[s-cars] Truth vs. Joy

[qshipq at aol.com]

 Taka
I'm an equal opportunity driver...  I enjoy my Audis, and I drive all the ones I can, and have driven the TTS, v10tdi Q7, the Q5, NeuS5, NeuS6, the R8, the R8v10, the RS4, and plenty of tweeked ur/neu S4's.  I also make a point to drive the competition, the most obvious being cuts of the roundel pie.  Say what you want about the X6, I say it doesn't picture well.  But I got a wild ride in the X6M, and must say, I truly understand why, in spite of the press (and your opinion) it's a sold out model.

A couple of nits, first the xdrive driveline is available on the 335 and the 535.  Drive a 335 with the dinan chip and oil cooler, you lay down more pony's than the M3.  Those twin turbo I6 cars are really nice, in rwd or awd models.  I dare say if you believe Audi has the 'right stuff' in the performance department, you just haven't driven that many BMW's, or are unable to compare them objectively.  The DSG versions of the BMW M3/M5 takes any paddle shift of any VAG product, and shows them it can be done right.  Same with Stability Control.

Remember too, Gen V of Quattro will go Haldex and also GKN for the highline Audis (GKN).  Fine and dandy, but GKN already is under contract to supply that awd system to BMW, and it's in production cars now.  So, what will be the Audi advantage exactly if the drivelines are identical?  

WRT opinions on the looks, and subjective comments, that's the eye of the beholder.  I'm not overly excited about much in the new Audi lineup, save the R8.  The 5 coupes of the respective marques?  Maybe it's just me, but I have a hard time telling them apart well.  

Snow?  Well, I've been known to drive on ice on occasion, and I prefer the center locked always, and usually the rear diff too.  But in my 14 years of Steamboat observations, driving skill is a higher variable than generation of quattro.  As Chad Clark will attest, Will Metcalf has done very well in B5 and B6 S4's thru the years.  WRT SUV performance machines, again drive a few.  The first time I drove a X5sport years ago, I fully understood why most buyers turned in their 540's to get one, it did everything better, and could tow 6000lbs to boot.  Contrast that to when I worked the Q7 Arrive and drive?  I told the boys in the comparo tent to park the non-sport version of the x5 v8, because it didn't make the Q7 rides seem 'better'.  

I will agree with you that if BMW and Audi get too ego-centric in their fights, Hyundai and Acura are going to sneak up and take the lead in AWD performance before either german marque can react quick enough.

I fully admit, I enjoyed my R8 rides fully.  But in all honesty, the last few rides that made me grin ear to ear were not Audis.  335i dinan, 135 stock, 135dinan, M5, X6M, M6 and just a month ago, carving Deals Gap in a brand new E92 M3 DSG.  That list of cars, really makes me wonder what exactly I drove that De Lorenzo didn't.  


When the R5 is still trying to sprout wings with some 'new' quattro system that's in the production BMW's already, and the TTRS awaits TTS sales to complete 'first'...  I say maybe the 'quattro advantage' is losing it's lock in the market.  I hope that changes, and really soon.

My .02

Scott J


 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Taka Mizutani <t44tqtro at gmail.com>
To: qshipq at aol.com
Cc: jc at j2c3.com; theringmeister at triad.rr.com; s-car-list at audifans.com
Sent: Fri, Mar 19, 2010 11:06 am
Subject: Re: [s-cars] Truth vs. Joy


Scott-
What kind of mind-altering drugs are you taking? Are you serious?

These BMWs you mention- they're all fugly, with a capital "F."

The X6- ugly, impractical, totally stupid. Whoever thought of this one and the "me-too" Accord Crosstour and Acura ZDX should be shot. Sold out just means that there are a bunch of lemmings that will buy whatever is the latest and greatest from BMW.

All the other cars you're talking about are RWD besides the X5, besides the 335.

The regular BMWs are terrible- ugly exterior styling, cheap-looking materials inside, horrible iDrive system. What's really there to love? For cars that advertise as the ultimate driving machine, they're moving further and further away from that motto and becoming overweight caricatures of themselves.

Meanwhile, Audi is improving with every successive generation except on the manual transmission front- the driving dynamics are damn near right on BMW with the latest generation of cars. At least this is an improvement, although the weight gain is similar to BMW, which is bad.

Have you driven any of the AWD iterations in the snow? I'd like to hear your thoughts- I hate open diff'ed, "lets let the ABS system brake the wheels to help traction" stupid AWD systems. I've yet to drive any AWD iteration that feels as seamless as Gen I/Gen II quattro.

Subaru STi DCCD is damn close, but you need to lock the center in 50/50 to have it feel stable when you just want to get somewhere without hanging the tail out every corner. Audi/VW Haldex AWD is terrible, Volvo's Haldex is terrible, not too impressed with how easy it is to burn up the brakes with the BMW and MBZ systems in snow. The same with the "EDL" quattro cars where you merely burn up the rear brakes. It's not fun when you have a long drive and just want to get there safely and the car feels like it's schizophrenic the whole time.

BTW, the real target should be the GT-R in terms of AWD for a performance application- the X6 is most definitely a joke if you're talking about a performance application- no one is seriously going to run an X6 really hard- an SUV? Really? Look at how good ATTESA-ETS makes the GT-R perform compared to cars that should destroy it.

The Germans better watch out or Hyundai will eclipse them all anyway- cheaper, more reliable, better performance, better warranty.

Taka