Which is the better motor?

[52172]

The 2010-2014 golf TDI or the newer 2015? Looking into getting my next commuter daily driver car. Will do some minor mods like reflash? Thanks

 

[jerrymander]

The motors are very close to identical for the average driver. The 10-14 has slightly more aftermarket support. They also should be 100% legal to drive from an emissions standpoint, meaning you won't "have to" take it back to VW just to appease the ****ers from CARB. 2015 might still require you to return to the dealership to perform "Phase 2" if the previous owner hadn't completed it. The 2015 was only sold in the US for nine months, so there's a lot less information on it.

2015 has a top mounted accelerator pedal, 2014 has a floor-mounted.
2015 has a single CD changer, 2014 has a six CD changer.
2015 has ADBLUE bull**** factory, 2014 does not.
2015 has an 11 yr/160k mi emissions warranty factory, 2014 does not(?).
2015 has VW CARNET that tracks your position via cell reciever for the NSA, 2014 does not.
2015 is assembled in Mexico, 2014 is assembled in Germany. Both German drivetrains.
2015 has 3 cockpit 12V plugs, 2014 has 1 (***).
Both have support for "reflash" from major tuning houses.
2015 has slightly more power and slightly better fuel economy than 2014, stock.
2015 has a nicer central console / multi function display than 2014.
2015 has less trunk space than 2014, in my opinion.
2015 only came in four door.
2015 has more VCDS tuning options for things like light function and button use, except you CANNOT disable hill-hold.
2015 has more room in wheel well for lol-stance or bruh-lift.

VW seems to estimate the DPF lasts shorter on the 2015, but I can't really find hard evidence of this.

 

[52172]

I’ll most likely go with 10-14. Commonrail.

 

[IndigoBlueWagon]

For engine specifically I think the '15 is better. Air to water intercooler (no icing), lower fuel pressure (less risk of pump failure), use of Adblue allows better tuning. Fixed '15s are showing great FE and seem to be doing well regarding repairs. There are a few cases of the variable water pumps failing, but not a lot.

Regarding the rest of the car, drive both and see which one you like better. I owned a '12 Golf and now have a '15 GSW. I like the '15 much better, never warmed up to the '12. But you should drive both and decide.

 

[52172]

Will do. I need a 6speed manual so finding a 15 might be harder.

 

[Lightflyer1]

Finding a manual is harder no matter which years.

 

[52172]

manual is the only thing I’ll buy. Is there any difference in the brakes on the s and se models? I wouldn’t mind a base S model as I’m planning aftermarket wheels? Thanks

 

[turbobrick240]

I suspect very, very few of the '15's will ever tick over 300k miles. Not that it really matters for most of the first and second owners. Emissions and cooling system issues will make them unpleasant to own once the emissions warranty expires, imo. The better fuel efficiency makes them attractive while the warranty is in effect, though.

 

[52172]

Yea it’s hard for me to retire my alh she’s still running strong at 430k. Would be nice to just redo the interior and drop a new motor and turbo in her and keep with the mk4? The newer cars are so much more refined though.

 

[Lightflyer1]

I would bet a fair number will lose their emission control hardware when the warranty ends and there is either trouble getting parts or great expense. Most will not be willing to just scrap the car because the dpf went bad. If no parts are available then there are also exemptions that can be had. Some amount of years makes them exempt from testing. Diesels are exempt anyway here in Texas.

 

[52172]

In Ca they have to be 97 or older to be exempt. I would love to just pay the 300 every 2 years to smog under the table and run straight exhaust and no dpf system.

 

[Matt-98AHU]

Not sure I'd get a 2009-14 "Gen 1" being in California and not able to 'delete' the emissions equipment.

Overall, they're a simpler engine than the 2015, in the long term the very basic components of the long block may very well afford a longer life with fewer complications.

However, there were a lot of dumb things VW was still finding out the hard way with them. This was the biggest compromise engine since they do NOT have diesel exhaust fluid (DEF). And since the scandal, the "fix" they've had is seemingly even harder on the DPFs than they already were.

DPFs were already failing at a higher rate on Gen 1 engines than on any of the others and from what I'm hearing, the update just makes the failure rate worse and the parts are backordered for at least 2 months now. And, to top it off, these are the engines more known for the high pressure fuel pump failing. The Gen 2 and Gen 3 engines having DEF and solenoid injectors don't seem to need as much pressure from the pump as well as not needing as many injection events since they don't need trick programming for the injection system to help get NOx levels where they need to be since they can just increase the dosing rate of the DEF to compensate for any shortcomings there. It may also be that the piezo crystals are part of the problem in the gen 1 engines.

The 2015s are extra complex, but they won't suffer some of the common maladies that IBW already outlined. Less DPF failures, no intercooler icing (not that that will be a problem in Buellton's climate). The 2015s have numerous tricks to warm the engine up faster and decrease drag from various items to help eek out every last MPG. And in real world use, the 2015 engines absolutely get better MPGs. Aside from the occasional leaky DEF injector, I suspect the 2015s are going to be much more reliable from the emissions equipment standpoint.

But, you might have to replace the oil bathed toothed belt that drives the oil pump with every timing belt change. There's a couple flaps in the cooling system for added complexity. A computer controlled variable displacement oil pump and as IBW mentioned, a computer controlled sheath on the water pump (though aftermarket timing belt and water pump kits offer to delete that).

The other thing you won't have to worry about on the 2015 engine? The P2015 intake manifold flap position code. There are no flaps to worry about with that setup. And that's a pretty common failure on the gen 1 engines.

Though, if you want my opinion, the gen 2 engine, which only came in 2012-14 Passats, is a real nice happy medium. It maintains some of what makes the Gen 1 engines simpler, and increases the simplicity and addresses some of the common issues that plague the gen 1s.

The gen 2 engines use an air-water intercooler as well, but it's a separate piece from the intake manifold (gen 3s it's integrated as part of the intake). The shortblock is much more like the gen 1s, the head is different, but still much simpler than the gen 3s. They also use similar solenoid injectors to the gen 3s, thus requiring less pressure from the HPFP and they do seem to have a lower failure rate than the Gen 1s as well. Can't remember the last time I heard of a DPF failure on a gen 2 either. It's a very similar design to the gen 1, but it doesn't need such aggressive EGR duty cycles or trick fuel injection programming or micro-regens for a lean NOx trap like the gen 1 does. Seems to help with reliability of the emissions components and despite being in a significantly larger car, the gen 2 engines get better fuel economy than the gen 1s as well.

The gen 1s are a bit of a disappointment in terms of efficiency, especially with shorter commutes.

I'm still tempted to pick one up and see if religious use of good fuel additives and paying close attention to exhaust gas temperature spikes, indicating an active regen, and letting it finish and cool down before shutting off the engine yields a reasonably reliable gen 1. But I suspect ultimately will be let down by the downgrade in efficiency coming from an ALH.

 

[52172]

Not sure I'd get a 2009-14 "Gen 1" being in California and not able to 'delete' the emissions equipment.
Overall, they're a simpler engine than the 2015, in the long term the very basic components of the long block may very well afford a longer life with fewer complications.
However, there were a lot of dumb things VW was still finding out the hard way with them. This was the biggest compromise engine since they do NOT have diesel exhaust fluid (DEF). And since the scandal, the "fix" they've had is seemingly even harder on the DPFs than they already were.
DPFs were already failing at a higher rate on Gen 1 engines than on any of the others and from what I'm hearing, the update just makes the failure rate worse and the parts are backordered for at least 2 months now. And, to top it off, these are the engines more known for the high pressure fuel pump failing. The Gen 2 and Gen 3 engines having DEF and solenoid injectors don't seem to need as much pressure from the pump as well as not needing as many injection events since they don't need trick programming for the injection system to help get NOx levels where they need to be since they can just increase the dosing rate of the DEF to compensate for any shortcomings there. It may also be that the piezo crystals are part of the problem in the gen 1 engines.
The 2015s are extra complex, but they won't suffer some of the common maladies that IBW already outlined. Less DPF failures, no intercooler icing (not that that will be a problem in Buellton's climate). The 2015s have numerous tricks to warm the engine up faster and decrease drag from various items to help eek out every last MPG. And in real world use, the 2015 engines absolutely get better MPGs. Aside from the occasional leaky DEF injector, I suspect the 2015s are going to be much more reliable from the emissions equipment standpoint.
But, you might have to replace the oil bathed toothed belt that drives the oil pump with every timing belt change. There's a couple flaps in the cooling system for added complexity. A computer controlled variable displacement oil pump and as IBW mentioned, a computer controlled sheath on the water pump (though aftermarket timing belt and water pump kits offer to delete that).
The other thing you won't have to worry about on the 2015 engine? The P2015 intake manifold flap position code. There are no flaps to worry about with that setup. And that's a pretty common failure on the gen 1 engines.
Though, if you want my opinion, the gen 2 engine, which only came in 2012-14 Passats, is a real nice happy medium. It maintains some of what makes the Gen 1 engines simpler, and increases the simplicity and addresses some of the common issues that plague the gen 1s.
The gen 2 engines use an air-water intercooler as well, but it's a separate piece from the intake manifold (gen 3s it's integrated as part of the intake). The shortblock is much more like the gen 1s, the head is different, but still much simpler than the gen 3s. They also use similar solenoid injectors to the gen 3s, thus requiring less pressure from the HPFP and they do seem to have a lower failure rate than the Gen 1s as well. Can't remember the last time I heard of a DPF failure on a gen 2 either. It's a very similar design to the gen 1, but it doesn't need such aggressive EGR duty cycles or trick fuel injection programming or micro-regens for a lean NOx trap like the gen 1 does. Seems to help with reliability of the emissions components and despite being in a significantly larger car, the gen 2 engines get better fuel economy than the gen 1s as well.
The gen 1s are a bit of a disappointment in terms of efficiency, especially with shorter commutes.
I'm still tempted to pick one up and see if religious use of good fuel additives and paying close attention to exhaust gas temperature spikes, indicating an active regen, and letting it finish and cool down before shutting off the engine yields a reasonably reliable gen 1. But I suspect ultimately will be let down by the downgrade in efficiency coming from an ALH.

I hear yea Matt. This is the second time you’ve recommended the Gen 2. I’ll have to consider a Passat with a 6 speed. Appreciate your in depth reasoning as to why it would be the better commuter.

 

[52172]

Also considering the e golf and solar panels on my roof.

 

[turbobrick240]

Unfortunately, the manual Passats are rare as hens teeth. They always were actually, but I bet 90+% of the few there were got crushed in the buyback program. For whatever reason, the manuals couldn't be made compliant and weren't eligible for a fix.

 

[52172]

Why were they not eligible for the fix?

 

[turbobrick240]

Good question. I guess it was going to cost VW too much to make them compliant. Must have been related to gear ratios and shifting behavior. The automatics can be programmed to shift more optimally- at least from an emissions standpoint.

 

[52172]

Hmmm so there probably aren’t any 6m tdi Passats out there. That really sucks. May just have to bite the bullet and go GTI 6 speed, but I’ll really really miss the range.

 

[Lightflyer1]

There are some out there but not buy backs. Only those that refused to turn theirs in and are now selling it. They will be difficult to find and probably command a higher price if they are aware of what they have.

 

[Matt-98AHU]

Court records show that VW did submit a fix proposal for the gen 2 manuals, but once evaluated was found not to be quite within compliance yet, VW had the choice to either rework that fix and submit yet another fix proposal and vehicles for testing (and pay the government for the pleasure of performing the testing) or just let it go.

Pretty sure they just did the math and found that they would have no problem meeting their quota for cars bought back and fixed within the timeframe outlined by the court settlement and decided it wasn't worth the time and resources to submit another fix proposal for what is a very small number of cars.

So, with how the court settlement worked, if you wanted to get restitution of some kind, you either had the car bought back for much more than it was worth, or you had VW apply the fix to your existing car, and they'd pay you once the fix was applied, your 3rd option was to do nothing at all, receive nothing, and pretend like none of it happened.

Being that the money offered to have the car bought back was so high, most people had a hard time saying no to the buyback offer. So yeah, 6 speed manual 12-14 Passats are exceptionally rare.

I do have a customer with one... he's got over 290,000 miles on it now, lots of long highway trips, tracks his mileage religiously on fuelly.com, lifetime average over the 250,000 miles or so he's been tracking it is 46.6 MPG... in that huge sedan.

I might have helped convince him to keep it, and likely said some similar words as I did above on how much I like the gen 2/CKRA engine.

Just wish it came in a Golf or Sportwagen... or that they had a wagon bodystyle that was offered on the NMS Passat platform with that engine in it.

 

[Rob Mayercik]

Hmmm so there probably aren’t any 6m tdi Passats out there. That really sucks. May just have to bite the bullet and go GTI 6 speed, but I’ll really really miss the range.

Is there no manual swap write-up for these cars?

 

[52172]

Don’t want to have to deal with a tranny swap.

 

[Rob Mayercik]

Fair enough.

 

[IndigoBlueWagon]

'15 Passat manuals are out there, and they were successfully fixed. And once in a while you'll see a '12-14 Passat manual for sale that someone didn't want to turn in. But odds are if an owner was willing to pass on the buyback to keep the car, they're not going to want to sell it.

You can also get an '11-15 Jetta with a manual. It's not a small car. Back seat is B4 Passat sized. I'd still go for the '15 for the better engine, however.