Volkswagen plans to start series production of the eighth-generation Golf at the car's home factory of Wolfsburg by the end of the third quarter, multiple company sources told Automotive News Europe. The latest iteration of Europe's No. 1-selling car is scheduled to debut in October.
VW originally planned to debut the Golf at the Frankfurt auto show in September. That plan was changed to let the automaker focus the spotlight at Frankfurt on the public premier of the ID full-electric compact hatchback, which is the first member of VW’s ID family of battery-driven vehicles.
In addition, the new Golf has been stung by an array of software-related glitches.
To make the new Golf stand out from rivals such as the Ford Focus and Opel/Vauxhall Astra in Europe’s highly competitive compact segment VW wants the car to set the benchmark for connectivity. VW, for example, will offer Golf owners the opportunity to unlock the car via a smartphone that utilizes a digital key. This single function, however, is hooked up to more than 10 different vehicle subsystems, engineers say.
“The navigational and infotainment system alone has between 10 to 20 million lines of code, which is more than an entire car had 10 years ago,” said a senior executive at the carmaker.
Standard features of the Golf 8 will include lane-keeping assist, LED headlights, a multifunction steering wheel and a fully digital cockpit that includes a touchscreen display in the middle console that will be a minimum of 8.25 inches.
In-car “Volkswagen We” apps can be integrated, using an ethernet connection to swiftly transfer data.
The new Golf will also be able to talk to other cars and intelligent transportation infrastructure.
Packing all of these features into the new Golf has been a challenge. Engineers are currently working the software bugs out of the system during testing of the pre-production series. When a problem is found, a ticket is opened and workers begin by trying to localize which system’s electronic control unit is causing the problem. There are dozens of ECUs in the car.
If they cannot fix the problem, the supplier of the component and its requisite ECU is contacted to determine where in the software code a problem has arisen.
To ensure all problems are addressed, a ticket cannot be closed by anyone other than the individual who opened it.
“Sometimes when you solve one, two more appear in its place,” said one senior electrical engineer involved in diagnosing the Golf's problems. This is in part due to the dozens of different ECUs that all have their own software: “We have to become world champions in integration.”
Since the Golf first launched in 1974, more than 35 million units of the iconic car and its derivatives, such as the Golf Variant and Golf Sportsvan, have been sold worldwide.
