All-new Volkswagen Touareg set

Volkswagen is about to launch its third-generation Touareg full-size SUV. Due to launch at the Beijing motor show next month and based on its Porsche counterpart, the new VW is effectively a Cayenne for the people

But the new generation Touareg won't be seen in Australia for at least 14 months. And when it does arrive, it will command a significant chunk more cash than the current Touareg.

That's partly because new Volkswagen Touareg will be the brand's new flagship, sneaking beneath the two-tonne barrier in its lightest form and toting all the same high-tech chassis and suspension technology as the biggest Porsche SUV.

That tech includes chassis technology like rear wheel steering, active anti-rollbars to keep the body flat almost all the time, active air suspension systems and LiDar-equipped active cruise control.

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New interior tech

Yet while the chassis and suspension hardware apes the Porsche, the new third-generation Volkswagen Touareg advances interior technology.

The highlight will be a radical curved 15-inch touchscreen for its multimedia system that sets new standards for size and style. It joins the eight-inch digital instrument cluster to create a 23-inch Innovision digital shield.

The big screen arrives in the new SUV largely thanks to an expensive interior development program that was supposed to be shared with the now-cancelled Phaeton II limousine.

The third-generation Touareg will (eventually) score 48V mild-hybrid power on its turbocharged, 3.0-litre V6 petrol engine and its 3.0-litre TDI is the same Audi-sourced V6 that has drawn official ire in Germany for continuing to host questionable emissions software in its management computer.

Volkswagen management assured us those bugs have finally been worked out, two years after Dieselgate first highlighted them.

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Faithful to Porsche

Even though the new Touareg is 120kg lighter than its predecessor (thanks, largely, to the 50 per cent aluminium mix of the Volkswagen Group's Modular Longitudinal Matrix (MLB) chassis architecture), it still totes a 3.5-tonne towing capacity.

So faithfully does the Touareg stick to the Porsche MLB script that it has the exact same wheelbase as the Cayenne, which means it's layout has been restricted to a five-seater.

A seven-seat layout would have meant adopting the Audi Q7 layout, which would have added 100mm to the 2895mm wheelbase, pushing the Touareg out to about 5100mm overall.

VW insiders say the change wasn't worth the effort for a flagship that would attract a different kind of buyer. In any event, most of Volkswagen's markets already have two three-row Volkswagen SUVs — the Atlas and the Tiguan Allspace.

For all that, the long-wheelbase Touareg was relatively recent cancellation and Volkswagen admits it could be revived quickly if there's enough demand.

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Roomy for five

Even with only five seats, the standard Touareg is 77mm longer than before and at 1984mm, it's also 44mm wider. It's also a touch lower (-7mm) but still swallows a phenomenal 810 litres of luggage space with the rear seats in the standard position. It can also carry 100kg on the roof.

At least part of the reason it can be so luggage hungry is that it doesn't carry a full-sized spare tyre, with only a temporary space saver sitting beneath the luggage floor.

Volkswagen insists it's not plausible to fit full-size spares for tyres ranging from 17 to 21 inches. For all that, it will offer an aftermarket full-size spare setup that takes up one side of the luggage area, dropping it to around 600 litres.

For everything the new Touareg gets out of the Audi-developed MLB architecture, there is also a lot of stuff missing at the launch because Audi's developers have missed their deadlines. The Touareg won't immediately be available with the mild-hybrid systems because it's not yet integrated for manufacturing, even though both the Q7 and the Cayenne come down the same Bratislava production line with it fitted.

Likewise, Audi hasn't delivered the key-operated self-parking system yet and it was also left in charge of developing the grunter turbodiesel 4.0-litre V8 which won't be ready for the Touareg's launch.

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Unique design

The Touareg has its own authentic design language for the first time in its million-car history. For the first time, it won't share its doors with the Cayenne, which let Volkswagen put some signature crispness in the new big SUV's waistline and some curves of its own over the wheel arches.

The head and tail lights are LED, and there is an option for full Matrix LED headlights with 75 light points each side. Beneath them is plenty of chrome, a lot of which shines out of the five horizontal bars of the grille to visually stretch the already impressive width dimensions.

All Australian-spec Touaregs will come with the full Innovision digital dashboard, complete with a stubby, flat-topped gear lever, fully adjustable leather seats and the more intuitive voice-command system debuted on the Audi A8.

And we've driven it... Read 2019 Volkswagen Touareg prototype review 

Volkswagen will encourage people to personalize their screens, even allowing a homescreen with their own photographs, and it dumps the "back" button in favour of crosses to close tabs and a "home" button a la smartphones. It will deliver an interchangeable row of "favourite" touchscreen buttons close to the driver instead of traditional fixed buttons, cleaning up the cabin and freeing up space.

There will also be a new full colour head-up display with a 33 per cent larger display area.

The new Touareg also introduces more new tech for the driver, including a forward-facing night-vision thermal-imaging camera, front area monitoring, more intuitive active cruise control and road-sign monitoring. The infra-red camera of the thermal-imaging system is supposed to pick up otherwise unseen pedestrians, then the Matrix LEDs will flash at them briefly to help the driver understand the threat.

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Shared all-wheel drive

The new Touareg features the same hang-on all-wheel drive system as its Porsche twin, delivering five different drive modes for the driver, ranging from Eco to Comfort, Normal, Sport and the customized Individual mode.

Touareg hasn't had a low-range transmission since the first generation, but it electronically delivers pre-mapped suspension, transmission, steering and skid-control packages. They range from Snow to Off-Road Auto, Sand, Gravel and all the way to Off-Road Expert. There's also an Off-Road Pack as an option.

The three-chamber active air suspension also helps with the off-road work, dropping 50mm in ride height at highway speeds to improve handling and lower fuel consumption, then rising 70mm in the car's off-road mode. It also drops even further to help people load the luggage area.

Driving all of that will be two versions of the 3.0-litre, V6 turbodiesel, with the Europeans initially using a 170kW entry diesel and a 210kW top-end version.

For the non-diesel believers (a growing bunch in Europe, at least) the mild-hybrid V6 TFSI turbo petrol engine will deliver 250kW. Touareg will eventually score a version of the Audi-developed 4.0-litre, biturbo petrol V8 with 310kW.

China will be the only country to grab the plug-in hybrid version, with 270kW of system power, but it will eventually sneak into other countries.

All engine variants will drive through eight-speed automatic transmissions capable of sending out 1000Nm of torque. The centre differential is self-locking and can send up to 70 per cent of its torque to the front axle when it's needed, or 80 per cent to the rear.