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John Mahoney11 Sept 2019
NEWS

Volkswagen Tiguan R not coming until 2021

Performance version of popular mid-size SUV rumoured to get uprated version of current Golf R's 2.0-litre turbo four

A concept car previewing the eagerly anticipated Volkswagen Tiguan R will be revealed next year but the production version won't be on sale in Australia until 2021 at the earliest, carsales can reveal.

A senior Volkswagen source at the Frankfurt motor show confirmed the German car-maker will launch a facelifted version of the current Tiguan next year but, initially, the Tiguan R will not be among the line-up.

Instead, Volkswagen will reveal a close-to-production concept for the Tiguan R later in 2020 before launching it in 2021.

Conflicting with earlier reports, instead of being powered by a petrol-electric hybrid powertrain, the fast Tiguan SUV will come equipped with an uprated version of the current car's turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder channeling its power and torque to the road via the car-maker's 4MOTION all-wheel drive system.

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A manual transmission will not be an option with the powerful Tiguan, which will come standard with a revised version of the Volkswagen Group's seven-speed dual-clutch automatic.

The good news for Australian buyers who are fans of rapid SUVs is that Volkswagen Australia wants the Tiguan R in its line-up and will have meetings at the car-maker's Wolfsburg HQ in Germany after the Frankfurt show to secure volumes and pricing.

"I think Australia would be the perfect market for it [Tiguan R] because of not only the strong uptake of performance models but because we're an SUV market," said Volkswagen Group Australia's product manager, Jeff Shafer.

Shafer told carsales that as well as the sporty Tiguan R, Volkswagen Australia has also put its hand up for the smaller T-Roc R that, alongside the Golf R and Golf R wagon, would double its high-performance model range Down Under.

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Shafer said that the production T-Roc R would arrive in Europe in the "not too distant future" and said Volkswagen Australia wanted it "as early as possible", but said there were a couple of things on the technical side it was working with the factory to resolve.

That could be a reference to ensuring the upgraded turbocharged 2.0-litre engine can run at full power on Australia's notoriously poor-quality fuel.

It's rumoured that the facelifted Tiguan and Tiguan R could be replaced as soon as 2022 with an all-new third-generation SUV that will switch to a more radical 'coupe' shape potentially inspired by the 2013 Shanghai BlueCross concept.

With an incredible 850,000 examples sold in 2018 alone, the current Tiguan has become a huge success, becoming Volkswagen’s best-selling nameplate globally.

Australia, meanwhile, has cemented itself as the third biggest market for VW R models globally, beaten only by Germany and the UK for volume.

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