VW Amarok

I concur with your assessment Norbar.
The Amarok is a fantastic dual cab ute.
What is it, won 4WD ute of the year twice now.
Kev

Alex

I am looking at gettin a new Dual Cab to replace my old patrol.
I test drove a number of vehicles. The three best to drive were the Amarok, Navara ST-X and the BT50/Ranger in that order.

I will probably be getting the Amarok. Still waiting a quote.

It is good to hear from someone who owns and drives one.

Hi Eric

You say "Interesting that the responders have not driven one" and "The service costs may be slightly higher but that is a small price for owning the best"

True I have not driven the Amarok, but I will say by the performance of our VW Golf TDi , it will kill any other vehicle in its class in every matter and as for service costs, if the Amarok is in the same manner as my diesel Golf, which it should, it is cheaper to service than my Prado.

I have a service interval of 7,500 km of the Prado, or 6 months which I do at 5000 kms and the Golf has a service interval of 15,000 or every 12 months. Even the Oil filters are cheaper for the Golf over the Prado.

VW have always made a great vehicle and like I said above, if and when I need to upgrade, the other manufactures would really have to pull a very big rabbit out of their hats to even temp me from buying an Amarok.

A very good friend of mine who was on my last trip and who's brother in law had the VW said that he would take Allans vehicle any time through the Simpson, and yes he knows a little about the Simpson and sand driving, as it is none other than John Deckert, author of the Westprint Range of Maps and has travelled extensively around Australia and knows first hand the full potential and ability of the VW.

I really love our Prado, and also having owned 4 Pajeros over a 18 year period which have all been great vehicles, but our Golf has made me seen that there are more than the other well known four wheel drives on the market.



Cheers



Stephen

Thanks for the feedback Guys, I should have added my mate will be leasing, so servicing etc are not an issue. I personally think everything taken into account and the fact he works in a town with a dealership so that also isn't an issue :-)

Cheers

One question , if Toyota's are so reliable , why is it necessary for there to be a dealer and SPARE parts division in every one horse town in Australia ?? Can't break'em ? Why all the Spare Parts !!

I'm glad they've got all the dealerships in everyone horse town cause that where I spend most of my time. Ive been caught before with a Pajero were I was getting a local dealership do the servicing because it was a 3 hour round trip to go to the nearest Mitsubishi dealership.

It went into limp home mode at Cobar in 40 degrees. I had an 8 hour road trip doing 40km/h top speed sweating my ring gear out to get to Dubbo to get it fixed.

It wasn't the Pajero's fault, They are a great unit, but the lack of dealerships hurt me big time.

If I had a VW dealer in Parkes, Id have one in an instant but wasting a day every 8 weeks to get it serviced means its not worth it.

Cheers Wilko

Tongue in cheek , If real truth be told and not just brand bias Toyotaphiles would ask the same question " why do we in our 'unbreakable' Toyotas need all these spare parts dealers , would not be that the "unbreakable " breaks ??

I test drove one as well and had it stall on me. I put it down to me being rusty and in a strange car because my current cars are autos, but apparently not? It was a big disappointment for me when VW released the auto without low range. I'm not buying one until the 8speed auto is proven to handle low range conditions without burning up the torque converter.

A nice new Amarok was in last years Australasian Safari (2012), I was really looking forward to seeing how it went, unfortunately it was withdrawn very early in the week long event ( I think it was the first day) I was told by another Official that the Clutch had expired. That was a shame as it would have been nice to see another Diesel type in the Event.
Cheers, Kanga.

Ross,
Your post made me laugh! I also stalled one I was testdriving 3 months ago - also had to stop the traffic while I turned it off and restarted it. Also found it gutless. Departure angle with towbar was poor. You lose a fair bit of clearance with the sump guard fitted. The standard tyres are too small for a vehicle that big.

But I like VWs which is why my wife drives a German built Tiguan. It's still one of the nicest vehicles on the road and drives like a cut snake. The Amarok would be great if it came with the 3L Toureg motor.

How do you "burn up" a torque converter?

Drive up a really long and steep track in high range letting the torque converter carry the load similar to riding a clutch. The transmission fluid will get extremely hot and can damage to the box. It happens on auto cars without low range like XTrails. My Freelander 2 has a transmission temperature warning light for just such an occasion. Continual heavy soft sand driving can cause it too. I have wondered whether the auto Amarok has any warnings, some cars don't.

Only problem would be the ramp over angle ???? LOL.

I love Kombi's! The Leyland Bros took them a lot of places :D

Hey Supa,

Guess his choice to now go for an auto has just been validated by you :-) A diesel Mechanic mate of mine only owns Toyotas, he services a fleet of Colorado's for a council and has had to replace all the clutches on the 2012 models and had to do the same with his 2011 Hilux, his latest LUX is an Auto. He mentioned to me a few months ago that he believed that all manufacturers would eventually go to CVT. Constant Variable Tranny's like the Nissan Marano and Mitsubishi Lancer run. This allows even the smallest the cube diesel to always be in the sweat spot for KW and Torque.

How do those CVT's go if you want to drive them in manual mode? I have a 6 speed tiptronic that I run as a manual especially on hill descents and winding roads. Do they have any gears to go back to?

I have driven a Murano Mike but that was a few years ago so can not comment on that. My Lancer has affectively a hi low ratio with 3 manual gears on each. Even in auto made coming down a hill you can feel it change back, if you go to Manual gate it works exactly the same as the Pajero, Magna, 380 TipTronics and you get the push into the seatbelt when you change down.

Of course IMHO the way of the future like it or not, all 4X4's I believe will come with some form of Hill Decent Control. Just one more reason I think I will keep my rig :-)

I've got HDC and I don't really like it that much although it's better than nothing. I gave my HDC a hiding in the High Country and the brakes went very hot, I could smell them and they started squealing. You can't beat selecting 1st (either in a manual or auto) low range and idling your way down. First gear in my Freelander 2 is not low enough for descents as there is no low range. The auto box and terrain response have effortlessly handled every ascent I've ever tried. I have doubts, could be wrong, that the auto Amorok's 1st gear is really low enough for a big descent without a low range box. I'm pretty confident it would handle the ascents though.