Here we go! In my previous thread I spoke about the Touareg and my personal experience having owned one.
Well, enough taking a walk down memory lane. Now it's time to get down to brass tacks with the third-generation Touareg. Let's have a peek.
All-new Volkswagen TouaregSo, here's the quick, blow-by-blow details. It is build on the same architecture as the Porsche Cayenne and it is longer and wider than the outgoing model. It will benefit from the use of a six-cylinder gasoline-powered motor and several diesel options: two sixes and one eight. Eventually, a plug-in hybrid is expected to join the lineup.
As to be expected there will be the usual technology available in premium vehicles these days. What separates the Touareg from the pack, however, will the use of two major monitors. The instrument panel will use a 12-inch screen and the center stack will gain a 15-inch screen. Although some buttons will remain, largely the controls will reside in the touchscreen.
It seems to be far more premium — on the outside and inside — than the outgoing Touareg, so, props to VW for finally not blowing it.
All that said though, we're left wondering:
Is the all-new Touareg a STUD or DUD?All-new Volkswagen Touareg
Volkswagen's press release follows:Leading the way –
Volkswagen presents the new Touareg
- In its most important market: Volkswagen is presenting the brand's new flagship in China
- Milestone of the SUV campaign: Touareg shows Volkswagen's claim in the premium class
- The power of the brand: Touareg is a statement on design, technology, handling and comfort
- Success story: around one million Touareg SUVs built to date
Volkswagen is making a statement by staging a world premiere of a new model for the first time in China – its largest market. The new Touareg1 marks a milestone in the brand's largest model and technology campaign, and it shows what engineers and designers at Volkswagen can do. The new flagship takes a top position in the premium class SUV segment with its expressive design, its innovative operating, convenience and safety systems, as well as in the high quality of its materials and craftsmanship.
Equipped with the connectivity of a new era and a pioneering fusion of assistance, comfort, lighting and infotainment systems, the Touareg points the way to the future. At the same time, the exclusive SUV charges up its market segment with pure dynamism. The largest markets for what is now the third generation of the Touareg are China, Europe and Russia. Worldwide sales of the previous two generations amount to nearly one million units. The Touareg – as comfortable as it is dynamic – has, as the most technically advanced Volkswagen of its era, the potential to enthuse technology and design savvy drivers of premium class models of all sorts, reaching new target groups as well.
Premiere of the Innovision Cockpit. Volkswagen is presenting the fully digitalised Innovision Cockpit for the first time in the new Touareg. Here the digital instruments (Digital Cockpit with 12-inch display) and the top Discover Premium infotainment system (with 15-inch display) merge to form a digital operating, information, communication and entertainment unit that hardly needs any conventional buttons or switches. Always-on, offering intuitive control and maximum personalisation – with the Innovision Cockpit, the Touareg provides the blueprint for tomorrow's digital interior today.
A focus on people. Drivers use the Innovision Cockpit to adapt the assistance, handling and comfort systems specifically to their personal tastes; the car becomes 'their' Touareg. This opens up a world in which the driver and on-board guests no longer have to adapt to the car; rather the car adapts to them. Like a new smartphone, the Volkswagen is set up and tuned to personal needs. This is made possible by a new high level of connected systems and programmes – controlled via digital interfaces and the multifunction steering wheel.
Fusion of new assistance, handling and comfort systems. The Touareg is launching with the largest range of assistance, handling and comfort systems ever to be integrated into a Volkswagen. They include technologies such as the Night Vision assistance system (detects people and animals in darkness via a thermal imaging camera), Roadwork Lane Assist (semi-automated steering and lane keeping, accelerating and braking up to 60 km/h), Front Cross Traffic Assist (reacts to cross traffic in front of the Touareg), active all-wheel steering (makes the Touareg handle like a compact car), new roll stabilisation with electromechanically controlled anti-roll bars, 'IQ.Light – LED matrix headlights' (interactive, camera-based dipped and main beam headlight control) and a 'Windshield Head-up Display' projected directly onto the windscreen.
The driver experiences these systems as a single unit in the new Touareg. They are simply there – interconnected via a new central control unit – working imperceptibly in the background and making travel safer, more convenient and more intuitive than ever.
New dimensions and reduced weight. Compared to its predecessor, the third generation Touareg is moderately wider and longer. The new dimensions have positive effects on both the vehicle's proportions and its amount of interior space. The added exterior length leads, for example, to a significant increase in luggage capacity, from 697 to 810 litres (with rear bench seat up). Cargo there is hidden from onlookers by an optional electrically extending and retracting luggage compartment cover. Despite its increased length and width, the car body is 106 kg lighter because of its mixed material construction of aluminium (48 per cent) and high-tech steels (52 per cent).
Launch with V6 engines. In Europe, Volkswagen will initially offer two V6 diesel engines for the new 2018 Touareg with outputs of 170 kW / 231 PS and 210 kW / 286 PS. In a number of markets, this will also be followed by a V6 petrol engine (250 kW / 340 PS) and a V8 turbodiesel (310 kW / 421 PS). A new plug-in hybrid drive (270 kW / 367 PS of system power) is being prepared for China; its exact launch date in Europe is still open.
Volkswagen SUV campaign. The 2018 Touareg is an important milestone in the largest product and technology campaign in the history of the Volkswagen brand. The brand's range of SUVs is also being expanded comprehensively. It currently consists of the new T-Roc, the Tiguan, the new Tiguan Allspace (Europe) and Tiguan L (China), the new Atlas (USA) and the Teramont (China), plus the now completely redesigned Touareg as Volkswagen's top SUV model. Volkswagen will also be further extending the lower end of its SUV range with the compact T-Cross. The first all-electric SUV from Volkswagen is also a sure thing: the I.D. CROZZ. It will arrive on the market in 2020.