Volkswagen Golf GTI W12 650 Concept
A front engined, front wheel drive hatch, converted to be a rear-engined, rear wheel drive monster. It’s happened before with the Renault Clio V6, and even a local has managed to stuff a Mitsubishi 4G63 VR4 Turbo engine into the rear of a Perodua Kancil. Now Volkswagen has pulled the same stunt with this show car it displayed at the Wörthersee 2007 meet in Austria. This is the Volkswagen Golf GTI W12 650 Concept.
You are correct to assume this particular concept would end up being a 650 horsepower W12-engine powered rocket due to it’s very indicative name. Only the production car’s hood, lights and doors remain – every other panel has been converted to have a widebody look. The C-pillar receives some engineering treatment, incorporating air intakes now to feed air into the engine mounted behind the driver and the front seat passenger.
The W12 engine is a 6.0 liter twin-turbocharged monster, found in the likes of the Audi A8 and Bentleys. It makes 550 horses in a Bentley, however in this car it makes 650 horsepower at 6,000rpm and 750Nm of torque to the rear wheels!
0-100km/h takes 3.7 seconds, a number that could perhaps be reduced if the car had all-wheel drive instead of just being rear wheel drive.
More photos of this monster after the jump.
May 21, 2007 @ 7:17 am
0-100km/h in 3.7second, that is absolutely an agressive looking supercar from VW. Nice Nice !
May 21, 2007 @ 7:40 am
Super-hatch for the Ãœber-rich. Bought just to humiliate 911 Turbo owners on the autobahn! Wait… can’t do that… Porsche owns VW now… ok… Ferraris then!
May 21, 2007 @ 7:56 am
Wow! A wide gaping mouth & a wide gaping a$$!
A true monstrous pocket rocket.
May 21, 2007 @ 8:25 am
Niceee, but the look, errr, too radical
May 21, 2007 @ 8:34 am
Nice car, and look at the aerodynamics; the rear spoiler’s integrated into the roof and the air intake integrated into the C-Pillar, absolutely beautiful. I’ve always thought the GTi is a nice car but pity it’s FWD, but now, with this MR widebody, it’s perfect!!
May 21, 2007 @ 9:52 am
Straight out fast and furious. A future MR Golf with the R32 engine? maybe vw is considering building a mr hatch in the future, and this is like their market research.
May 21, 2007 @ 11:53 am
nice car…w12 engine with 650hp??? that’s awesome….
May 21, 2007 @ 11:56 am
No engine shot?
May 21, 2007 @ 11:56 am
nice car…w12 engine with 650hp??? that’s awesome…
May 21, 2007 @ 12:05 pm
low slung supercar beaten by this
May 21, 2007 @ 2:05 pm
hey what i saw on NST yesterday is dat they say..this is what future generations of classic sportcars might be like……yikes…..
this car is even better looking than the NFS most wanted/carbon game!!!
May 21, 2007 @ 2:30 pm
wow wow really big suprise !!! the 6.0 twin turbo with 650 ps !!!! crazy man …. it is really will sell on market ??? another crazy sport cars ….
May 21, 2007 @ 2:34 pm
xtra…….ive never seen this fully modified golf..in my life!
May 21, 2007 @ 2:39 pm
This is certainly too fast too furious, 0-100km/h in this small little baby is simply crazy!!!
The widebody is nice, I like that. But prefer Renault Clio V6 and Ford Focus hatchback though….
May 21, 2007 @ 3:19 pm
It may be one hell of a car to drive but for me, the looks won’t sell because whenever i think of widebody hothatch with wide intakes at the side, Renault Clio V6 comes first so that’s minus a point to the VW in terms of originality although the design may be aerodynamically great…
May 21, 2007 @ 3:24 pm
sweetfreak
May 21, 2007 @ 4:54 pm
virtually no suspension travel at all!
May 21, 2007 @ 5:23 pm
wow!!! what is this…
May 21, 2007 @ 6:22 pm
very very nice styling.
i remember looking at a european site about modified VW’s and Audis several years ago. They had a mk3 golf running 1000hp. its radiators were mounted on the rear tailgate, with huge air ducts just before the rear wheel wells feeding air to cool the radiators.
with 4wd, launch control and the right gearing, the average 2.0 litre turbo WRC rally car with 300hp does 0-100km/h in 2.6 secs.
May 21, 2007 @ 8:56 pm
Will never make it on the road. VW are rich, can afford concept cars.
May 22, 2007 @ 8:41 am
But that doens;t mean it has no chance to get on the road. Well maybe not with the W12, but their more “sedate” 3.2 or 2.0 TFSI.
VW group has built many concepts that became reality. This is peanuts compared to the development costs of the Veyron (and the rest of the Supercars that the group produces)
I believe that this is the direct response (or backtrack) by VW to inject some excitement back into the brand (also with the Scirocco concept…and the recent “hip” VW adverts). The Golf has become bloated and big, and gotten far too costly and complicated than the “peoples car” that it was to be. Most of this slack in “excitement” has been taken over by Seat, but VW, being the only Global brand, something is still missing from markets that Seat does not penetrate..
The Golf lost its “fun” factor after the MK2
.
Now that the new Clio no longer the demented mid engine monster, maybe VW will just jump in.
May 24, 2007 @ 4:43 am
very nice for small car. looks very pretty.
but 650hp only for a w12 twin turbo?
even a ferrari v12 engine in the enzo without turbo can produce 650hp.
May 24, 2007 @ 4:44 am
for me ferrari engine is the best
May 26, 2007 @ 11:30 am
[...] the monstrous concept Volkswagen Golf GTI W12 650 you saw earlier? Sure, it looked cool, but there were no photos of the actual engine sitting in the [...]
May 26, 2007 @ 1:48 pm
v12 ferrari engine can produce 650hp without turbos..
maybe the engine “lagi berat” compared to this one..
so, VW put turbos…
small in size, lightweight also..
May 26, 2007 @ 3:30 pm
but for this century…not that great….cos of the global warming issues….sigh..
August 12, 2009 @ 10:38 pm
hi i juse wanna say it’s a best golf tdi w12 concep ever made and i would like to know what’s the price sale
August 12, 2009 @ 10:39 pm
it’s a best golft tdi w12 concept ever made
October 17, 2009 @ 10:00 am
as i seen in top gear, jeremy had a problem on cornering with this car.. but the stig manage to handle it very well.. the car design still mesmerize me.. y dont perodua take design as a new facelift on myvi