John Welsh said:
I went down the rabbit hole and found this...
Here are a few Harlequin fun facts:
- Harlequins were built in batches of four, starting life as single-color cars in Tornado Red, Ginster Yellow, Chagall Blue, and Pistachio Green.
- Doors, hatches, hoods, and fenders were swapped manually, making the process fairly labor intensive.
- There were only four color combinations, each batch consisting of one of each.
- Two of the colors, Chagall Blue and Pistachio Green, were not otherwise available on Golfs in North America.
- All harlequins had the original donor car’s roof, C-pillar, and rocker panel, as these elements were formed of a single welded piece and were impossible to swap out.
- The color of the roof was used for license and registration purposes.
- All Golf Harlequins came with grey interiors.
- The Harlequin treatment was a $150 option.
- All Harlequins were based on the GL trim level, and thus came only with a 115-horsepower 2.0-liter engine. No word on how many were built with manual transmissions.
- With manual transmission, a Golf Harlequin would have started at $13,725.
- With automatic transmission, air conditioning, antilock brakes, and a CD changer, the Golf Harlequin listed for $16,730.
While that initial run of 60 Golf Harlequins wasn’t enough for VW dealers, the additional batch of 200 or so was apparently a few too many. Rumor has it that at least a few Harlequins were swapped back to single-color status at the dealership to help move them off the lot.
I went into this thinking that I'd want the green car, but I think I'd prefer the red one so that I get the green hood.
I love these for the concept because they are as anti lean manufacturing, anti-quality standards as possible in modern manufacturing.
So, you want to take 4 cars, take them off the line and manually move parts around, and then reassemble the combinations?
All of the time efficiency and quality developed for the manufacturing line tossed out. That's awesome that someone would agree to do that for a small batch. That's why I have a soft spot for them. Shows that sometimes humans will be humans and do things because it's cool or you can and not because it makes any sort of sense.
am I the only one sad we never got the Polo?
So wait, is this a Drift car, then?
Peabody
UltimaDork
2/4/21 5:55 p.m.
In reply to mad_machine (Forum Supporter) :
No
If they tried this with most cars today you'd wind up with black and three shades of gray.
Love it and would've totally bought my Golf R in harelquin colors if they'd made it.
GCrites80s said:
If they tried this with most cars today you'd wind up with black and three shades of gray.
Absolutely true:
When this commercial came out, VW had to clarify that they were not bringing the Harlequin back.
David S. Wallens said:
From SEMA 2019:
Donut did a Bumper to Bumper on the car. I love the BBS center caps.
ShawnG
UltimaDork
2/5/21 2:07 p.m.
Seems like you could use plasti-dip and roll your own pretty easily.
This popped up on FM last night. I think the look works better on the VWs.
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/3257616554330065
Love it! Also, many of the MKIII were painted their base color by the dealer because they couldn't sell them. One of 260 would be cool to have.
hoots04
New Reader
2/5/21 5:55 p.m.
Interestingly (scarily?) enough, this showed up in my youtube suggestions a short time after I clicked on the GRM article.
84FSP
UltraDork
2/5/21 7:01 p.m.
I would love a Polo. There is a harlequin poli that sits at a vw across from my companies office in frankfurt. There is much want. The Polo's came with a G40 supercharged option, although not the Harley's.
Mr_Asa
UltraDork
2/5/21 7:19 p.m.
Considering they are done to showcase the colors available on the current models, shouldn't they be Black, White, Grey, Other Grey?
Edit: I see my joke has already been made. :(
Just noticing that the SEMA car has a Momo Benetton wheel. I had one--different model--in my CRX. I should have kept the wheel when I sold the car. 
Wonder if you had to pay a premium for insurance. Body shop would have a headache trying to fix one of those!
There was a business around here that bought at least two Golfs as promotional cars. They surely did stand out in traffic.
I've also built a few low budget harlequins myself over the years, based on my cheap soul.
In reply to Gearheadotaku (Forum Supporter) :
No need to blend panels. Seems easier to me.
Duke said:
I love Harlequin Golfs.
So if you have one, do you keep it stock or GTI-ize it?
In reply to David S. Wallens :
Since the value of these cars is strictly based upon their unique appearance, I don't think GTI-ing one would hurt that value at all.
Also, can we agree that this is the perfect wheel for one? 
