It's been a year since I bought the CR Wolfsburg, and having just returned from a big cross country 10,000km trip that was both on and off-road across some iconic Aussie tracks, areas its worth writing up about it.
From east to west and then back via the off-road sections of great central etc this is what largely we covered over three weeks.
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I refer to Wolfsburg to talk about the additional features and how they performed in the conditions.
Firstly the positives, VW have managed to improve most aspects of the Touareg to make it better for such adventures. Having owned and driven all makes of the Touareg since 2004 I feel comfortable in saying that.
The air suspension with the additional active roll assist is awesome on and off-road. It eats up the worse of the corrugated tracks and hugs the road so well in twisted mounted tracks, love it! One of my fav parts of the CR.
The heated, cooled massage seats are nice to keep you going on a long drive.
Overtaking the long road trains is a breeze, the 210kw engine and gears do a good job putting you over the front with confidence. Having owned the V10 and V8 I didn't miss the extra kw's.
The V8 would be better if pulling a big van of course.
The Matrix headlights and night vision are again superb and give you the extra confidence to drive at dawn and dusk helping avoid animals. Great how the lights dance around cars and keep high beam on all the time.
Night vision picked up Roo's couple of times and rang the bells.
Car was boot full with gear, with rear seats tilted(not flat), pushed forward and with the cargo net in place there's so much room in the boot! Much more than 7l or 7p.
I had the extra spare in the boot and all the gear with it and still had space to put in plenty more! This included 20litrs water and fuel.
Running on 18s with duratrac wranglers it was the only 'modification'. Had no punctures at all. Ran 40 on road and 28 off-road.
With this weight, setup and 110km speed (except 130 across NT) the fuel efficiency was between 7-8 l/100.
Across the off-road, pot holed, bull dust ridden tracks it performed flawlessly, no sign of bull dust inside.
No noise, no rattles at all. I tried the air care function, I reckon it does it's magic very well to keep the air so fresh and clean, good addition that. More than a gimmick!
The Waeco fridge was run off a separate battery when not driving and it worked quite well. Last thing I wanted was risk a flat battery in the middle of nowhere.
So what can be better?
- the lane assist does great job preventing anyone being careless and dozing off but I felt the system isn't suited to the endless, straight Aussie roads. The system keeps kicking in to falsely alert you to take over the steering wheel.
Across the Nullarbor and the longest, straightest road in Australia this kept on happening, or it must be the way I hold the steering.
Besides this a great trip on a great car. So comfortable, sure footed and capable for a trip on and off-road like this.
Few pictures to showcase what sort of terrain and places were covered.
Air suspension was in comfort on road and at off-road height when off-road.
Back home, few washes later it's clean and sparking, ready for the next one.
![Image]()
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![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
From east to west and then back via the off-road sections of great central etc this is what largely we covered over three weeks.
I refer to Wolfsburg to talk about the additional features and how they performed in the conditions.
Firstly the positives, VW have managed to improve most aspects of the Touareg to make it better for such adventures. Having owned and driven all makes of the Touareg since 2004 I feel comfortable in saying that.
The air suspension with the additional active roll assist is awesome on and off-road. It eats up the worse of the corrugated tracks and hugs the road so well in twisted mounted tracks, love it! One of my fav parts of the CR.
The heated, cooled massage seats are nice to keep you going on a long drive.
Overtaking the long road trains is a breeze, the 210kw engine and gears do a good job putting you over the front with confidence. Having owned the V10 and V8 I didn't miss the extra kw's.
The V8 would be better if pulling a big van of course.
The Matrix headlights and night vision are again superb and give you the extra confidence to drive at dawn and dusk helping avoid animals. Great how the lights dance around cars and keep high beam on all the time.
Night vision picked up Roo's couple of times and rang the bells.
Car was boot full with gear, with rear seats tilted(not flat), pushed forward and with the cargo net in place there's so much room in the boot! Much more than 7l or 7p.
I had the extra spare in the boot and all the gear with it and still had space to put in plenty more! This included 20litrs water and fuel.
Running on 18s with duratrac wranglers it was the only 'modification'. Had no punctures at all. Ran 40 on road and 28 off-road.
With this weight, setup and 110km speed (except 130 across NT) the fuel efficiency was between 7-8 l/100.
Across the off-road, pot holed, bull dust ridden tracks it performed flawlessly, no sign of bull dust inside.
No noise, no rattles at all. I tried the air care function, I reckon it does it's magic very well to keep the air so fresh and clean, good addition that. More than a gimmick!
The Waeco fridge was run off a separate battery when not driving and it worked quite well. Last thing I wanted was risk a flat battery in the middle of nowhere.
So what can be better?
- Full sized spare to go in the boot floor.
- whilst there was no dust inside, the seals are very good, there is accumulation of lot of dust outside the seals around the sills. Especially the back 5th door and the rear lights they suck in dust alright. Not inside the lights but in the crevices, between the body and lights.
- the lane assist does great job preventing anyone being careless and dozing off but I felt the system isn't suited to the endless, straight Aussie roads. The system keeps kicking in to falsely alert you to take over the steering wheel.
Across the Nullarbor and the longest, straightest road in Australia this kept on happening, or it must be the way I hold the steering.
Besides this a great trip on a great car. So comfortable, sure footed and capable for a trip on and off-road like this.
Few pictures to showcase what sort of terrain and places were covered.
Air suspension was in comfort on road and at off-road height when off-road.
Back home, few washes later it's clean and sparking, ready for the next one.
