The Volkswagen Passat W8 was a weird automotive when it was first introduced, and it’s even weirder now that the majority of the W8 Passats have either grenaded themselves or became too expensive to take care of and ended up getting lost. This one, nevertheless, is an impossibly well-kept and low-mileage example of certainly one of Volkswagen’s most peculiar decisions, and it’s currently listed on the market with no reserve on Bring A Trailer.
Volkswagen’s mid-size Passat sedan was meant to compete with America’s favorite family cars just like the Toyota Camry and Honda Accord, but it surely wasn’t enough for the evil mastermind behind Volkswagen’s most absurd vehicles, Ferdinand Piëch, the grandson of Ferdinand Porsche. Piëch believed VW needed to maneuver upmarket, and he was the orchestrator of other unprecedented Volkswagens just like the S-Class competitor Phaeton and the flamboyant and excessive Touareg SUV. The W8 Passat was brought along to supply buyers a step below the Phaeton executive sedan, but time hasn’t been kind to the W8 motor.
The Passat was the one automotive ever produced with this wacky W-shaped eight-cylinder engine, and it was the primary of the VW Group’s W-shaped line of engines that eventually grew to incorporate a W12 and a W16. The W8 was a little bit of a Dr. Frankenstein project, formed by taking two of Volkswagen’s revered narrow-angle VR6 engines, lopping two cylinders off every one, and melding the 2 halves together.
It was offered from 2001 to 2004, with standard all-wheel drive and either a 5-speed automatic transmission or a 6-speed manual transmission like this instance. The 4.0-liter W8 engine produced 270 horsepower and 273 pound-feet of torque, which wasn’t particularly remarkable and didn’t lead to especially strong performance numbers. The W8 was well regarded for its silky smooth operation and rev-happy demeanor, but it surely cost an absurd sum of money, around $40,000 when recent within the early 2000s. Accounting for inflation, that’s about $68,000 in 2024 for a Passat.
So even when recent, the W8 Passat was an expensive, rare and unique automotive with a one-of-a-kind engine. Fast forward 20 years, and the considered maintaining an eight-cylinder German automotive with such a bespoke motor has my wallet trembling. This particular automotive, though, is an exceptionally well-kept, low-mile example, so possibly it’s the one W8 Passat price buying? Test it out on Bring A Trailer.
This Article First Appeared At jalopnik.com
