Mk3 golf vs mk4 reliability issues

[Seanl]

Surprised about the Focus but the pug isn't a shocker,  I've had a couple of their models old and new, they were sh*t.  I've had friends that have had them, they were also sh*t.  I bet the 307 blew bulbs like an 80's Christmas tree too!  My mates 307 estate has never had a full set of outside lights working since he's owned it, he just seems to go round in circles replacing them.  The one before it was the same.

 
[/quote]

I actually sold the focus to my sister which makes it worse as she's had nothing but problems with it as well. Feel a bit guilty obviously but she did get an outrageously good deal on it! From interior trim items falling off or breaking, a/c pump dieing, coilpack going, rear shoes going and destroying the drums, windscreen chip that I had filled spreading again.......etc etc. Think shes spent more on fixing it than she bought it off me for, and it's only 5 years old!

[tweed]

my mk3 has never let me down. I've never had to replace anything on it in two years. Well apart from window wipers 

Can't comment on the mk4

[DOA]

Mk3's do seem pretty reliable but thats what happens when most of the basics are pretty much carried over from the far superior Mk2. Quite how they wrecked the good bits about the Mk2 and made the Mk3 so relatively horrid and puddinglike to drive is beyond me. Sure they are a lot more refined but they just feel like a big wobbly lump of blancmonge with zero steering feel to drive in comparison. I can still remember the press car that Car magazine ran when the VR6 came out, they hated it and its multifarious reliability problems so much they put a lemon on the front cover of one issue in place of a picture of the car with the title of something like VW makes a lemon lol. Needless to say, VW picked the reliability game up a bit after the first years efforts!

As for the Mk4, why would you??? Ugly, heavy, fat arsed heaps of crap made down to the lowest possible budget.

[Screech16v]

The main downfall of the a standard mk3 is the mk2 suspension it came with,just not up to the job with the extra weight.

[Wayne]

The main downfall of the a standard mk3 is the mk2 suspension it came with,just not up to the job with the extra weight.

It was not mk2 suspension  all GTI's and VR6's had the plus suspension which was underdamped however they were uprated from the mk2 settings.

[Screech16v]

The main downfall of the a standard mk3 is the mk2 suspension it came with,just not up to the job with the extra weight.
[/quote

It was not mk2 suspension  all GTI's and VR6's had the plus suspension which was underdamped however they were uprated from the mk2 settings.

Well i cant argue with you as  i just presumed that was the case because they are interchangeable 

[thai-wronghorse]

And even that was only up until 95 when it was revised. But yeah I do agree, standard mk3 suspension is turd.

[SoundillusioN]

And even that was only up until 95 when it was revised. But yeah I do agree, standard mk3 suspension is turd.

Was this not slightly deliberate of VW in an attempt to sell the car to a bigger audience as with many things on the MK3, more comfortable and refined etc.? Not suggesting it was a wise move though.

[thai-wronghorse]

''comfortable and refined'' More like vague and wallowy. As soon as you change from the OEM struts and springs the drive is transformed, even without smacking it with the lowering stick.

[dom]

I've spent more money on maintaining the Mk4 in 6 months than I did on the mk3 in my 18 months of ownership.

And I still need to change the arb bushes & top mounts