The successful diesel
04/21/2018
It was 1976 when Volkswagen announced the Golf Diesel. Of course, it was not the first diesel car, but with the Golf, the diesel engine entered a class that had previously been dominated by gasoline engines.
You could clearly hear that it was a diesel. Many an early diesel Golf driver was asked whether he had engine damage because the Golf was only known as a petrol engine and the diesel engine was visually indistinguishable from the petrol engine. Accordingly, the petrol station attendant also looked suspiciously when you drove up to the diesel pump in a Golf.
In 1977, the magazine Auto Motor und Sport immediately subjected the new diesel to an endurance test over 50,000 km. Half a year was enough, during which time the Wolfsburg-based company easily delivered 25,000 new Golf diesels - the start of a boom.
Criticism was directed more at the Golf than at the specific diesel model. Instead, the 50 hp engine was described as robust and lively. It also proved to be reliable. The 840 kg Golf took 18.4 seconds to sprint from 0 to 100 km/h and "only" ran out of breath at 144 km/h. Over the entire 50,000 km, the diesel-powered Golf consumed just 6.9 liters of diesel per 100 km. Oh yes, we almost forgot: As a GLD, the Golf cost DM 12,975 back then, which would be around EUR 7,000 today, albeit with 145 SR 13 tires - even the space safer replacement wheels are wider today ...
The final sentence reads interestingly today: "The Golf Diesel has proven with this favorable kilometer price (7.9 Pf/km) on a longer distance that it not only consumes little fuel, but that it is also very reliable and less susceptible to repairs. It has thus confirmed the reputation that diesel cars generally enjoy."
Yes, those were different times. Nobody thought about diesel gate and cheating diesel 41 years ago. And nobody was bothered by the seconds-long preheating either - after all, you could save a lot of money.
