About China's Coolest Cars
A red Volkswagen Polo sedan, seen parked at a charging station in Beijing in 2017. Well, Volkswagen still doesn’t make an electric Polo even today, so we can be sure our red car is in the wrong lot. Happily, it was in a reasonable shape for its years. Paint was fading a bit, some damage here and there, and the original wheel covers were gone. But that’s okay, as black steelies always look great on red cars.
Continue reading “Mk4 Volkswagen Polo Is A Rare Sedan In China”
A Volkswagen Santana 2000 in heavy rain in Beijing. Note the cool Xiali sedan in the background on the right.
This vehicle belongs to fire prevention and control (消防) department of the police, so it is a bit of both a police car and a fire brigade car. The white license plate are used by the police, People’s Armed Police (PAP), and by the armed forces.
I took this photo in 2010, when the old white license plates were still in use. WJ stands for wujing (武警), a collective abbreviation police and armed forces. 31 stands for Beijing.
The Santana 2000 was one of many Santana variants manufactured by the SAIC-Volkswagen joint venture in Shanghai. It was rather rare to see Shanghai-made cars in public service in Beijing, as the local government mostly bought locally-made cars, like Hyundai’s and Beijing’s and such.
In any way, with so much rain the fire fighters probably had an easy night!
A black Volkswagen Santana 2000 1.8 GSi, seen on the road in the Chinese capital Beijing. The old Volkswagen was in a reasonable shape, but clearly in need of some work and love.
Continue reading “The Volkswagen Santana 2000 1.8 GSi Was A Sporty Sedan For China”
Production of the B6 Volkswagen Passat in China started in 2003 and ended all the way up in 2011. Over the years it was updated and facelifted several times. The car we have here is a 2007-2009 2.8 V6, the highest spec B6 Passat in China, and probably in the world.
Continue reading “The B6 Volkswagen Passat 2.8 V6 Is A Luxury Sedan In China”