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'What's Up!, Doc?' It's VW's mini!

It's cute and sweet and all those other adjectives that manage to apply to what is, after all, just a chunk of metal, but - like the first ant coming out of the nest-  VW’s Up!.just launched at the 2011 Frankfurt auto show, carries a stinging threat of many more behind.

Competitors in the A segment market, buy your Doom! now.

Frankly, I think VW’s taken a high-investment gamble on what its broad corporate bosses must see as a catchy name. The Beetle reborn as the Up!. A replacement for the ultimate classless car.

MUSIC-HALL PARADE

The name actually has a lower-case u, as in up!, but VW’s typo-illogical spelling just ain’t going to work, so Up! it will be on Wheels24. And be prepared: there WILL be lots of Up!s (see, even the plural doesn’t work, heaven help writers when they have to use possessive construction as in “the Up!’s” (singular) or “the Up!se’s”).

The cars were launched to the media (about 2300 of them) at the giant Ballsporthalle (not at the actual Frankfurt show venue) the night before the world’s biggest auto extravaganza opened to the world’s biggest frenzy of motor media representatives as the first act of what turned out to be a music-hall parade of new models from the VW Group’s eight automakers – VW, Audi, Porsche, Seat, Bentley, Skoda, Lamborghini and Bugatti.

They came, well, Up! through the floor as well as out through camouflaged doors with much banging and flashing and in fact looked just like many other brands’ small hatchbacks. Somehow (and this article is an example) the Up! is garnering way more publicity than its diminutive size might expect.

Which is why VW is taking that gamble: there’s won’t, you see, be just one Up!. Oh no, VW has a whole string of doublenames lined up and no doubt many more will follow as the advertising copywriters warm to the theme.

PERHAPS A TOUCH SPARTAN? The Up!'s cabin is compact but comfortable but the fascia and it's top look rather lacking in interesting features.

One drags me very much into temptation: it’s the Buggy Up! 'Nuff said. Then there’s the Black Up!, the White Up! and the Up! Azzurra sailing team. Look out for the GT Up!, a concept version tuned to handle the “no limit” sections of Germany’s autobahn with twice the power of the basic car.

But wait, there’s more: the Eco Up! (it burns natural gas) and the E Up! (battery version) and the Cross Up! to follow in the ruff-‘n-tumble world of the VW CrossPolo, CrossGolf and CrossTouran (the German car moniker-makers apparently unaware the ‘cross’ in English can mean angry, upset or just plain pissed-off but none of them nice.

So, for VW “the New Small Family” has been pro-genitored and the advertising opportunities seem unlimited though that plastered all over Frankfurt for the show hasn’t moved the VW moguls in South Africa to commit (or, for that matter not commit) to the Up!.

The two-door hatch will be followed by a four-door hatch. And while the Beetlemeisters are on a roll, why not a station-wagon version (the Pack Up!) and a two/four-door cabriolet (the Roof Up!).

Chicken farmers could buy the Cock Up!, basketball players the Jump Up! and parliamentary members keen on the 'No Information is Good Information' Bill their offspring (without telling them why) a Hush Up!.

In fact (a small eurocheque from Wolfsburg for this please) why not just have the Up! word on the boot and adjacent to a universal and adjustable slot into which the buyer can fit his/her own pet Up! name, made (of course) by the dealer for a modest sum/profit in variously coloured plastic?

In fact why not suggest your pet Up! name now, using the Readers’ Comments section further down the page,,,? Let’s hear them!

SEE-THROUGH BOOT: The VW Up! IS a city car but does that make a glass rear door good for reversing AND security? Time will tell - though maybe not in South Africa.

The Cross Up! is real as a concept car but VW says it already demonstrates three aspects very clearly:

1 How the four-door Up! will look.
2 What the four-door Up! might look like in a Cross Up! version.
3 That VW will be expanding its successful Cross programme series across more models.

Typical of a Cross model from Volkswagen, the wheel arch and sill extensions designed in a dark anthracite (with satin effect) as well as the black side protection strips above the sills; worked into these strips is the "Cross Up!" signature.

The rugged bumpers are also a new and eye-catching at the front is the silver crossbar in the bumper which carries fog lights and an air intake with a honeycomb grille that is distinctly larger, especially towards its bottom.

Also designed in a silver colour is the underbody protection. The rear of the car also has a counterpart to this underbody protection and a silver crossbar on the bumper. Another unmistakable trait of the Cross version is its ground clearance - its 15mm higher.

The concept car makes its appearance with red paint and other silver elements such as machine-polished 16” alloy rims in “Cross” design and 185-profile tyres; the roof rails of the Cross Up! concept car are "matt silver" to match the external mirrors.

The first Up!’s will have a 55kW but VW says the cars’ design can handle much more power. And that, too, can be desirable. Showing how such a more powerful Up! might appear is the highly dynamic GT Up!. Conceivably, its engine could have 75kW which would give the  barely 900kg GT more affordable driving fun than almost any other vehicle.

Now, we wait for the decision from VW South Africa... after all, it's Up! to them.
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