| Volkswagen and Porsche recall Touareg and Cayenne SUVs The largest German automaker, Volkswagen, is recalling its first Touareg SUV, presented to the world at the Paris show in the fall of 2002, for repair. In the car, which, despite its high cost, has managed to appeal to Russian car enthusiasts, problems were discovered in the brake system. “We are talking about checking the operation of the brake pedal mechanism, a malfunction in which can damage the braking system,” explains the VW expert. The handbrake spring is located in such a way that there is a risk of damage to nearby wires and a fire in the instrument panel area. VW claims that there have been no such cases yet, but last Friday a representative of the concern in Wolfsburg (Lower Saxony) strongly recommended that Touareg owners visit a branded service center or workshop in the near future. The same fate will befall the all-wheel drive Cayenne produced from October 2002 to July 19, 2003 by Porsche (owned by VW) - that's about 22 thousand cars. The development of Touareg and Cayenne was carried out jointly, as a result of which the cars practically do not differ in technical equipment.
However, the Cayenne is increasingly being attacked by automotive experts. “A brand with high reliability in 2000 slipped into the “average” in 2002, and now (in 2003 - Ed. ) has become completely bad,” notes the British consumer magazine Which? based on the results of the annual investigation. Which? has already assigned the Golf and Passat, one of the most popular cars in Russia, the category of “poor” cars in terms of manufacturing reliability. Now the shadow has fallen on the Touareg, on which VW has special hopes, hoping to sell up to 80 thousand cars a year, although the planned plan for the current year is 44.3 thousand.
The VW Touareg, which comfortably coexisted with qualities not typical of every SUV (the ability to overcome lateral rolls of up to 45 degrees and a ford up to 60 cm deep), was recognized as “the best on the American market” even before its release. And at the end of last year, this title was formalized when the most widely read US automotive publication Motor Trend named the Touareg the best Sport Utility Vehicle of 2003. In Russia, where sales began only at the end of February last year, the VW Touareg has already managed to win the sympathy of consumers, becoming the best-selling jeep after the BMW X5 (out of 7.4 thousand VW cars sold in 2003, 800 were jeeps). Russians are not bothered by the high cost of the Touareg - from 40 thousand euros with a V6 engine to 70 thousand euros with a ten-cylinder turbodiesel. And the price of its “twin” Cayenne with a V6 engine is even more - 65.9 thousand euros and more. Last week, during the annual national award “Car of the Year in Russia 2003”, the Touareg was recognized as the winner in the heavy SUV segment.
Meanwhile, the “favorite” has upset motorists before. In August 2003, VW recalled 620 Touaregs on North American roads (the largest market for the Touareg and Cayenne). As it turned out, the tire pressure monitoring system wires are located close to the parking brake, which can lead to a fire in the engine compartment.
The reputation of Porsche cars in terms of reliability has so far been favorable, and, for example, in the US market they occupy an intermediate place between the recognized leaders in quality, Japanese and domestic cars. However, the recall of such a significant number of cars - comparable to the annual production of the Cayenne (25 thousand) - could negatively affect the sales plans of Porsche, which considers the new SUV a growth engine in the face of falling demand for sports cars. After all, it was the demand for Cayenne, according to experts, that allowed the company to increase revenue by 15% in 2003. Porsche export sales rose 65% last year. In Russia, the Porsche Cayenne is a piece product; basically the entire volume of cars produced goes to North America. Yana VIKTOROVA |
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