>It’s common knowledge, that VW went all in with their diesels and totally ignored petrol engines for a long time.
Sorry, but that "common knowledge" is wrong. Source: I know people working in the VW engine research and design lab, and they can be very talkative (probably to the point where they broke NDAs while a little drunk).
What is true is that VW, at a certain point, did invest significantly more in diesel engine tech than in petrol engine tech. But not to the point where they ignored petrol engines. They couldn't afford to do so, as they were serving many markets where diesel is rather uncommon (for personal cars). And at that point in time, they already had petrol engines that were very competitive and often even leading the pack (depending on the model). Not that any of this matters a lot today, as all that is quite a bit in the past now.
That isn't to say that some VW models are rather shit when it comes to reliability. The VW Jetta, which isn't even sold in Europe I believe, has a particularly bad rep in that regard.
Specially for petrol engines, the 2006/2007 EA111 TSI (1.2l and 1.4l) have a particular bad rep for reliability, and later EA111s are a mixed bag at best. Earlier EA111s and the successor, the EA211 (1.0 to 1.4l), do not have the same bad rep, and in fact got at least decent reliability rep and favorable mpg rep. The "bigger" EA888 (1.8l/2.0l) initially had a design flaw that caused excessive oil consumption in a lot of cases, which was later fixed in future iterations of the engine.
Sorry, but that "common knowledge" is wrong. Source: I know people working in the VW engine research and design lab, and they can be very talkative (probably to the point where they broke NDAs while a little drunk).
What is true is that VW, at a certain point, did invest significantly more in diesel engine tech than in petrol engine tech. But not to the point where they ignored petrol engines. They couldn't afford to do so, as they were serving many markets where diesel is rather uncommon (for personal cars). And at that point in time, they already had petrol engines that were very competitive and often even leading the pack (depending on the model). Not that any of this matters a lot today, as all that is quite a bit in the past now.
That isn't to say that some VW models are rather shit when it comes to reliability. The VW Jetta, which isn't even sold in Europe I believe, has a particularly bad rep in that regard.
Specially for petrol engines, the 2006/2007 EA111 TSI (1.2l and 1.4l) have a particular bad rep for reliability, and later EA111s are a mixed bag at best. Earlier EA111s and the successor, the EA211 (1.0 to 1.4l), do not have the same bad rep, and in fact got at least decent reliability rep and favorable mpg rep. The "bigger" EA888 (1.8l/2.0l) initially had a design flaw that caused excessive oil consumption in a lot of cases, which was later fixed in future iterations of the engine.