Instead of the TDI . . .

The Crazy Train continues to pick up speed. It just won’t go very far… .

VW – clearly unhinged now – has revealed an updated version of its unsalable electrified Golf.

This one is New And Improved!

Instead of a maximum range – under ideal conditions (this part always said at triple Warp Speed by a fast-talking, sotto voce announcer like they do at the end of a radio commercial about a car dealer’s month-end “give away” sale prices) of 86 miles, you will get 126 miles of range!

Well, in city driving . . .

Maybe.

Hopefully?

Possibly . . . before the lights go dim and the eGolf rolls silently kaput to the side of the road.

That’s 126 miles (city . . . 105 on the highway) assuming it’s sunny and warm out. But not too sunny, so you don’t need to use the AC, which draws electricity (lots) and so reduces the car’s real-world range (also lots).

Or too cold and dark.

So you can avoid using the heater – and the headlights – which also burn up electricity, it being the car’s only source of power.

The clapping seal media never mentions this stuff. They snap up the press kit mackerel about 126 miles of range and New! and Advanced!

It’s beyond malpractice.

Do they not think people will notice that their mileage will vary? Do they not consider it relevant to mention the electric car-specific problems of range affected dramatically by heat and cold and use of accessories?

But don’t worry! The new eGolf is Advanced! It will offer as (sotto voce, fast talk) optional equipment a “fast” charger that gets you going again in only one hour!

But you’ll go even less far than when you first started out.

The mackerel-eating press never mentions this, either.

Here’s the scoop:

The nature of batteries being what it is, a full charge in a short time results in shortened battery life. Hence (once again, sotto voce) 80 percent of charge after a one-hour hook-up on the optionally available “fast” charger rig.

What is 80 percent of 126? You are good to go for another 100 miles – maybe, if it’s not too cold or too hot and you don’t drive very fast – before needing another one-hour hook-up to the electrical umbilical.

If it’s highway driving (105 mile best-case range) you’re looking at 86 miles before your next one-hour pit stop.

PS (and sotto voce, again) the bas trim eGolf without the optional – that is, extra cost – “fast” charger system needs six hours to  recharge itself.     

No word yet about the cost of the optional “fast” charger system. But expect the New and Advanced! eGolf to cost at least what the old one did – which was about $30,000.

Meanwhile, the TDI diesel-powered Golf – which could go 594 miles in between fill-ups without caveats about conditions and which took less than five minutes to refuel and stickered for about $22k – has been fatwa’d out of existence.

The multi-leveled dishonesty – and idiocy – makes my teeth ache.

There is no sane explanation for any of this. The people running VW – and the other automakers – aren’t imbeciles and they’re probably not crazy, either. They know perfectly well – one hopes – that a $30,000 car with a best case range of 126 miles that needs at least one hour to recover the ability to go another 100 or so isn’t going to sell unless that’s all they’re allowed to sell.

Which as it turns out is exactly the case.

Not yet here, but in Europe – which of course is VW’s home market (ditto BMW and Mercedes, who’ve also guzzled the electric car Kool Aid). The various governments over there are threatening to or actually have imposed “zero emissions zones” where it’s illegal to drive a car that isn’t electric.

For the earf, you see.

Actually, for the elites – the people (like the people in government) who have the looted riches to be in a position to afford a $30,000 electric Golf or a $40,000 Tesla  or (even better) an electrified six figure BMW 7 Series such as the one I test-drove (and reviewed, here) recently.

It at least has heated and massaging seats.

Again, these people aren’t stupid. They have entire departments of marketing people who crunch numbers and know their demographic. The have to know that two-thirds of the people who buy new cars will be priced out of the market by electric cars.

Leaving aside the issue of the functional gimps.

What they are doing, I have come to believe (because I do not believe they are stupid) is push electric cars as a way to get people out of cars. And by “people,” I mean us.

They will continue to drive – just as the elites in the former Soviet Union cruised blithely on empty highways in their well-padded Zil limousines.

It’s us who’ll either be taking the bus – or riding our bicycles. Which they’ll probably go after next.

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