1 Year, 10,000 Miles, Loving Our 2008 VW R32

Posted on September 6, 2008 by BeatingUpwind

When I got the R32 a year ago I was really psyched. I had waited like 6 months for it and it was in the first batch to arrive in August ’07… My only complaint about the car is that I haven’t gotten to drive it enough – especially this year. I think it was July that we put a whopping 30 miles on it.

Nevertheless, we did manage to put about 10,000 miles on it the first year and had a great time with it. Initially I was driving to Norwalk, CT a couple a times a week on the Merritt Parkway, which is a blast with all the curves and whatnot. And on Memorial Day I drove single-handed to Chicago with a stop in Cincinatti both directions.

I haven’t gotten enough pictures of it, but here is one from the Chicago trip – this one is taken in Oak Park, near the Frank Lloyd Wright house…

Gas mileage isn’t all that great with it, but with a 3.2L, VR6, 250hp engine you don’t really expect it to be. I get about 24 mpg on the highway driving “comfortably fast”, which isn’t bad in my book. If I slowed down, I’d get better gas mileage, but that’s not why I bought an R32. (Do make sure you have a good radar detector).

One of my favorite things about the car is when Dan drops off something at the front door and then drives away to go park it in the garage. The sound (or should I say growl) of the car is just perfect. I get this big grin on my face and think “yeah, that’s my car…”

Would I get another R32? Absolutely, in a heartbeat…

The Downside Of In-Car Navigation Systems

Posted on May 25, 2008 by BeatingUpwind

We love the 2008 VW R32 we got back in August. And one of the things we like the most is the nav system. I’ve read reviews that say it’s not the best navigation system, but it does the job pretty well. The most important thing is we never argue about directions… I was raised in a family where the answer to “are we there yet” was to pass you a map and tell you to find where we were, where we were going and calculate the distance and divide by the speed. Dan has improved his navigation skills considerably since we first met, but before the nav system there were still times I’d have to either grab the map and look at it while I was driving, or pull over to look at the map… Now with “Mildred” (the name we’ve given our nav system) – none of that is necessary.

You’d think the nav system is completely wonderful, but I’m on a trip right now in Chicago and I gotta say there are times I love the nav system, and times I wish I had a map on me. What you lose with navigation systems is a sense of place and location. With a map you get a big picture and see things in relation to each other. Coming into a new city I feel a bit lost using a nav system to get me around. Sure it does a good job, but I don’t really have a clue where I am, and I miss that. I want to understand the city and the nav system doesn’t do that for me. I tried Google Maps and that helps a little, but for really getting and understanding a big map with lots of information density will beat Google Maps any day.

Our R32 In Canada

Posted on August 14, 2007 by BeatingUpwind

Dan and I (and the dogs) went to Toronto this past weekend. The craziness started with the Canadian border guard who didn’t seem to know what a temporary tag was and thought we were driving an unlicensed car. Then a few miles down the road this kid in the back seat of a Lexus SUV had his window rolled down and was pointing and smiling at our car (guess he knew what it was).

But the funniest thing was taking it to the local dealer – Yorkdale VW. When we were there over Christmas we saw a black, low-profile roof rack on a GTI which looked a lot better than the standard, chunky thing that VW sells. The dealer here in the US didn’t know how to get one so I figured the VW dealer in Toronto could get one…

So I get this guy in the parts department who tries to help me, but he’s junior and looking at all the wrong pages in the catalogs. So he goes and gets help from the more senior guy who’s on the phone. He asks what type of car I have and I say an ’08 R32. “You have a 2008 R32 here?”, “Yeah…” I say… “I’m creaming my pants right now…” he responds…

He comes out to the car to take a look, and while we’re walking through the shop he tells a couple guys there’s an ’08 R32 outside… When we get out there there’s already someone looking at the car (probably a sales guy or manager). The parts guy and I take a quick look at the car and then head back inside. We look through the computer to see if we can find the low profile roof rack, but can’t find one – even for an ’07 GTI.

On my way back out to the car I see a bunch of guys looking at it. The manager says, “I could make a $100 if you stayed here another 15 minutes – just in charging the guys to look at the car.” Later I think it’s more like he’s losing a $100 since they’re not working…

I get out the car and there’s at least 8 guys standing around looking at it. One of them asks me to pop the hood, I do… They ask how much horsepower it has – one guy thought it had 280 – I say 250. They talk about how VW could fit a 3.6 liter engine in there and make an incredibly fast car. I didn’t correct them (the 3.6 liter won’t fit in there). The funny part was how respectful of the car they were – it was like they were afraid to touch it. I wouldn’t have cared – I even left it unlocked when I went back in with the parts guy figuring some of them would want to look inside, but no one did…

I barely had enough time to get home and change for Dan’s grandmother’s funeral, so I excused myself, closed the hood and left… Too bad I didn’t have more time. I really wanted to get some of their dealer plates and a pic of it in front of their showroom so I could do fake “look, you can get R32s in Canada” post… But I didn’t have the time…

We Finally Got our .:R32

Posted on August 8, 2007 by BeatingUpwind

Took possession of our .:R32 last night. The session with our sales guy went really well, after some “drama” last week when the car came in and we went to look at it.

I think the drama last week was due to a number of factors. First, it was the last day of the month and they wanted to close deals. It seemed like every sales guy (and their dogs) were at the dealership making it a bit of zoo. Second, there was just simple miscommunication (things were on the wrong line of the invoice, etc.) Then there were a few jerks around there, and unfortunately our sales guy shared an office with one. And lastly, they mishandled the financing. Their first offer was for 7.5x% through VW Credit, then they went down to 6.89% through some bank whose name I didn’t recognize (we wound up getting 6.49% through our bank – Chase).

But he made up for it last night. I’m thinking he must have read my rant on VWVortex ’cause we went into another office (away from the rude guy), and he was pretty meticulous. It also helped that the place was quieter and calmer…

We’re doing a road trip to Toronto this weekend, so we’ll have pictures of the car early next week…

Knowing I was just going to stick it in the parking garage for a few days, we drove around last night. I took it pretty easy since I was just getting used to the car and it’s still in it’s break in period – not to mention that I’m a bit petrified of potholes with the 18″ rims…

All in all, it’s a pretty slick car. Sounds great, seems really solid (critics would say it feels heavy). The few times I pushed it a little it felt really surefooted. However, while I’d read someone who said it felt go-cart-like, it didn’t. The Mini Cooper S felt like a go-cart, the R32 feels too big and substantial for that… Then again the Mini was too much work to drive and I used to like to get back into the GTI and feel real power and more pampering… The R32 is like our old GTI, only on steroids…

Our car is on it’s way…

Posted on June 24, 2007 by BeatingUpwind

Back in February we ordered a new VW R32. I just found out from Brendan at Boardwalk VW in Redwood City, CA that 1) the car was “born” on Dan’s 40th birthday (6/15/07), and 2) that it will be at the port on 7/6/07. Brendan’s not our dealer, but he’s been really generous with all the people on VW Vortex who’ve pre-ordered their R32s – letting them know the status of their cars. He even found out the VIN number for us… WVWKC71KX8W021052…

But other people are saying that VW will be holding the cars at port and not releasing them until August since they want to do a proper ‘launch’ for the car and not have the cars trickle out one at a time… While I’m not happy the car will be sitting in the hot sun for the better part of a month, at least we should get it early in August… Hopefully we’ll be able to take it to Canada when we go up to renew Dan’s visa in mid-August…