Reuters news said that SAIC Volkswagen Santana will soon officially stop production. After the Jetta, Volkswagen Santana will also leave us. This classic model, which has been on the market for 38 years, is finally going to be discontinued.
Relying solely on the Volkswagen Santana car, SAIC Volkswagen can be said to have made a lot of money in China. According to statistics, the total sales of Santana and its derivatives in China have reached more than 3 million units. But for a long time, Santana's platform and technology have completely lagged behind foreign models.
In 1981, the second generation of passat models was introduced, which was subsequently launched in the Brazilian market and named Santana, a more local name in Brazil, and in 1983, when Shanghai Volkswagen introduced the Passat B2 to China, it also used this name. Santana was 4546/1710/1427 mm in length, width and height, and had a wheelbase of 2548 mm, and although the size was not even compact today, it was a solid mid-range car in those days.
1.8L four-cylinder self-priming engine with a maximum power of 70KW and a peak torque of 140 Nm, with a 5-speed manual transmission, 14 seconds of acceleration from 100 km/h, suspension structure of the front McPherson rear torque beam, manual air conditioning, 14 inch wheels, no airbags.
In that era, the monthly wages of ordinary workers were only a few tens of yuan, but Santana sold for 180,000 yuan. Moreover, the Volkswagen Group launched the third generation of Passat in 1988, the fourth generation of Passat in 1993, and Santana has since been updated many times, evolving into Santana 2000, Santana 3000 and Santana Zhijun and other models, but it is still based on the second generation of Passat platform, so the platform of Passat B2 has been sold from 1983 to 2012, surviving in China for a full 30 years, and the overseas version of Passat has evolved to the seventh generation of models. In this way, Santana relied on the old platform of seams and patches to circle the money of the Chinese people for several generations.
Many people say that the current Santana compared to Poussin, the quality is too much worse, at that time Santana left the impression of leather durability to the Chinese people, but also laid the brand position of Volkswagen in the country, but the quality of Poussin is far from stable, but at that time the domestic car was too weak, and there was no other joint venture model, Santana from the mature platform is naturally outstanding.
In order to extract the residual value of the name Santana, in 2013, the new Santana went public, the Santana, which was originally positioned as a B-class car, became an entry-level joint venture compact car, and the new Santana used the PQ25 platform, you know, the PQ25 platform is a platform launched in 1996, saic-Volkswagen used the platform 17 years ago to turn Santana into a Chinese special supply car. 1.5L naturally aspirated engine, maximum power 81KW, peak torque 150 Nm, the material of the wheel hub from aluminum alloy, replaced by steel wheels, torque beam suspension, no rear anti-collision beam, the new Santana can be said to be the reduction to the end, but it is such a model, sold to 84,900-123,800.
In this way, from the introduction of Domestic in 1983 to 2021 in the past 38 years, Santana relies on backward platforms and technologies, sold more than 3 million cars in the Chinese market, several generations of Chinese people are Santana owners, recently came out of santana to stop production news, in fact, such a car should have been discontinued long ago, SAIC Volkswagen should no longer squeeze Santana's residual feelings and values, let such a car lie quietly in history.