[s-cars] Quattro.... there is no substitute - just add JNR

[calvinlc at earthlink.net]

Well I am going to be in the minority opinion here...what else is new :)  I
think the ESP works great!  If you are driving regulalry to mildly
aggressive, that is.  I can't speak to hanging the tail out and all that
jazz....well not too much anyway...I can say that the damn thing works so
good it's almost not fun to drive in the snow.  During the AFC championship
game halftime I ran out for some Chinese food and needless to say I was in a
hurry.  It was snowing and the roads were in pretty bad shape.  I took the
A6 because it is so damn sure footed with the ESP on.  Now don't get me
wrong, if you go into a corner waaay too hard like the pavement is totally
dry it's not going to turn - don't take driving lessons from all the SUVs I
see in the ditches just because you have the best all wheel drive system
around it's not invincible.

As far as the straightline performance goes there is no way you could ever
accelerate in my UrS as fast as in the A6 in a couple inches of snow if you
have the same tires on both cars....no fricking way....I don't care if
you're the best driver in the world.  It seems completely stable to me.

I don't know, I just think that the ESP really works well in my wife's
A6...you really have to be doing something stupid to lose control, IMHO.
And if I ever want to get nutty there is always the on-off switch, which
reverts it back to the same thing as the UrS without the diff lock engaged.
I would never buy a car with a system like this that you could not disable.

If I want to fishtail the car around I'll wait 'til it's dry and do it in my
Firebird where it's nice and predictable....no computer interaction to worry
about there...just 0 to 540 ft-lbs in a nice analog fashion controlled by my
right foot.

Like I said, I know I am in the minority here.

--Calvin




-----Original Message-----
From: s-car-list-bounces at audifans.com
[mailto:s-car-list-bounces at audifans.com]On Behalf Of Taka Mizutani
Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 5:41 AM
To: pkrasusky at ups.com
Cc: wmahoney at disk.com; s-car-list at audifans.com
Subject: Re: [s-cars] Quattro.... there is no substitute - just add JNR


Can any of you nuts that has a late-model Audi w/ ESP tell me how the ESP
does
in the snow?

Does it cause the car to terminally understeer to the point of not being
able to turn?

I've experienced this a few times in the Volvo where the DSTC is interfering
so much that
I can't turn at a decent speed in the loose stuff. I can't figure out how to
turn it off completely
w/o reading the manual- it was supposed to be hit the button 7 times, but
that doesn't work.

With quattro, ESP is too much of a killjoy, I'd think- being able to go in a
little hot, countersteer
and give it a lot of gas is part of the fun of driving quattro in the snow.
I wouldn't recommend trying
this on public roads, though. :-)

Taka
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