VW XL1 Turbo Diesel Hybrid — The Most Efficient Car In The World

MotoMan takes a look at the VW XL1 Turbo Diesel Hybrid and learns that the ingenuity employed in its engineering and design far exceed its technology. MotoMan is joined by Volkswagen Technical Developer, Christian Kolano.

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The hybrid electric vehicle technology shows no signs of slowing down, even though many all-electric cars have already hit the market pretty hard.

This technology is already being applied to sport cars in order to give additional boost, when it’s needed. Additionally, such vehicles tend to be more eco-friendly and fuel-efficient, which makes them even more exciting for every enthusiast.

20 thoughts on “VW XL1 Turbo Diesel Hybrid — The Most Efficient Car In The World”

  1. Ridiculous that efficiency has to be bought at premium costs, it is totally backwards, maximum efficiency in a car should be standard in the cheapest, benefits for the planet and for people struggling to afford cars in general. But anything to perpetuate the petro-dollar and exploit the masses.

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  2. The concept of a Diesel-electric power-train (pun intended) is exciting, but the price needs to come down if they want to sell any to the average working man; "volks wagon" is "people's car" in German is it not?

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  3. Ah spokesperson from VW speaking in a German accent saying "please take your cloths off and make your way to the showers" – really the diesel fumes are different from the ones we used at trablinka.

    VW claims that this car uses 1 litre of fuel per 100 km in fact it uses 2 litres of fuel.

    As an electric car it manages to go, on paper, 30 km. do you find that impressive?

    It's a Prius costing 110k euros.

    Where's the 1 litre per 100 km car you promised us VW?

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  4. This is total bullshit, the drag does very little, especially at low speeds, the weight too. The reason for the efficiency is diesel electric..you know the cheap low tech part.

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  5. if they mass produced them it would be much cheaper, if you noticed they a german spit out bunch of non English nonsense so that they don't give away any secrets about the engine & motor. someone once told per weight hauled a train is one of the most economical vehicle in the world. check out the VIA truck 3/4 ton gasoline/electric, gets 100 mpg, if was desiel/electric powered it would do even better, old technology. the desiel/electric train has been around for 50+ years. the oil corporation's are very greedy. the world's energy can be can me maintained by solar panels & wind mill generator.

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  6. Wrong! The very idea of a hybrid powertrain being 'the most efficient' is ridiculous. Fastest? Maybe, but efficient – never.

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  7. I have heard that it can go upto 100 kmpl …Does that mean Xl1 at nearly 0 percent charge and in 1 l of fuel it can go 100 kms??
    or it is 100kmpl plus some initial electric power?

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  8. the mitsubishi outlander PHEV gets 2L/100km in hybrid mode, cost 100'000$ less – there are alot more of them – isnt so damm ugly

    so it roughly gets around the same MPG as the VW because (lets convert to metric here)
    10.2L divided by 496km is around about 2.05L – a very minimal increase in fuel consumption

    but for the better price tag, better looks – what are you better off to buy?

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  9. no offence to VW – but fuck that – why not buy saw a Holden commadore that will use 10X the amont of fuel with a 6.2L V8 engine and save the remaining $100'000 for fuel money? – hey at the end of the life cycle of both cars you will probably have a few $$$ to spare!

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  10. The mistake they did was opting for the DSG. They should've used a normal Automatic gearbox and save like 50KG or so

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  11. The most efficient cars in the world.. are electric.. sorry. They don't have to haul around a petrol generator.
    Now if you are talking about efficient ICE car.. sure.
    This is where things get interesting. The current battle is one of material development for batteries.. not hybrids. Not if one is talking efficiency.
    Range? That is a matter for some discussion yet. Turbine generators running on CNG might be more efficient generators. Lots of work to do there yet however.

    I do have an issue with the use of the word "efficiency" in the title here. It may be an efficient combustion driven car.. but it's not as efficient as electric conversion to motive power alone.. sorry.

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  12. if I could afford a 150,000$ car, I could afford a car that gets 5mpg, and that explains why its going to be so limited.

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