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New-Car Review: 2013 Volkswagen Beetle
Vehicle Highlights
2013 Volkswagen Beetle: What Is It?
This sporty/performance compact car arrived for 2012 as the redesigned replacement for the 1998-2010 Volkswagen New Beetle. Renamed as simply, Beetle, it, too, is styled to recall the original rear-engine Bug, but the look is modernized and sleeker in a bid to woo more male buyers. The New Beetle was unflatteringly regarded by many as “a girl’s car.” The redesign also makes the new version longer, lower, and wider than its predecessor, with a more-usable back seat and added trunk space. Despite all its changes, the latest Beetle retains a 2-door hatchback “coupe” configuration, four-passenger seating, and a front-engine/front-wheel-drive format. Also as before, some underskin components are shared with Volkswagen’s compact Golf hatchbacks and Jetta sedans.
The original VW Beetle was produced from 1938 to 2003–still a record for a single car design–and sold in the U.S. from 1949 to 1977. Over 21 million were built. The latest Beetle, like the car it replaces, is made in Mexico alongside the Jetta sedan and Jetta SportWagen. All are built only in Mexico and are sold globally, not just in the U.S.
2013 Volkswagen Beetle: What’s New
VW announced turbodiesel TDI versions as early-2013 models. The only other changes among Beetle coupes involves features shuffling and a special Fender Edition package created with the noted maker of electric guitars and amplifiers. But the major news, as expected, is the debut of a parallel Beetle Convertible line, which is covered in a separate report.
2013 Volkswagen Beetle: Model Lineup, Features, and Options
The 2013 Volkswagen Beetle coupe comes in three main versions: 2.5, Turbo, and new-for-2013 TDI. Each is available in base trim and with specific feature packages. All are sold as individual “one price” models with no factory options. Dealer-installed accessories are available, though. These range from cosmetic add-ons like decals and bodyside moldings to functional items such as ski racks and protective nose masks.
Base-trim 2.5 and TDI Beetles feature 17-inch alloy wheels, leatherette vinyl upholstery, heated front seats with 6-way manual adjustment, tilt/telescopic steering wheel, trip computer, 50/50 split-fold rear seat, twin dashboard glove compartments, wireless phone link, media-player plug-in, and iPod connector. The base Turbo substitutes 18-inch wheels and adds a rear spoiler, foglights, sport front seats, cloth upholstery, aluminum pedal trim, and leather-wrapped shift knob and handbrake lever.
The step-up 2.5 and TDI model is a “w/Sunroof” version that delivers a tilt/slide panoramic sunroof and a touchscreen audio system with satellite radio. The 2.5 also includes keyless entry/engine-start, a leather-wrapped steering wheel with audio and cruise controls, a front center console with armrest, and a “high line” trip computer.
The top-line 2.5 and TDI “w/Sunroof, Sound and Navigation” have all the above, plus navigation and a premium Fender audio system. The 2.5 version gets 18-inch wheels as well.
The step-up Turbo offering is a “w/Sunroof and Sound” model that repeats 2.5/TDI “w/Sunroof” features and adds the Fender audio system. Above that is a Turbo “w/Sunroof, Sound and Navigation.” This duplicates the like-named 2.5/TDI package but adds 19-inch wheels, leather upholstery, leather door and dashboard trim, bi-xenon headlamps with LED running lamps, and LED license-plate lighting. The last three items were previously available for top-trim Turbos in a $ 1000 package.
The new Fender Edition Beetle is offered in “w/Sunroof” 2.5 and “Sunroof and Sound” Turbo guises. Specific features involve Deep Metallic Black paint, brushed-chrome door mirrors, special 18-inch wheels, bi-xenon headlamps, Fender-inspired “sunburst” upholstery-seam and dashboard coloring, and Fender logos inside and out.
2013 Volkswagen Beetle: Engines, Transmissions, and Drive Wheels
As before, Beetle 2.5s use a 170-horsepower 2.5-liter 5-cylinder engine that mates to a 5-speed manual transmission or, at extra cost, a conventional 6-speed automatic. Turbo models use a 200-horsepower 2.0-liter turbocharged 4-cylinder, while TDIs substitute a 140-horsepower 2.0-liter 4-cylinder turbodiesel. These engines team with a 6-speed manual transmission or an optional 6-speed dual-clutch automated-manual that behaves much like the torque-converter automatic. As noted, all Beetles employ front-wheel drive.
2013 Volkswagen Beetle: Fuel Economy
EPA ratings for 2.5 models are unchanged at 22 mpg city/31 mpg highway with manual transmission and 22/29 with automatic. The gas Turbo models also stand pat at 21/30 mpg with manual transmission and 22/30 with automatic. The new-for-2013 turbodiesel TDI versions come in at 28/41 with manual and 29/39 with automatic.
Volkswagen recommends regular-grade gas for 2.5 models and premium for Turbos. In Consumer Guide testing a Turbo with auto-manual transmission averaged 23 mpg in a 60/40 city/freeway driving mix. Unlike many diesels, Beetle TDIs meet 50-state emissions standards without a urea-based exhaust-treatment system requiring periodic dealer maintenance.
2013 Volkswagen Beetle: Safety Features
The 2013 Volkswagen Beetle has a standard complement of expected and federally mandated safety features including ABS, stability system, traction control, and front side airbags. Rear side airbags are not available. Manual-transmission models come with a hill-holder clutch.
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Notes From The Parking Lot: 2012 Volkswagen Beetle
Inside This Article
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Notes From the Parking Lot: 2012 Volkswagen Beetle
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Model: 2012 Volkswagen Beetle 2.5L Sunroof/Sound/Navigation; 170-horsepower 2.5-liter 5-cylinder and 6-speed automatic transmission
Base Price: $ 25,195
Options: None
Price as Tested: $ 25,965
Total Miles Tested: 654 miles
Fuel Economy: 26.9 mpg
| Editors’ Comments: |
| Damon Bell: I’m intrigued with the Beetle’s one-of-a-kind styling, but not enough to put up with its higher sticker price and compromises in practicality and ergonomics compared to its Golf stablemate. A Golf is cheaper, its body structure feels more robust, and it offers more cargo and passenger versatility. Also, all of our testers were put off by the non-linear throttle response on this Beetle test car. |
| Don Sikora: The new-for-2012 European-brand, made-in-Mexico, small, cute hatchback class includes two entrants: the Volkswagen Beetle and Fiat 500. Both are surprisingly refined, and each has a distinct personality. If fun-to-drive is more important to you, consider the Fiat. If you need a bit more room inside, the nicely trimmed Beetle might be a better choice. With the standard 2.5-liter engine and automatic transmission, it’s pleasant to drive, and if you watch your options, the VW could arguably be a better value than the Fiat. |
| Jack Stewart: The VW Beetle has most of the strong points of its Golf platform mate, but with a unique style for about a $ 1,000 price premium. Back-seat passengers also pay a premium for style. In spite of an extra three inches in overall length, the Beetle’s rear seat is a less pleasant place to be than the Golf. For some, the form-follows-function Golf is the best buy. While for others, the Beetle’s retro look is well worth its cost in both dollars and back-seat room. |
Inside This Article
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Notes From the Parking Lot: 2012 Volkswagen Beetle
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Wasabi alarm, beetle sex win Ig Nobel spoof prizes (Reuters)
(Reuters) – Prognosticators who predicted the end of the world and got it wrong, scientists who built a wasabi fire alarm, and researchers who studied how the urge to urinate affects decision-making were among the winners of spoof Ig Nobel prizes on Thursday.
The annual prizes, meant to entertain and encourage scientific research, are awarded by the Journal of Improbable Research as a whimsical counterpart to the Nobel Prizes, which will be announced next week.
Ig Nobels also went to researchers who found that the male buprestid beetle likes to copulate with Australian beer bottles called stubbies, and researchers who showed why discus throwers become dizzy and hammer throwers do not.
Former winners of the real Nobel prizes hand out the prizes at a ceremony held at Harvard University in Massachusetts.
A personal favorite of Marc Abrahams, editor of the Annals and architect of the Ig Nobels, is this year’s winner for the Public Safety Prize, which went to John Senders of the University of Toronto, Canada.
Senders and colleagues conducted experiments to see how distractions — in this case a helmet with a visor that repeatedly flaps over a person’s face — affects attention during highway driving.
“They put this on someone while this visor is flapping and blinding them,” Abrahams said.
Remarkably, the driver fared quite well, Abrahams said.
Peter Snyder, a professor of Neurology at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, was part of two research teams who won the Medicine Prize for studying how the urge to urinate affects decision-making.
Snyder’s team set up an experiment in which volunteers did computer tests and then periodically drank 250 ml (about 8 ounces) of water as the scientists measured the effects of the volunteers’ gradually swelling bladders on attention and working memory. The aim was to see who could last the longest before bolting for the toilet.
The study found that attention and working memory suffer when you are so focused on having to pee.
“When you gotta go, you gotta go,” Snyder said.
Abrahams said Ig Nobel judges spend much of the year sifting through piles of nominations, and the selection process can become quite heated.
“We have a devil of a time picking them. I have to step in and remind them what prize it is we are arguing about.”
Other winners:
– Arturas Zuokas, the mayor of Vilnius, Lithuania, winner of the Peace Prize for showing that the problem of illegally parked luxury cars can be solved by running them over with an armored tank. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-fWN0FmcIU
– John Perry of Stanford University for his Theory of Structured Procrastination, which holds procrastinators can be motivated to do important things as long as they are doing them as a way of avoiding something even more important.
– Anna Wilkinson of the University of Lincoln in the United Kingdom, Natalie Sebanz of Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands and others for their study that found no evidence of contagious yawning in red-footed turtles.
– Makoto Imai, Naoki Urushihata, Hideki Tanemura, Yukinobu Tajima, Hideaki Goto, Koichiro Mizoguchi and Junichi Murakami of Japan for determining the ideal density of airborne wasabi — a pungent horseradish — to awaken sleeping people and for applying this knowledge to invent a wasabi fire alarm.
– Karl Halvor Teigen of the University of Oslo, Norway, for trying to understand why, in everyday life, people sigh.
– Americans Dorothy Martin who predicted the world would end in 1954; Pat Robertson who predicted the world would end in 1982; Elizabeth Clare Prophet who predicted the world would end in 1990; and Harold Camping who predicted the world would end on September 6, 1994, and on October 21, 2011; Lee Jang Rim of Korea who predicted the world would end in 1992; Shoko Asahara of Japan who predicted the world would end in 1997; Credonia Mwerinde of Uganda who predicted the world would end in 1999 — for teaching the world to be careful when making mathematical assumptions and calculations.
A replay of the awards ceremony can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/improbableresearch .
(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago; Editing by Xavier Briand)
