Volkswagen Santana

The cabin of the Volkswagen is very spacious and wouldn’t feel very different than the Honda City or the Hyundai Accent. The dashboard is clean and the button bits and knobs are not very clustered together. The height of the driver’s seat can be adjusted based on the comfort level. The three-spoke steering wheel has quite a lot of control buttons on it and can even be adjusted as per the driver’s comfort.

A storage box is added to the driver’s side as well, which makes for a very important miscellaneous-carrying space. The seats are covered in good quality fabric that is comfortable as well. However, reading lights are added to the front row only. Instead, the company has gone on to offer an amazing feature built on the air conditioning system. The AC vents now have pollen filters on them.

The entertainment box consists of a 2-speaker system that can be connected via Aux-in, USB and an SD card. As for the radio, there is a roof-mounted antenna for the connection.

The Volkswagen Santana is more of a purist-like car with almost no elements of being brash. Despite being a subcompact, it is quite pleasing to the eyes. The car rides on 14-inch wheels and 175-section tyre, which may not be the best in the segment, but is quite capable of pulling the car without losing its grip on the ground.

The front fascia has the company’s trademark slated grille with a lot of chrome on it. The lower nose section has air vents and is accompanied by fog lamps at the two ends. The wheel arches are not very prominent and there aren’t any black cladding anywhere. The headlamps up front do not get projectors or LEDs for a start, but just a pair of halogen bulbs with turn indicators.

The wing mirrors are electrically adjustable and have the turn indicators installed on them. Moreover, these ORVMs, along with the door handles, are body-coloured. The rear boot is slightly uplifted and has thick split tail lights. There is also no such signs of chrome at the rear end but it does house rear fog lamps that come in very handy on dark roads.

The Volkswagen Santana isn’t the most powerful car around and even has inferior specification sheet to its competitors. The inline 4-cylinder gasoline engine works smoothly and does not have a very high revving engine to burn out a lot of fuel.

The 1.4-litre engine is good enough to make a maximum power of 90 horsepower at 5,500 rpm along with a peak torque of 132 Nm that comes at 3,800 rpm. The engine is compliant with the Euro-5 norms and does pretty well to fulfill most of the requirements.

The power thus produced is sent down to the front wheels via a 5-speed manual transmission gearbox only. Operating the gear knob in tandem with the clutch works amazingly well and there aren’t a lot of hiccups while cruising on the highways or even crawling down the busy traffic.

As mentioned before, the engine does not gobble up a lot of fuel. Hence, even if you have already covered a long journey at a solo or family drive, the 55-litre capacity tank will still have a lot of fuel left to keep you far from worrying. However, all of this comes at the cost of that extra punch down at the engine throttle.

Speaking about the safety, considering the price at which the Volkswagen Santana can be bought, the safety features offered are quite at par. Two airbags are offered as standard, just like any other car in the segment.

The braking is handled by ventilated discs for the front wheels while the rear gets drums only. However, despite the lack of disc brakes on all the sides, ABS is still offered as standard and we all know how good and safe it is to have the feature. However, the lack of EBD (electronic brakeforce distribution) may hurt the buyers slightly.

At the rear row, ISOFIX child seat provision is given, along with three 3-point seatbelts. The front seatbelts have the pretensioner feature, which makes jerks and thrusts in tight braking situations more bearable. Immobiliser and electronic door lock are also added to the package. Another impressive thing about the sedan is that a 14-inch spare wheel is offered as complementary.

With the introduction of Santana in the market, the Filipinos have received a more sensible choice in the sub-compact sedan segment. Ones who are not looking for anything fancy, Santana will definitely suffice their requirements in an effective manner.