What do VW gain from Underestimating Performance?

[Bill_the_Bear]

I dunno if VW have thought about it that much tbh...

[master_hayabusa]

The July edition of Car and Driver stateside tested the GTI (Manual NON-PP) and got 5.6s to 60MPH and a 14.2 Quarter Mile 

Remember though it's an american magazine and they quote 0-60mph NOT 0-62mph

[Bill_the_Bear]

The July edition of Car and Driver stateside tested the GTI (Manual NON-PP) and got 5.6s to 60MPH and a 14.2 Quarter Mile 

Remember though it's an american magazine and they quote 0-60mph NOT 0-62mph

Ah ok.  Well, it beats the Focus by 0.1s, so if the British official Focus 0-62 is faster than 6.6s then we know the GTI should be faster than its official 6.5!

[Gung-Ho]

Slightly off topic but interesting nonetheless.... back in the early 90's there was a gentleman's agreement in Japan that all high performance cars such as the Impreza & Evo were limited to 280ps (276bhp), when in reality these cars were producing well over 300bhp. Reasons were unknown as to why this power limit was introduced, but many thought it was a response to the increasing number of traffic accidents associated with high performance cars. Also, the gentleman's agreement was there to avoid unlimited power race between Japanese car manufactures.

So maybe the real reason why the power figure is greater than stated, is to prevent an all out power struggle within the VAG group???

[Hobojim]

The DIN standard test that VAG quote their PS from is for an 'as installed engine' including all losses for alternators, water pumps, catalysers, etc, at the output shaft ( before gear box losses ). The ISO standard that the japs and yanks use does not include these losses I don't think ( I'm not up on the ISO I don't use it ). The ISO is a bench test of the engine.