Coupled with the equally smooth eight-speed gearbox, it made town work - and long distance motoring - a distinct pleasure. It’s undeniably fast, too.

On motorways and A-roads the distance cruise control worked efficiently, accurately reacting - for the most part - when preceding vehicles moved over, allowing the engine to accelerate smartly. In this mode, steering lane control was present but nicely muted so as not to be irritating.

Light years

Vision out - despite the bodyshell becoming more streamlined, less utilitarian over the years - was reasonable, aided by a big reversing camera screen. Talking of vision out, the headlights - which followed bends in the road - were excellent. Seat comfort was good (even the seat squab could be electrically extended), the seating position nicely ‘hugging’, while, adding to the feeling of refinement, the cabin remained relatively hushed even over concrete stretches of the A30.

There are - almost - too many toys to play with. I found the (misleadingly straight forward-looking) driver interface screen bamboozling at times, as there are sooo many options. Especially when trying to coordinate separate Apple CarPlay functions with my iPhone 13 Pro, for instance while using Waze for directions and attempting to listen to BBC Sounds; I could manage one but not both. It’s at times like this - before, presumably, weeks of familiarity in a new car - that old-fashioned push buttons seem like a dream.

Menus in the instrument binnacle, operated by steering wheel controls - were useful, more straightforward, and offered selection of a secondary navigation map as well as a ‘tiltometer’ for off-roading.

Other ‘toys’ including air suspension, enabling different settings (off-road, high/low ride height etc.), keyless entry, snazzy puddle lights projecting the VW badge, eight speakers for the great sound system, good provision of USB-C ports and so on, were the icing on the cake.

Favourite piece of kit? A button in the very spacious ‘boot’ that lowered the rear suspension when I was harnessing up our hound in the load area. It made him easier to reach. The model driven also had a useful, electronically-deployable tow hook.

This is a car that - effortlessly, it seems - combines practical workhorse ethics with lashings of discreet luxury, all bound up in a car that will slip through traffic virtually unnoticed. Without bragging about it. Which is precisely what many customers want.