audi tour in Germany

[Jon Linkov]

I have done Audi (3 times) in Ingolstadt, BMW in Munich, and Porsche.

If you are going on a factory tour, then Porsche is worth the visit. If not,
skip. The Museum is small, parking is a chore, and the overall experience
is, IMHO, blah.

The factory tour is interesting, particularly the leather-stitching area and
the Exclusive area, where they create green leather seat belt holders and
yellow leather vent flaps for people with more money than sense (like you
WANT hot air flowing over leather like that?). It's a good tour, but if you
can't go for the tour (ie, just the museum), I say skip.

BMW in Munich was EXCELLENT...well, the Factory tour was. The Museum is
dated, as least in 2001 it was. The exhibit ended with a display that said,
in effect "one day there will be navigation systems in our cars!" It's circa
the first BMW 750IL era. The old BMW stuff is cool, though.

The factory tour was great, because it is an old factory. You walk right
near the lines, close to the workers, etc. There aren't any static displays
(this will make sense later) that you go to. It's real, live, carmaking..and
you're very close to it.

The Audi factory is interesting. The new museum and store are very cool. The
main displays rotate, so you never know what will be featured. Go just to
see the rotating wall that blocks the sun, and the stacked display of cars
that is 4 stories tall and moves.

The factory tour is VERY sanitized. They have fixed displays they take you
to, and you move from display to display. Yes, you see the cars on the line
and the robots and workers, but it's not as interesting as the BMW one.

Feel free to e-mail me w/questions. If you are flying into Munich there is
an Audi Zentrum Forum at the airport..Boutique, nice water closets,
espresso/coffee bar, all the brochures (in UK-English too!) for cars we
don't get, etc.

Jon


On 3/20/04 12:51 PM, "quattro-request at audifans.com"
<quattro-request at audifans.com> wrote:

> Message: 5
> Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2004 01:28:37 -0800
> From: Rocky Mullin <caliban at sharon.net>
> Subject: audi tour in germany
> To: quattro bang <quattro at audifans.com>
> Message-ID: <p060204a0bc81be3522cb@[192.168.1.105]>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"
> 
> 
> is ingolstat the place to go to visit audi in deutchland?
> you know, factory tour, or a museum, or...?  is it even any good,
> or should we instead visit that cool new VW plant in dresden?  i
> can only get two "car" tourism in germany with my sweetie this summer,
> i want to do audi and porsche (stuttgart, i assume).
> 
> TIA!
> 
> -- 
> Rocky Mullin              |
> http://www.e-sheep.com/