Hallo :D, today it's hot like KRAZY, i'm melting and bored as always. Today it's special car from a normal manufacturer that has no idea on how to make a luxury sedan. I'm Talking about the one and only, i present you the Volkswagen Phaeton:                                                                                                     Volkswagen Phaeton

                                          Origins

Back in late 90s early 2000s, Volkswagen group decided to make RADICAL changes to all car brand within the group, by first starting to use common platforms instead of making every single chassis and engine for each car, so reducing costs 

                                     shared engines and chassis

Well we can say that Volkswagen AG back in the 80s-90s-00s bought nearly....everything, Like Skoda, Revived Audi "NSU", Seat, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Bentley, Ducati and truck companies
                                          Volkswagen AG
Recently their latest purchase is Porsche after the 2009 financial Crisis and all of this was done by a one single man the grandson of the guy who founded Porsche, I'm talking about the one and only Ferdinand Piëch                                                       1937-2019
He was a quite special man, quite "GERMAN", he decided to make Volkswagen aka a normal car brand with no experience in making Luxurious cars rival Mercedes and BMW with his ultimate weapon named The Volkswagen Phaeton and will It succeed...?

                                                        The Phaeton Project

It all started with a Concept

    

                                                        Volkswagen Concept D

Volkswagen was always special for Ferdinand by making a Luxurious SUV "Touareg", "The Phaeton", a Passat with 8 cylinder and a concept supercar with a W12 "12 cylinder but more close and less long" 

                                                  The Volkswagen W12
His idea was to make Volkswagen more respectable because the name "Volks Wagen" means people's car so something low cost and not very important and in the same group you have Audi "more premium" but he didn't care the, Phaeton philosophy was a car that can drive at 300kph under 50°C while maintaining 22°C inside with pure comfort. The car borrows part from Bentley Flying Spur and Audi A8 such as the engine, yes the Powertrain of the car can range from" V6-V8-V10 and the big boss himself the W12" 
This W12 has 2 variants: Twin-Turbo and Naturally Aspirated, in the one in the car is the N/A which it produce 450HP which is enough to drive on the Autobahn without breaking a sweat, the BiTurbo is in the Continental GT which is logical because the car is POWERFUL, it can output 560HP. The Phaeton share parts with the Bentley because of the same Platform "D1" the same one as the Bentley Continental GT/Flying Spur "psst the FS is just 5 doors"                                               Bentley Continental GT SPEED
and not really with the A8 because it uses Aluminum unlike the VW and the Bentley which they both use steel.
And the interiors MY GOOOOOOOODIt's just....beautiful, how well made and crafted, Ferdinand wasn't bluffing about making it a rival for the S class Mercedes and the 7 series BMW or even the A8. Sure the car was AWESOME and cool but now we are gonna see why it flopped hard "sure 70000+ were made and sold".
But it didn't meet the expectations that were set like i dunno loosing money everytime they sold a car because the production was so expensive hmmmm. And the Volkswagen brand itself, sure the car looked cool but when you go to the dealership and see a Phaeton beside a Lupo                                                          This shitbox
You don't technically understand the drill and the reliability sure the 2000s were unreliable like UNRELIABLE, the W220 Mercedes was beyond unreliable But the V10 TDI was a special case of how unreliable an engine can be too much heavy too much slow, sure torquy as hell but meh for the same amount of power output, an Inline 6 diesel 3.0 can produce the same amount of power without drinking fuel like a fat pig, the car parts were as expensive as Bentley's one because it's technically a Bentley. The car price it self didn't help, like for the same price you can get a Bentley, Audi, Mercedes, BMW or even a Lexus.

In the end Volkswagen stopped it production after 14 years and they wanted to make a successor but the Dieselgate said fuck you And if you think that it looks like an Audi, it's normal because it's based around the new A8, somewhat even reusing platforms in high end models. Did you know that the word "Phaeton" is from Greek mythology ? Technically it's the son of Helios "the god of the sun". Now see ya *^____^*