Pumped-up $80K Amarok ute is a ‘GT’ model, tuned by the same team behind the HSV GTS-R W1
- Chassis dynamics tuned by HSV’s best and brightest
- Durability testing covered 15,000km
- Why doesn’t the W580 have more power?
If you haven’t heard about the 2021 Volkswagen Amarok W580 yet, you will soon.
Developed exclusively for the Aussie ute market by the same team responsible for the game-changing HSV GTS-R W1 supercar, Walkinshaw Automotive Group, the Volkswagen Amarok W580 goes against the grain of most factory-backed hard-core utes like the Ford Ranger Raptor and Nissan Navara N-TREK Warrior, favouring a sporty, on-road performance tune over off-road capability.
Priced at $71,990 plus on-road costs for the W580 and $79,990 plus ORCs for the up-spec W580S, Volkswagen’s sports ute will roll into showrooms mid-April after the first batch of 42 units was sold out in five minutes.
And the collaboration between Walkinshaw and Volkswagen will deliver Australia’s most dynamic dual-cab one-tonne ute.
That’s the word according to Nick Reid, Volkswagen Australia’s commercial vehicles marketing and product manager.
“Yeah, I would say that,” he told carsales from Walkinshaw’s head office in Clayton, Victoria.
“We soon landed on a proposition where no one had really gone before, which was this GT-inspired ute.”
You can read all about the upgrades and mods that make the 2021 Volkswagen Amarok W580 wider, more agile and more aggressive here, but the main changes involve the fitment of new shock absorbers at all four corners, a wider track, unique 20-inch alloy wheels shod with Pirelli Scorpion ATR tyres (275/50 R20), pumped wheel-arches, a front suspension lift and a new front-end design.
“We like to call that zigging when everyone else is zagging,” said Reid.
“When everyone’s going off-road we’re just going to hone our performance on-road. So that’s the brief to the team at Walkinshaw and they’ve delivered a package which we believe does that down to a tee.”
Despite all the changes, the flagship Volkswagen Amarok dual-cab ute maintains its five-year factory warranty, and the fuel economy rating and 3500kg towing capacity also remain firm.
The engine remains unchanged as well, the 3.0-litre V6 turbo-diesel punching out 200kW/580Nm, pumping through an eight-speed automatic transmission and 4MOTION 4×4 system with Torsen differential.
Walkinshaw says it will build around 1200 vehicles a year, more than initially anticipated due to increased demand for the jacked-up, corner-carving pick-up truck.
Chassis dynamics tuned by HSV’s best and brightest
According to David Kermond, Walkinshaw’s chassis engineer, the crew working on the Volkswagen Amarok W580 project know a thing or two about tuning vehicle suspension for seriously sporty driving.
“Everyone that worked on this program from a suspension point of view comes from [HSV] GTS-R W1, so that’s our background. So we really put that idea back into this car and made it a GT-spec car. It doesn’t feel like a truck when you’re pushing it,” he said.
“It’s very sure-footed, it’s very dynamic in the way it drives. The donor vehicle allows us to do that because it’s a such a good platform to start with and coupled with the [V6] engine really allows us to highlight those characteristics.”
Kermond explained that the Amarok W580 keeps the original front and rear springs but replaces the monotube dampers with a twin-tube damper set-up because it’s easier to tune and improves durability.
Walkinshaw’s chassis guru said tyre and wheel set-up were also crucial in improving the Amarok’s apex-attacking competency.
“The tyres we’ve used, the [Pirelli] ATRs, are not a very heavy off-road tyre, but they are a light truck kind of compounded tyre. So it can handle the loads but also gives us a very, very strong amount of grip out of the car.
“In terms of the wheel, [we use a] 20×9-inch wheel with a 20mm offset, so we’ve basically widened the wheel and taken that offset and increased which gives us a much wider track, which increases stability and performance attributes of the car.
“It also gives us a much more aggressive stance, so it gave our designers something to play with in terms of the fender flares, to give it a really aggressive stance.
“We’ve also been able to improve things like steering feel, the linearity from on-centre to off-centre is really, really good. It’s very comfortable to drive on a freeway or a country B-road. But the moment you get to a tight, twisty road, something like Lake Mountain or Reefton Spur, the car comes alive.
“You can really push this car quite hard,” added Kermond, who says the smaller steering wheel makes the drive experience feel more like a sports car than a traditional ute.
“Not only that, but when you go to a loose dirt gravel road, the car is fantastic to drive as well. We’ve improved a lot of the understeer characteristics the car had on dirt and you can really push the car quite hard at higher speeds on gravel roads and it’s just enjoyable for the driver.”
Sounds promising, but we’ll reserve our judgement for the national launch drive in the Snowy Mountains in May.
Durability testing covered 15,000km
The 2021 Volkswagen Amarok W580 is more than just a bunch of bolt-on parts, according to Volkswagen’s Nick Reid, who outlined an extensive testing regime that allows the brand to attach its five-year warranty to the tricked-up ute.
“To get there it’s not as simple as bolting on components and pushing it out into traffic. It’s a very complicated and dedicated process,” said Reid, who outlined the eight-week, 15,000km testing regime that took place at the AARC proving ground in Anglesea, Victoria.
The W580 was also put through its paces on a shaker rig and inside a climatic chamber.
Trevor Barallon, Walkinshaw’s chief engineer, explained that the W580 went through rigorous durability testing before it was signed off for production.
“The durability cycle was derived specifically for this program targeting the components we designed. The rough track events targeted front fascia inserts, suspension dampers, alloy wheels and dual exhaust outlets for strength and integrity. On the rough track [test] there’s a lot of vibration, it’s real harsh conditions,” he said.
“This is a full durability test. We go and test and target the touch points that we modify. It’s built to OEM-level standards. The validation is on the same sort of roads as a full durability [test] would be run.”
Other tests included an outback 3600km round trip with a braked trailer, loaded to maximum weight, and the repositioned front parking sensors in the new-look front fascia and even the decals were tested for durability, as was the paint on the alloy wheels.
Why doesn’t the W580 have more power?
Volkswagen and Walkinshaw decided not to increase the power of the Amarok’s 3.0-litre turbo-diesel V6 engine (200kW/580Nm) for several reasons, including the fact that the 18-month development program and the vehicle’s price would have blown out – and the performance gains would have been marginal.
“One thing we’re very confident in is the base vehicle engine. We are well and truly above the rest of the pack when it comes to power and torque,” said Reid.
“We’re also well and truly above the pack when it comes to those things some people think are important like 0-100km/h times. We’re 0-100 between 7.3 and 7.9 seconds … and most of our competitors are lucky to be in the nines [9.0sec region].
“We asked that question: what would another 20kW or 30kW and 50Nm give us? It might give us 0.2 or 0.3 of a second [faster to 100km/h]. But then with that comes complexity; we’d have to get the car recertified.
“And there’s a lot of aftermarket tunes out there for $1000 or $1500 and we’d ultimately be compared to them but we can’t offer it for that price, because we don’t just tweak the fuel and air mix and let the car go out into the market. It’s more complicated [and expensive].
“We truly believe the base vehicle doesn’t need that extra power. In a nutshell, that’s why we didn’t think more power was needed. We had some chats about it but never went down that rabbit hole.”
Perhaps most intriguingly is that Volkswagen HQ in Wolfsburg, Germany, is watching the project closely – as are VW’s German engineers on the ground in Australia who are currently prepping the all-new, Ford Ranger-based second-generation Volkswagen Amarok for the local market.
Asked if Volkswagen Australia would be sending one of its locally-developed Amarok W580 utes to Germany for their own engineers to inspect and evaluate, Reid simply answered “yes” but declined to provide more detail.
With Australia being the world’s biggest market for V6-powered Amarok utes, Volkswagen is clearly interested in how the local market here is developing.
Will it spell more Walkinshaw-tuned Amaroks like the W580 – and potentially other Volkswagens – for Australia in future?
You can bank on it.
Keyword: Volkswagen Amarok W580: 'Australia’s most dynamic' dual-cab ute