- If you happen to be above the age of 25
there's certain cars that
you hold near and dear to your heart.
Maybe a little small, maybe a little cold,
but you still got a heart.
Cars that back then were your dream car
until you actually got old enough to drive one.
And then you realize that maybe,
just maybe, they weren't as fantastic as you thought.
And you just stick to staring at the one posted
in your garage or maybe your hot wheel
that you got hanging up above your bed.
But nevertheless, even though they are fantastic car
to look at and they have that really
a little funky on the inside.
They're cars that we look back on and wish they did better
than they actually did.
3,000 GT you're forever in my heart.
And I wish you just stayed a lot, a little bit longer.
I'm Alex.
Alex at fi Instagram.
And today we're gonna be talking about a car that tried
to sucker-punch the JDM compact cars of the 90s.
The car that was the true Frankenstein of trying
to be a sporty hip kid that could outperform the decades
of Japanese cars that were roaming the world,
or at least it gave it its best shot.
A car that by now you probably see and say
something along the lines of,
"Oh, that's kind of neat.
That's actually pretty,
I haven't seen one of those in awhile."
Ladies and gentlemen,
we're gonna be talking about you wanting to own
for some reason or another have Volkswagen karate.
(upbeat music)
And if you're just jumping into this video,
hello, I'm Alex.
And if you could maybe just take a look
at a little red button it's called subscribe,
it'd be cool.
It makes us feel good.
We're a low, low commitment channel
It makes you feel happy.
Just like those zoo.
Oh, if you remember the Zoo magazine commercials
that played midday when you were watching "Cartoon Network"
that had the zebras and the elephants
and you got really excited,
and you tried to convince your mom
that it was totally worth the 1999 subscription
because then you've got two years instead of one.
- [Advertiser] Now your child can visit Stevie jungles,
grassy plains, and the dark depths of the ocean.
- The Volkswagen Corrados is quite literally the feeling
of those zoo animal magazines.
It is that embodiment.
The Corrado was only in its brief world or
this brief world for about seven years from 1988 to 1995.
It was Volkswagen's attempt to go toe to toe
with the Acura Honda and Toyota coops at the time
while also replacing the Volkswagen Scirocco.
The car wasn't really planned out as much
as one would like to believe.
In fact, the timeframe kind of ran up
on Volkswagen before they could really think about it
and cause them to create something
that they really didn't know that they needed that much.
It was really neat.
Starting with the design, the Corrado was meant
to replace the Scirocco,
which was designed by Giugiaro, Gigi,
a relatively famous Volkswagen designer.
The Corrado would be co-developed
but mostly led by a new designer by the name
of Herbert Schafer who claimed that only he and Gigi
would ever be capable of designing a proper Volkswagen Golf,
which was actually a very big deal at the time.
And anyone that's a designer in the designer world
for automotive is a little bit of a bold move to say that.
But that's what he felt.
Built by Carmen, the Corrado was quite literally
an interesting mix of technology and styling
that really didn't have that much of a budget.
It just kind of came together because it needed to.
It was based on the YouTube platform.
The Corrado would be one of the first vehicles
to actually feature an electronic and automatic wing riser,
which was bragged about by Volkswagen
for as long as the car was in production.
It did the little and probably broke because it
was made by Volkswagen and pretty much
every Porsche automated VW thing always broke.
Especially with the wing.
It was faster than the 944
and the 060 and had a higher top speed,
which by the way, did you know it had an automatic wing.
They will tell you that everywhere you look,
Formula One cars had them,
Corrado's have them.
Marketing, boom.
Now you own a Formula One car.
This front wheel drive variant came to America
with many of the standard options as humanly possible
because they wanted the Corrado to take the world by storm.
Especially in the United States, North America as well.
They wanted to break into the Porsche kind of segment
without the Porsche price point, which was hard to do.
Available initially in two model engines at 1.4 liter
and a supercharge 1.8 liter,
the car did pretty well in all senses,
but units moved.
But we'll get to that.
But it wasn't incredibly unique car
because it was attacking the Japanese.
And it was also showing that
it could go toe to toe with some German stuff.
And what made it so interesting,
at least from the beginning was the G60 trim
that everyone talks about.
Is a scroll supercharger with a 60 millimeter inlet
that looked like the letter G.
The G bumped enough horsepower up to brag.
And it was even better than Porsche or Porsche.
But the G60 had some funkiness to it because after all,
it was German engineered,
which back then they're really cool,
but they don't stay alive very long.
Chipper charges are typically pretty simple, by the way,
you just slap it on the top or the side of your motor.
You tie a belt to it.
You pretty much forces more compressed air into the block
and wollah, you've got more horsepower
without that much work.
With the G60's there was two spiral elements
and they were kind of this weird sequential thing
that was going on.
One that spun within the normal, supercharger sass,
another one compressing the air around that compressed air,
of trying to get more horsepower.
But because of the design of it,
it didn't really stay alive too long.
It did good, but not really that good
from a liability standpoint.
But it broke a law.
It just did.
Tell us your roles when you buy a German,
it just sometimes happens.
And it's not anything new.
So for the Corrados mid life facelift Volkswagen
would change out the heart as needed.
And to be fair, they were already expecting it
because of the introduction of the VR6
was almost too smooth when it came to this face lifted car,
mid into it's like seven year lifespan.
The 1992 Corrado with 178 horsepower
was a fun (beep) sports car saloon.
And it was a banger.
The car came out with the VR6 motor
was everything that people wanted.
It was a clean, sleek fighting machine.
The VR6 is an iconic motor in the sense
that due to the angles of the cylinders.
And the space design,
Volkswagen could fit a six cylinder motor into previously,
a four cylinder motor engine Bay.
That's what made it so fun.
That's actually why I kind of feels like it's almost too big
of a motor for the platform that it's in.
It's why the M2 feels so fun
because it's got the M3 and the M4 platform.
You get the power linear curve of a straight six
with the size of a four cylinder.
It was a great motor.
It still is a great motor.
And because of that, automotive enthusiast fell in love
with the Corrado even more.
But that was inherently the problem with the car
is that only really enthusiastic seemed
to fall in love with the car.
A little under a hundred thousand units
ever made us be the road for the Corrado.
And when you compare that to the Scirocco's numbers,
of begging like five to 10 times that
you can only guess why the old German executives axed it
after just a few short years,
but we're not here to talk about the history of the Corrado.
We're not here to talk about why ended, RIP.
We're here to talk about you wanting
to own a Volkswagen Corrado.
Well, set down your BBS stickers
and grab your favorite Soho shirt.
Because we're gonna be talking about
what it's like to own one of
these lovely German sports cars,
which by the way,
if you can get your hands on one,
kudos to you,
because these are awesome.
If you're looking to own a Corrado,
there's a couple of things you'll want to know right out
of the gate before you even snag one.
The G60s are cool.
They're rare.
They're collectible.
And probably one of the best samples
of the Corrado you can actually buy,
especially when it comes to an appreciation standpoint.
You just want to own one to say you own one,
and then you wanna keep it in the garage
and air conditioning and all of that good stuff.
It's pretty much what you'll wanna do.
But they will break your heart eventually.
And they won't really treat you right.
So only get one if you're looking to put your money
from the stocks into a car.
It's pretty much the only way it's gonna make sense.
And it'll be a front wheel drive.
The VR6 trim is the model you want to get
if you want one of these subtle cooler sleeker golfs.
The tough thing about this car with
its initial introductions was a similarity
it carried to the golf in terms of some
of the things that were inside of it,
questionable tech of the G60s
and the fact that the price tag was very, very high
when it essentially came out.
To justify the price of
a normal German automotive enthusiast,
a 40K price tag by today's dollars
was still just too tall.
It's a pricey front wheel drive my friend,
it's not gonna get you there and it didn't.
But wait it's still neat.
The cars aren't usually modified past
some typical BBS wheels, some Michelin tires,
maybe a coil over setup from your boys over at KW or BC.
For the most part, these cars seem to be kept
as pretty much just samples.
Like if you see them,
you don't see them heavily modified.
They're just maybe have a resprays with
some window tint to keep it looking fresh.
The paint is probably the most notable thing
that you can notice that people take care of.
The manual transmission can feel a little dog fish,
but with a few aftermarket parts that can help that out.
The VR6 is the trim you will want to get,
which is 1992 and plus,
which has a massive following in the scene these days
when compared to the G60.
VR6, that's the one you wanna get,
just get that one.
Most of these cars sit for pretty good deal,
but without the VR6 engine model,
if you're driving it or the G60 for the collectability,
the car can feel like it's falling a little bit short,
where a second generation golf
just make be more your answer.
The Corrados is more of like a fine wine.
It's more of like a automatic wing riser.
Did you know that they had that?
Did you know?
Did you know that?
Pretty much the car was just
this like middle finger to Porsche.
And I don't know how else to really explain it.
Unfortunately, and by all technical terms,
it's pretty clear to see which one won during that time.
That's a joke.
Don't hurt me.
The Corrado is a fantastic sample of a Volkswagen sports car
that came out in the 90s and late 80s.
It's a car that you want to try and drive once.
And it's one that feels very fun.
It's a little bit different.
It's a little bit sleeker
and it's not something that you really see all that much.
So if you are a German automotive enthusiast,
it's a car that you'll love.
If you're not a German automotive enthusiastic,
it's a car that you'll question.
And if you're only a Japanese tuner automotive enthusiast,
you're gonna look at it and say,
"Why does it look like a drawing I made when I was eight
on a napkin at Culver's?"
Because it does look a little bit like that.
What do you think about the Volkswagen Corrado?
Let us know in the comments section below.
And of course, if you're looking
for after market wheels, tires or suspension,
be sure to let us know over at Fitment Industries.
Be sure to check us out over a fitmentindustries.com
where we literally have everything
your little heart could possibly imagine.
I'm Alex from Fitment Industries and we'll see you later.
Peace.