2009 Volkswagen CC 2.0 T Luxury Full Test and Video

There are plenty of people who would like the 2009 Volkswagen CC a lot better if it were ugly. Isn't a VW supposed to be ugly?

Hardly anyone has firsthand memories of the Volkswagen Bug anymore, and yet the lumpy little People's Car follows VW around like some kind of family curse, reminding everybody of a time when everything about Volkswagen seemed wacky and comically futuristic, like a science fiction movie of the 1950s. The fatal flaw of the 2004 Volkswagen Phaeton might not have really been its $66,700 price point but instead its refusal to embrace the Beetle's stereotype.

Of course, this is the very strength of the 2009 Volkswagen CC. It's really, really stylish and yet it still has the soul of a plain, practical sedan meant for our times of frugality and fuel-efficiency.

Style Statement
Car designers have been slapping tight coupe-style tops on sedan bodies since the 1930s, and now it's very much the fashion of the moment again. Product planners are seeking a way to make the sedan package that everyone needs as sexy as the coupe plaything that everybody wants. Yet rarely has the concept been so well executed as it is with the 2009 Volkswagen CC.

The Passat package is the Camry of Germany, a tidy, affordable effort that gives the Germans something to drive if they don't want a VW Golf. There was a time when the Passat had a lot of appeal to Americans, too, back in 1998-2004 when Consumer Reports endorsed it (seems like a long time ago, doesn't it?).

And yet the CC makes it seem like you're seeing the Passat for the first time. The compressed curve of the CC's roof line arches gracefully over the car, magically integrating the trunk into the rest of the shape and fooling the eye into believing that it's not seeing the conventional three-box silhouette of a sedan. The frameless door glass reinforces the design conventions of a coupe, while the front of the car presents a unique look with a certain elegant efficiency. Altogether the VW CC makes the similarly coupelike Mercedes-Benz CLS look like an over-frosted piece of German chocolate cake, stylistically speaking.

The 2009 Volkswagen CC also has a visual balance that's missing in the Benz, perhaps because it's not too big. It's Camry size without the sedan bloat. And it backs up its luxury-style looks because it comes only in two well-equipped trim levels, Sport and Luxury, which are largely distinguished by a few convenience features. You can also pick the front-wheel-drive Sport model with either the turbocharged 200-horsepower 2.0-liter inline-4 or the 280-hp 3.6-liter VR6 V6, or you can have the front-wheel-drive Luxury model with the 2.0-liter turbo or the all-wheel-drive Luxury model with the 280-hp V6.

The German Car Thing
As you're wafting along the highway at 80 mph in the front-wheel-drive CC Sport with its 2.0-liter turbo, you could only be in a German car. The wheels track straight and true at high speed, and yet the long-legged suspension calmly strokes through its full range of travel as it absorbs the rolling concrete waves. You never want for power, which always arrives with an elastic surge of authority. The cabin feels at once spacious and yet carefully fitted to the driver, so nothing is more than an arm's reach away.

When you add it all up, this is one of the very few front-wheel-drive cars with a four-cylinder engine that feels like a genuine luxury car. The relaxed suspension calibration helps here, and the relatively sizable overhangs of the 188.9-inch bodywork on the 106.7-inch wheelbase further calm the ride motions. Yet it's also fair to say that the four-cylinder engine plays an important role as well.

Recently revised, this 2.0-liter inline-4 never lets you know that it is small and efficient instead of big and thirsty. A cast-iron block and an internal balance shaft help quell vibration, while direct injection and a relatively tall (for a turbocharged engine) 9.6:1 compression ratio deliver crisp throttle response, and finally the combination of variable valve timing (on the intake side only) and turbocharging helps broaden the power band. It adds up to more performance than you expect from 200 hp at 5,100-6,000 rpm and 207 pound-feet of torque at 1,700-5,000 rpm.

The engine also performs well when you have something serious in mind, as this front-wheel-drive CC accelerates to 60 mph from a standstill in 7.3 seconds (7.0 seconds with 1 foot of rollout like on a drag strip) on its way to the quarter-mile in 15.2 seconds at 92 mph. Of course, the price for such enthusiasm is an uncouth growl from the engine room, a reminder that there are just four cylinders doing your bidding.

Not the German Car Thing
If you go by the numbers, the Volkswagen CC is also pretty adept at all the usual dynamic handling tests. It grips the skid pad at 0.82g, then punches through the slalom at 63.5 mph and stops short from 60 mph in 123 feet. A good amount of rubber on the road counts for a lot here, as the 235/35R17 Continental ContiProContact tires are up to the task of coping with the CC's relatively modest 3,362 pounds.

Truth to tell, though, the 2009 Volkswagen CC handles better when you think ahead and apply your inputs deliberately. The suspension is soft (though not uncontrolled) in roll and pitch, so if you start whipping the steering wheel around, the ride motions get a little confused. This is a highway car in the American idiom, though it's always safe and utterly predictable everywhere else, which is very much in the Volkswagen idiom. It likes slow hands on the steering wheel, not fast ones.

Not that you feel particularly deprived. This is a gorgeous cabin in which to spend time on the open road. The seats have retro-style pleats like those of American or Italian cars of the 1950s, though they're carefully fitted to the human form in the modern style. Everywhere you look, you find color values that are perfectly judged, which help make the relatively simple architecture look like spectacular European design, even if some of the materials don't bear close inspection. The confines of the low roof make everything look slightly five-eighths scale, as if you'd bought some assembled Swedish furniture from Ikea, although there's no want of real space.

Much of the cabin's goodness comes from the four-passenger seating configuration, a very smart choice that makes this VW seem snappy instead of sensible. Now that utility vehicles of various persuasions have taken on the responsibility of toting families, there's no reason for an adult car to carry more than four people. And with the CC's overall passenger volume of 96.8 cubic feet — which suggests that there are a few cubes missing in the corners — the four-passenger configuration means more space for everybody.

Yet for all the CC's visual refinement, there are some gaps in the presentation. The little luxuries like the ignition key, push-button parking brake, automatic locking and satellite radio are all in place, but these are clearly the most affordable of their particular genus, and they operate with a noisy clumsiness that undercuts the CC's visual impression of exclusivity. The sound of the doors unlocking just before you prepare to climb out will literally make you jump. And while there is a lot of technology available in the CC, most of it affects the way the car drives rather than passenger convenience. This is much to Volkswagen's credit, but it leaves an apparent gap between the CC and the gadgets of its competition from Japan.

Luxury Comes With Four Cylinders
Americans continue to tell opinion polls that one of the greatest luxuries is the ability to drive heedlessly past a gas station, and the 2009 Volkswagen CC 2.0T delivers with its EPA rating of 19 mpg city and 29 highway. Meanwhile, it also delivers on all the other luxury stuff, including strongly expressive styling, a big-car ride and a ready supply of power. This is a wonderfully satisfying car to drive, proof again that a premium car doesn't have to be big to be good.

You can still see some compromises in the performance, though. It's the opposite of a Japanese car, refined visually but a bit unresolved mechanically. A lot of smart work has been done on the product plan, so fairly affordable hardware has been plugged into the slots in order to meet this car's price point.

But that's the Volkswagen way, because as elegant as this car is, an important part of its character comes from the spirit of the practical, affordable Volkswagen Bug that lives within it.

The manufacturer provided Edmunds this vehicle for the purposes of evaluation.