Seemingly aimed at Golf owners who want to sit a little higher, does the Tiguan offer anything new to market, asks Michael McAleer, Motoring editor.
IT WAS only a matter of time before Volkswagen took on the soft-roading suburban SUV set. After all, the brand is responsible for probably the most iconic suburban hatchback: the VW Golf.
Something of a symbol of middle class motoring, particularly for young females, its power of attraction probably meant that some senior product planners thought they could withstand the SUV onslaught on their core market.
Ever-growing sales figures for SUVs showed they were wrong. So the Germans have bit the bullet and built a soft-roader.
Of course, they've done it on the basis that it's probably going to be a Golf owner who buys it. So in reality there's a lot of similarity between the two products.
The exterior look takes a little while to get used to. While some of the design heritage does hark to VW's full-sized Touareg SUV, it's just a little too diminutive to be considered muscular. In rugby parlance, it's more scrum-half than prop.
There's no question that the Tiguan is cute and relatively practical. It's just that at no stage does it look menacing, and like it or not, that's the look that most SUV owners are striving for. They want to dominate the road and subconsciously influence other drivers to avoid them and pull aside when they pass. In reality, few motorists are going to pull over to let a Tiguan past.
Back seat room seems slightly more spacious than in the equivalent Golf, but it's not going to add much in the way of family flexibility to the current hatchback offering.
If it wasn't for the current fascination for these higher-set vehicles, you'd have to wonder why people actually bother.
For the same money you could pick up a Passat estate, which is a real family motor with a boot big enough to swallow any family load. And given the seating format, there's only a handful of SUVs that really offer the sort of people carrying capabilities that can cope with families that have more than three children.
The simple truth is that many buyers of these soft-road SUVs don't actually put practicality as high up their priority list as they would have you believe.
The Tiguan is perhaps a symbol of German surrender to the forces of the market. And the other truth is that the car companies - even giants like Volkswagen - can't ignore the demands of the market. You can see the logical application of their thinking in the Golf-sized model range.
First they went for the people carrier format with the Touran, then the high-roofed Golf Plus. The latter seemed the most inexplicable.
A high-roofed Golf: were there really thousands of 7ft Golf owners complaining of cramped cabins? Still the sales were there but the big numbers remained in the SUV set.
So here we have the Tiguan, a plucky little SUV.
Whatever about our qualms with small SUVs, there's no doubt buyers do feel a level of extra safety and ruggedness sitting higher than the rest of the traffic. The only problem is that this is leaving us in an unending race to the clouds.
In terms of engineering the Tiguan is a good solid performer. It doesn't set the world alight in terms of handling or ability, but it's as well put together as you'd expect from a Volkswagen and that badge up front will win favour with the buyers.
What's more, the engine behind it is something of a modern engineering novelty. While there are several variants on offer, our test car was powered by the plucky little 150bhp 1.4-litre turbocharged petrol engine.
The very idea of putting a 1.4-litre engine in a vehicle of this size would seem like madness, but VW has done some fantastic work with turbocharging in recent years.
In this case they match the turbocharger with a supercharger to eliminate any of the nasty turbo lag that used to be the sacrifice made by owners of such vehicles.
This engine already features in the Golf range as the GT, with 170bhp and will feature in the new Scirocco as well.
However, that doesn't mean it is without criticism, particularly when pushing along this relatively large vehicle.
For all the turbocharging and supercharging on offer, the low-end torque never comes close to rivalling that of the diesel offerings.
Nor does it match the diesels when it comes to either emissions or fuel efficiency. While it makes sense now in our current tax climate to go for a smaller engine, the reality is that once the changeover to emissions taxation occurs on July 1st, it will be very hard to make a case for this little engine.
As stated already, the Tiguan shares the same underpinnings as the Golf, only this time it includes the VW four-wheel-drive system, 4Motion.
While that means all four-wheels are capable of powering you out of trouble, it's unlikley to be your vehicle of choice for heading to the hills. The 4Motion system has long been developed for VW's regular models, offering them extra grip in wintry conditions and designed with Austrian or Swiss motorists in mind. Plugging across a wet and soggy bog in the middle of Ireland was not top of the engineering priority list.
That said, the ride quality is quite impressive. There's little of the roll you get in older versions of the SUV set, and it tucks in nicely into corners. It's soft and supple enough to swallow up our more uneven road surfaces while sacrificing little in the way of bodyroll. In summary, Golf owners will find little to complain about or little difference when they swap the hatchback for this SUV.
We were also quite taken by the Tiguan's ability to overcome the wind noise that's generally a feature of these vehicles. Perhaps its down to the softer lines on the car than on other SUVs.
Another positive is the list of standard features. It's rare indeed when we complement VW for their specification levels, but the Tiguan comes with a decent standard fare.
While we're still not enamoured by the €137 charge for floor mats, the sport version does come with cruise control and a decent entertainment package. It's less good news when you see things like rear side airbags on the options list priced at €662. We all accept that the buyer should have the freedom to decide, but the reality is that in the heat of the purchase decision, few will spend that sort of money on hidden safety equipment when you can get a leather steering wheel and Climatronic air conditioning for roughly the same price.
In the end, the Tiguan comes away as a tidy package and a decent suburban alternative to the Golf. The problem is that it doesn't offer enough of a difference for us to believe it's worth the price tag. For that money we would still rather have a well-equipped Golf or even a Passat.
If it must be a soft-centred SUV then the Tiguan is up against some competitively priced rivals. Established models like the Rav4 are well within reach here and even the much more agile Land Rover Freelander is on offer for just a few thousand euro more.
There's a certain rush towards this class of vehicle from the mainstream brands - Ford is about to introduce its Kuga model based on the Ford Focus - but we just can't get our heads around the reasoning.
While it's an impressive car to drive and nicely laid out, at the end of the day the Tiguan is an expensive offering compared to the rest of the players in this category.
If practicality is what you want, then there are several better players on the market. If it's off-road ability, again there are also much stronger competitors at the same price. If it's a VW dealership where you must spend your money, then even within its own family there are better models to buy.
It's a good decent offering in a crowded market, but it's hard to see the Tiguan as more than another also-ran.
Factfile
Engine:1390cc turbocharged petrol engine putting out 150bhp @ 5,800rpm and 240Nm of torque from 1,750rpm
Specification:Standard features include: driver/passenger side and head curtain airbags; (rear side airbags optional - €662); esp with brake assist; climatic air-conditioning (Climatronic - €506); 17" alloys; cruise control; Radio/CD with six-CD interchanger and eight speakers; electric windows; electronic parking brake; tyre pressure monitoring indicator. Other options include: floor mats (€137); trailer hitch (€1,010); sports suspension (€217); alarm (€342)
L/100km (mpg): urban: 10.6 (26.7); extra-urban: 7 (40.4); combined: 8.4 (33.6)
CO2 emissions:199g/km
Tax bands from July 1st: VRT - 32 per cent; annual road tax - €1,000
Price:€38,070