How, when & can Volkswagen fix its diesel mess?
Charlie Daher, president of Commonwealth Volkswagen in Lawrence, was blindsided by the recent news that VW had rigged the emissions software in its 2.0-liter diesel engines.
“We never had an inkling that something was coming down,’’ he was saying on the phone on Monday.
“A few weeks before the news broke, we got a call from VW. They said diesel sales were going through the roof in California, and they wanted to buy our inventory. We were told to put sold tags on them. Once the news broke, they didn’t want to buy them anymore, and there’s a stop sale order on them [VW diesels].’’
There are no blessings in disguise in the VW mess, but diesel sales, which had been averaging 20 percent, have been down.
“Diesel sales reflect gasoline prices,’’ says Daher, whose Commonwealth Motors family also includes Chevrolet, Honda, Kia, and Nissan franchises. “When gas prices go up, so do sales of diesels. With lower gasoline prices, diesel sales have gone down. But VW sales, overall, have been strong. It’s a good product.’’
Customers have been asking Daher what they can do.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have any more answers than they do at this point,’’ he says. “The cars are safe to drive. We know the company is working on a solution, and they’ve set up a customer car number, but so far [as of Monday] there aren’t any real answers.’’
Daher, like other area dealers, is hoping VW will come up with a software fix that will allow the diesels to retain both their performance and fuel economy numbers. The diesel Jetta with an automatic transmission is rated at 31 miles per gallon in city driving, 45 mpg on the highway, and 36 combined, numbers some local owners routinely claim to exceed.
“We’ve been getting software fixes lately,’’ Daher says, “but we were told they were to fix other glitches and make the cars 100 percent compliant for emissions.’’
When Volkswagen came out with its 2.0-liter diesel engine in 2009, most reviewers thought it was something special.
“It had power and loads of torque. It was almost like a muscle car that got 40-plus mpg,’’ says John Wolkonowicz, a Boston-based independent auto industry analyst. “It truly was a wonderful car and we wondered why can’t all diesels be like this?’’
Now the question is whether a fix can be made with software or if the cars will need additional filtering in the exhaust system. VW says it will have a solution for regulators this month.
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“Hopefully they’ll still run fine,’’ says Wolkonowicz, “but there was a reason this (software manipulation) was done—better performance and fuel economy. It’s certainly possible the cars will lose some of each, and you have to expect the government will require the fixes to be made.’’
“It’s an issue Volkswagen has to deal with,’’ says Pat Brown, GM of Colonial VW with dealerships in Medford, Wellesley, and Westborough. “They’ve certainly acknowledged responsibility for this.’’
VW isn’t the first company to deal with a major problem.
“GM had its ignition switch issues, Toyota had sudden acceleration, and Kia and Hyundai “admitted inflated fuel economy figures,’’ says Brown.
“All those brands subsequently flourished,’’ he says. “Fortunately, this isn’t a safety matter.’’
In each of the other cases, but especially with Toyota, the automaker’s dealer network was front and center in making fixes and dealing with the public’s angst.
“My first thought was: What arrogance! Someone had to assume they could do something so bad and not get caught,’’ says David Rosenberg of the Prime Motor Group. “Someone had to make a conscious decision to do this and fool the public and government agencies.
“And my second was how egregious this is and then to wonder what can VW do to make recompense—to the United States for extra emissions and for those customers who are driving Volkswagens because they made a decision to be practical and create a smaller carbon footprint.
“And, after that is how will they restore their name?’’
One way is to rectify the situation.
“We’re all hoping that VW comes up with a good fix and can turn this into a positive,’’ says Colonial’s Brown.
These VW revelations, however, will have long-term ripple effects on the industry.
“This is looking like the biggest automotive story since the forced bankruptcies of GM and Chrysler in 2009,’’ says Wolkonowicz. “There are going to be a lot of unexpected consequences.’’
Among them lawsuits, criminal investigations, government penalties, more stringent government regulation on all brands going forward, and upset customers.
“There are countless owners out there who are upset,’’ says Wolkonowicz. “They bought these diesels because they wanted a clean car; instead, they now find out they have one of the dirtiest cars on the road. Some don’t even want to drive them because it goes against their principles.’’
Then there is VW’s quest to be the world No. 1 in sales, a goal it attained by supplanting Toyota in the first half of 2015.
How it began may never be known.
“At first, I thought it might be a rogue engineer,’’ says Wolkonowicz. “But it’s likely that there had to be more than one person involved. Someone apparently made the decision to do this. Who knows the ‘who or when’. We may never know.’’
Recently, a neighbor asked me to surprise him by naming one model I’d like to buy that might surprise him. My answer was, “The VW Passat diesel with a manual transmission.’’
Today, I’m wondering how well that will run once “the fix is in.’’
Etc.
The Steve Varney Memorial car show is scheduled for today (11 a.m.-3 p.m.) at the Georgetown VFW on Rte. 133. Varney, the dyno-tuning wizard at his shop, SV Engineering & Performance in Peabody, died suddenly at 49 last March …Next Saturday, early risers can catch Herb Chambers’ season finale for Cars & Coffee (7-10 a.m.) at his new Lexus of Hingham dealership across from the Derby Street Shops. He’ll have his ’71 Toyota Land Cruiser on hand … Next Sunday, Heritage Museums & Gardens is hosting the Cape Cod British Car Club Show from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. … Also next weekend, the Larz Anderson Auto Museum in Brookline features a pair of events, German Car Day on Saturday and Transporterfest for all things VW on Sunday.
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