UK-POLOS.NET - THE VW Polo Forum

Hi guys,
can you explain me how can I find out where my baby (Polo 9N 1.9TDi) was built?

Look at your VIN number - and then look in the DIY section, there was a guide explaining how to read them

my 9n is from spain

My 9N is from Spain too...
What's the difference?

My 9N is 2004 model.... any changes in the chassis hardiness?

mines 2004 too

mine's from spain too. the factory in spain won the "best quality award" among all VW factories last year

cheers

I listened that the VW Spanish factory is not good like the factory in Germany...
I listened taht the spanish one is the worsest!!!!

mhmmmm!!!
Is there some article of this "best quality award"...

well i searched the net but i couldn't find an official statement about the factory in pamplona winning an award. but believe me, my source is reliable (works for VW)
anyway, winning "the best" award doesn't necessarily make a factory best, but i've heard good things about spain from other people too.

cheers

Yeah! Spain is cool! We have sun, we have beach... But this doesn't mean that we have the best factoryes... I agree with you that maybe spanish made polos are worse than german. But, isn't building a car a "standard"? I mean, putting the pieces one by one in one determinate order, so I can't figure how can be "bad quality".

99.9% of UK 9n's are built in Spain. The only other place being Slovakia.

I have only ever seen one Slovakian built 9n and that was at a VW training college in Nottingham.

"bad quality" means different materials like gum-gasket and bad montage I think...

spain = good qual.
makes me feel better!

Quality has a huge amount to do with the workforce as well as with the design.

If you want to take a quality control view, then the issue is one of reproducability -- for example, with the same design of mechanical connection between two parts, what is the probability of the connection being formed correctly?

When talking about machine-made connections, you're talking about the quality of the design of the manufacturing machine as well as the design of the connection itself.

When you're talking about man-made conections, you're talking about the attitude, willingness and desire of the workforce to form the connection correctly, as well as the design of the connection itself.

If you want to take a total quality management view, then the issue is one of how empower the workforce is to make changes to the design or the assembly process and the willingness and desrie of the workforce to make that change. I seem to recall that Nissan (I think) have a system where any plant floor operative can stop the line if they feel that the cars aren't going together right. The issue can be anything at all - big or small - In Nissan's corporate culture, the stopping of the line is considered an (albeit a bit late) opportunity to improve the quality, not a loss in production.

It all comes down to attitudes, in my opinion. This is why the Eastern-european VAG cars (Skoda in particular) are doing so much better than VW in the quality stakes -- because they have a willing workforce. Afterall, much to the design and materials are the same.

Just my thoughts, anyway.

I'll follow up with some more info on what VW's doing about this...

Deek

OK, here's the follow-up.

VW are facing huge problems with expectations and past image not being met with the quality of their current existing cars. They know this. What's worse, is customers (particularly the more vocal North American ones) have been noticing this for the past few years. Now, the motoring press have caught up with the "voice of the customer" and that's potentially devistating for VW. Once you loose your brand image, what do you have left other than competition on price and the need to create a new image.

In the UK, we just need to look at the comments Clarkson made in last Sunday's Times when comparing the MK5 Golf to the new Astra:

There’s been a bit of a tectonic shift in the world of the family hatchback recently, mainly because of the Volkswagen Golf. For 30 years it’s been the solid, well made fallback for those who wanted a taste of the exotic but nothing too challenging. ... The new version, however, really doesn’t seem to have captured anyone’s imagination. Some say it’s the price, which is steep, others argue that VW has lost the quality plot recently.

Inside, the Astra’s sense of quality continues. The carpets and upholstery don’t feel like they’ve been taken from an Indian restaurant’s offcuts. The plastic doesn’t feel as if it’s been made from a melted-down Action Man. It feels like a Golf used to feel when Volkswagen made its cars properly.

Then, the owners are noticing this as well:

Still got the top centre vent rattle despite dealer trying to fix twice among load of other problems with rattles, poor fit and sub quality parts (door skin peeling etc). Now the vent is completely stuck. What C**p build quality - really. The 2.0 TDI does vibrate a lot but they should get these gremlins out before putting the model on sale. This is my first VW and my last - I thought Fiat were bad but this will kill the golf stone dead if it carries on.

Source: http://www.uk-mkivs.net/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=32692

By the recient posts about poor fitting panels, rattles, poor wipers etc. It dosnt look good for future MK V owners!

Surely alot of these problems should of been sorted at the factory nevermind the PDI!

Source: http://www.uk-mkivs.net/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=32669

VW's reaction to all this? Publically deny there's any problem and continue to sell the quality pitch. Interestingly, they don't do this in the corporate advertising any more (insteading preferring the brand values of "uniqueness" and "individuality"), but the dealers certainly still use it!

Internally? Panic!:

It's [VW's] facing a crisis of confidence among dealers and customers who are increasingly fed up with quality problems.

and then employ the "Quality Guru" from Audi. Source: http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2004-05-11-vw_x.htm

VW also have a less-sustainable reaction to the Golf's problems -- ignore the problems and push the dealers harder to sell them!!
Source: http://www.channel4.com/4car/news/news- ... s_id=10630

Let's hope it all works out well in the end!

Deek.

Hmmm... All this sounds very familiar: that's exactly what happened to VW in the late '90s and early-'00s in Brazil when it lost its 50-year market lead in this country.

What happens is, VW suddenly decides it is not a 'popular' car maker after all but rather an 'upmarket' brand. Cue unjustifiable price increases across the range, not matched by the quality of the cars (particularly the Golf III imported from Mexico and the German Passats that weren't 'german-solid' at all - these had people wondering whether they had sent us cars that hadn't passed quality control).

Huge increases in parts and labour costs at VW dealers didn't help: VW was giving itself the BMW treatment by charging absurd prices for its (locally-made) parts - and that was before the Euro even existed, let alone got that expensive - thus ruining the easy-maintenance image its cars enjoyed. These days VW justifies the absurd prices by saying that the Euro is expensive - but hey, look, doesn't it say 'Made in Brazil' on the part itself?

You used to pay more for a Volks in the certainty that 1. the car would not give you trouble and 2. even if it did it'd still be cheap to have it fixed. That's the image that made (and still makes) the Gol so successful.

By leaving all that behind, not only here but elsewhere in the world, soon VW will only have China and its car-illiterate, Santana-purchasing market to rely on.

[/end rant]

Now, I've been looking (and talking, and driving) around and what I've come to realize is, the more 'aspirational' (ie pretentious) VW cars got, the more problematic they became.

Compare a rattly new Polo with a ten-year-old Gol and you'll know what I mean (these things sell well in supposedly tough places like Brazil Argentina and Mexico for a reason)*.

Now, we should remember that not all that long ago VW was a company that had to buy another (Audi-Auto Union) just to be able to make a proper front-engined, water-cooled car. Maybe we're just expecting too much from them.

Or maybe we're overpaying (Golf V anyone?) for fidgety cars that just aren't up to their car-for-the-common-man jobs.

I say this because it's easy to claim an Audi A4 built by essentially the same company is better made - then again it's way more expensive AND, crucially, it's never subject to the same use and abuse as a Golf or Polo.

So, it's unjust to expect the same behaviour from cars that are put to rather different uses - but I don't blame anyone who's bought a Golf V, after all they've paid silly money for their VW and should expect that every silly penny they've spent be converted into more that just dampened grab handles.



*A note from a veteran VW flame warrior: before the continent vs. continent, first vs. third world, "different needs and expectations" debate begins, if it begins, all I have to say is this: no matter how much Europeans kid themselves otherwise, the everyday conditions a car faces are NOT that different from one continent to another (unless we're talking dirt-road American or South African countryside here, that's definitely tougher than Europe - and by America I mean the whole continent and not just the USA). Europe's got excellent technical controls (MOT, TÃœV, CT etc.) and sometimes better motorways but by no means cars have an easier life there. Ask any 10-year old Ford Escort.