Passat 2.0TDi Business Edition Estate B8 - first experiences

I finally had my new Passat 2.0TDi SE Business Edition Estate 2017 delivered around April this year after a long long wait.  It's a company car that has replaced a BMW 520d saloon.

I had a few options on it.

Firstly the wheels, just to make it look different to the standard one, still on the standard 17" diameter to keep the ride comfort.  They are easy to clean which is something that I always look for on a car, as cleaning the wheels can be a pain.  The BMW's were a complete pain, but I didn't choose that car.

Secondly I had the 3 zone climate, not because I needed 3 zone, but 2 is a must to allow a hotter passenger temperature, and mainly as I find climate control one of the better features of modern cars, and the first thing I look for in a car specification. I think it is a bit tight that Volkswagen do not include it as standard on the Passat SE Business Edition.

I  also had heated front seats, which is something that was nice on the BMW. Whether they are worth having I can't comment on yet. They are not going to be as useful as when the seats are leather, and therefore always cold in the morning.  The winter will show how worthwhile that option was.

The final option was the retractable towbar as we have a caravan.  This needed to have the paint rubbed off as they all do before it was used.  I've found it to be very convenient removing the need to grovel under the car attaching a removable one.  The downside is that the ball can easily corrode so I put a couple layers of cling film over it and wrap an elastic band around to secure which has worked quite well.

Ownership
It has been great to go back to an estate again after 2 years of having a saloon.  It's a huge estate as well.

That is a single mattress in there, I haven't moved the front seats forward at all, just removed the luggage cover, pulled the lever each side and thrown it in.  It's as though they made the Passat Estate boot to take a single mattress.  Does this make it the new VW camper?  It's really handing being able to lower both rear seats from the back of the boot, saving walking round from one side of the car and to the other.  The boot floor is not flat, as the seats don't quite fold flat, but with the massive space I can forgive that.

The handling is OK, it's a large car and it rides relatively tautly, certainly tauter that the BMW.  It's not going to win any handling competitions, but then it is a large family estate so not really what the car is about.

It's very economical if you drive gently, I've seen upto 73mpg on a longer drive already, but that is exceptional, although I have got 60mpg driving across town in free flowing 30/40mph traffic which I think is pretty impressive.  If you were going a long distance and drove very gently you could get close to 800 miles on a single tank of fuel. It's just over 10 years when I thought getting 500 miles to a tank was impressive.  I do tend to drive with it in the economy driving mode, albeit with sport steering setting which makes it easier to get better economy.

The Passat's ACC or Adaptive Cruise Control is brilliant, generally it works really well at tracking the speed of vehicles in front, and also preventing you from undertaking someone in the right hand lane in busier motorway traffic.  This feature of ACC on the Passat automatically switches to prevent undertaking when driving abroad as well, so you can still use it if you drive abroad.  The ACC will apply the brakes to achieve the desired speed, including when you are towing a caravan. You can also change gear whilst the cruise control is still on which is also a handy feature when in traffic or towing.

The ACC also has a maximum speed setting as well which works well, but annoyingly prevents you from heeling and toeing if you do such things.

The satnav works OK, but finding the Postcode entry can be a pain at first.  It really is hidden away. I resorted to searching out a YouTube video on how to access it.  The one option that I really wish that I had got is the link to use Google Maps through the sat nav screen off my phone. i was gutted to discover that it was an option. You retro fit it but it costs £200 to do at the dealer.  I have updated the sat nav maps once so far, new ones come out around April / May, then Oct/Nov each year and can downloaded for free from the vw website.  The download is about 14GB though.

So for the first 4,000 miles or so that is it.  So far so good. The 2017 Passat Estate is proving so far to be a comfortable and roomy family estate.  I just hope that it continues like that for the next 3 years or so.

Update in February 2018.

There had been a blemish on the VW Passat reliability! It failed to start one evening, the engine was turning over but not evenly. I tried it about 5 times before i gave up.  Luckily I was at home at the time with access to another vehicle, so I locked the Passat and used the Qashqai instead.

I was back home 90 minutes later so thought I'd give the Passat another go before calling for assistance in the morning. It started perfectly on the first push off the button, no hint of an issue, and has started and run perfectly ever since as well. Very strange. It even had me checking my last fuel receipt even though i had done over a 100 miles since it was last filled up.

Other than that all has been perfect, it remains a large family estate that is economical.

It's getting near to it's first service on time at about 11 months, even though I have only done about 7,500 miles as I've spent so much time flying this year instead of driving around the UK.

I'm still missing having the Android Auto option, but I see that it is standard on new Passats now, as well as the climate control and LED lights. I'd be interested to see what a 1.4TSi is like compared to the 2.0TDi 150. If especially like the refinement and faster engine warming.

Update November 2018

No further issues with reliability, previous one was really a one off thing, most strange.

Economy has been great, over 60 mph is available even on shorter runs if you take it easy.

How on earth can do get higher than 95 out of 100 on the Think Blue Trainer I do not know. I think you would have to start at the top of a mountain and not touch the accelorator all the way down.  It is a good guide to getting amazing economy for such a large family car.

I have still not had to have the car serviced, after doing about 14,500 miles so far. I haven't had to top up the oil either. The level is about 2/3 of the way between min and max on the dip stick.

Downsides are just two.  The first one is noise from the front suspension, I suspect from the anti roll bar bushes, which is something that me Octavias also suffered from.  The other thing is a rattle from one of the rear doors. I can't here it very often but I would really expect better from a car of this cost.  I'll mention both when it finally gooees for its first service.

Update - failure
The infotainment display has gone blank. It started turning off after about a minute, then back on, the off again. A blot on the Passat reliability.

It's booked into the dealer in 10 days time, they only allocate 1.5  hours from my described problem so I suspect that it happens with some regularity. 

My 2017 Passat had been reliable until this point apart from when it failed to start once, but that resolved itself by just leaving the car for an hour, and has not done it since.

I've had my front tyres replaced at 18,000 miles which was something of a shock. The tread was 3mm but the tyre place I suspect was a little  suspect with the readings given to Leaseplan to get them changed at the same time as a tyre was changed due to an unrepairable puncture.  I have never had tyres replaced so early, even on my previous vRS Octavia TDi which was somewhat hard on the front tyres....I wouldn't have been surprised if the traction control light had worn out on that!