King and the pretender to its throne.
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As fate would have it, during the same week we were spending some quality time with Volkswagen’s Golf 8 GTI and singing its praises as the King of Hot Hatches, a new pretender to the throne pitched up looking to topple the King. Enter BMW’s 128ti.
Normally compact BMWs do battle with Audis and Mercs. But this particular hatch from Bavaria was set out from the beginning to try and take the ever-popular Golf GTI’s crown. And it came armed with the exact same artillery to make it a fair fight.
Both these hatches run a 2.0-litre, four-cylinder, turbocharged powerplant. They churn out an equal 180 kW of power, while the 128ti offers a mere 10 Nm of torque more that the GTI’s 370 Nm that is on tap from as low as 1 600 rpm.
This power and torque are channelled to the front wheels (yes, the 128ti is front-wheel-drive). Via a more aggressive shifting seven-speed DSG on the Golf 8 GTI, and an almost as rapid, but smoother shifting eight-speed traditional torque converter Steptronic on the 128ti.
The GTI is slightly lighter and gets onto the scales at 1 463 kg, whereas the 128ti weighs in at 1 505 kg. Forty kilograms heavier but offering 10 Nm more, the two cars felt very similar when being put through their straight-line testing.
The GTI is said to hit 100 km/h in 6.4 seconds, and the 128ti in 6.3 seconds. If one looks at all these claimed numbers, the BMW should have a slight edge over the Volkswagen.
But what happens on paper can be somewhat different to what happens out on the road, and this we found out when we lined the two up next to each other. The GTI blitzed through to 100 km/h in 5.88 seconds, a full five-tenths quicker than claimed, and the 128ti also beat its claimed time with a 5.98 second run, but not enough to put the Golf 8 GTI in its place.
ALSO READ: Golf 8 GTI even faster than what Volkswagen is telling us
It might have been really close, and it was, but if you think this was a once off thing, you would be wrong. The GTI saw off the 128ti over and over again. And in fact stayed ahead of the 128ti all the way through to the 1km mark where it kept its slight advantage by crossing the line in 25.08 seconds vs the 25.55 time of the BMW 128ti, with a speed of 212.82 km/h to 211.55 km/h.
Even in all the roll-on acceleration tests from 60-100 km/h, 80-120 km/h the Golf 8 GTI took a few tenths out of the BMW 128ti every time. And, in the big boy 100-200 km/h run, the GTI ran a time of 15.88 seconds versus the 16.53 for the 128ti. Now 0.7 of a second might seem like nothing, but traveling at 200 km/h, this puts the GTI comfortably ahead by more than half a rugby field of the 128ti.
The top end battle also would go in favour of the GTI, as VW claim a top speed of 250 km/h versus the BMW claim of 243 km/h for their 128ti. If this matters to you when you buy a hot hatch, where the BMW came back at the GTI was in the fuel consumption stakes.
Although the GTI offered a better claimed number of 6.5-litres per 100 km over the 6.8-litres per 100 km offered by the 128ti. It was the BMW that won this part of the war with a real-world number of 8.6-litres per 100 km over the 9.8-litres per 100 km achieved by the Once again, the two cars have been separated by fractions of a number.
The base BMW 128ti comes in at R699 500, and the base Golf 8 GTI at R669 300. Although this is another point in favour of the VW, I think we all know that you won’t find either of these cars standing on showroom floors in base spec. And the cost of the extras will drive the price of both up as far as your wallet can stretch.
For more information on the VW Golf 8 GTI, click here.
Their warranties are also a close-run kind of affair with BMW offering a two year/unlimited mileage for their 128ti, and Volkswagen offering three year/120 000 km for its GTI. The BMW scores a point for offering a full five year/100 000 km maintenance plan as standard while Volkswagen only offer a five year/90 000 km service plan for the sticker price you see.
For more information on the BMW 128ti, click here.
As much as I really liked the BMW 128ti, and feel it is a worthy challenger to Volkswagen’s Golf 8 GTI, there is no escaping that if we had to draw up a simple comparative box. The GTI beats the 128ti on paper and on the road.
To see the numbers comparison chart, click here
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