in2dwww

After waiting since the order on September 19, I finally picked up my A6 TDI.

I'm not new to TDI or modern diesels, but this is my first Audi.

I picked it up on Friday afternoon. Over the weekend, I did my typical new car road trip to effectively give the car a nice break-in and find out if there are any issues to be addressed.

First off, this car is solid. No rattles, squeaks, hisses, howls, or moans. Secondly, this thing is super quiet and super quick. I have no regrets leaving an SLK55 AMG and an E320 BlueTec for this A6.

I haven't had ACC, lane keeping assist, or all-wheel-drive on any car before so here's my take on my first 600 miles so far.

Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC):
Stunning. Set the speed, adjust the following distance to 4 rather than the default 3. Let the car do all the work. PERFECT for highway use. Even better for those busy roads where traffic is constantly adjusting speed. Absolutely amazing when the car comes to a complete stop on its own. This will be the one feature in future cars that I will not live without. Sometimes the car in front would exit to the right in a separate lane and ACC would not unlock for a few seconds, leaving me with deceleration and then a burst of acceleration. It was most prevalent in mode 4 and mode 3 was more forgiving. I'm too chicken to go for mode 2 or 1 right now.

Lane Keeping Assist:
I'm not sure on the actual name, but the car uses a camera to identify lane markings and steers the car to keep it centered in the lane. At first, I thought the system must have a better idea of how to drive than I do, because it kept disagreeing with me on my idea of where I should be in the lane. It also corrected me constantly on curved roads as if to tell me that my angle of attack was all wrong. Well, the A6 is fairly wide compared to an E-class so I was shocked to find such an aggressive steering correction. While getting used to it, I think I found out the secret. It feels like the level of correction also corresponds to the car settings (comfort, auto, dynamic) in the MMI. In auto, the system intervenes early but the correction is aggressive. In dynamic, it's a late intervention and a light correction. In comfort, it's an early intervention and a light correction. Also, I've noticed that there is a vibrate mode. Mine vibrates when I stay too close to the edge of a lane. Overall, it's freaky. But it's also a good way to learn the lines in this sized car. Also, the intervention takes full control and it's almost intimidating when it does because it takes a lot of force to override. The system will ignore lanes if you turn it off or signal a lane change. But be sure to signal your lane change before you even think about moving. Signal, then move. Don't move and signal at the same time because it will intervene briefly.

Combine ACC with Lane Assist and what I have is a semi-autonomous car (or auto pilot). I'm really just looking out for road debris, animals, and idiots. Speaking of idiots, the lane keeping combined with the ACC radars will also control the gap between cars in parallel lanes. I figured this out when someone came real close to me while passing on the left. I had no idea how close they were, but the car actually steered itself away and toward the right side of the lane while the idiot passed me. Also, when passing semi trucks (at any speed), the steering corrections begin to take on crazy minute corrections (I'm talking miliseconds) and the car cuts a straight path while passing. I've never felt such stability in a car when blowing past truckers.

The intervention seems to have cooled down during my return from Charlteston, SC and I think the break-in of the tires had something to do with it. The Continental ContiProContacts that came with the non-sport must have been oily/greasy and the trip definitely warmed them up and cut a nice drift-free straight line stability.

Bose Stereo:

I did not get the B&O and although the Bose has a very nice sound stage, the tunes definitely lack compared to the Harmon/Kardon systems I'm used to in the Benzes. I don't have any regrets, but if the B&O was $2k, I might have gone for it. $6k is just too much but the sound must be the complete picture because I'm certainly not getting it in the Bose. I also don't have the CD changer in the glovebox... is that included with B&O? I'm also unable to import CDs into the jukebox.

Performance:
I babied the car for the first 100 miles and then gradually increase the need for speed on the highway as the miles add up. But in no way do I exceed 3k rpm. At one point, I needed to pass someone so I kicked it up past my preset 80mph speed limit and it was effortless.

The sound of the engine on a cold start has no hint of diesel clatter. In fact, it reminds me of an older inline 6 BMW engine with it's smooth yet deep note.

I'm not going to do any 0-60 runs until I get at least 1200 miles on the clock. I'm taking it easy for now.

Stop-Start:
I'm still not used to this and it's making me conscious at stop signs. Other than that, I like that it works better than the Mercedes ECO mode and I like that it will stay on/off at my election for good.

Efficiency:
I filled up the tank this morning and averaged 35.1 overall according to fuelly:
http://www.fuelly.com/driver/in2dwww/a6-quattro
The first 150 miles were 75% city and the remaining 450 miles were 75% highway.

Conclusion:
This Audi is so much more involving and so much more rewarding than anything I've ever owned. In terms of Car and Driver's proclamation that ACC is "utter ruination" of the A6, I think C&D needs to rethink that statement.

Pardon the picture as I took it in haste. I have better photos from my trip which I'll get around to later.

Mike_L

The Start/Stop system depends on how hard you're on the brake pedal. So if you just barely hold it enough to stop at Stop signs, it won't turn the car off most of the time.

Brooklyn

Beautiful car! My impressions of my 3.0t pretty much mirror your TDI intro. Of course you're trouncing me in the mileage dept. on the circa 700 mile trip back home, believe the best I managed was 25mpg tracked via Fuelly.

Re: ACC, agree that it is a very useful feature, but the jury is still out for me on its utility in town. A good stretch of my commute these days involves a 2-3 lane road with a speed limit of about 50mph, with lights scattered throughout. There are times when traffic will clear and the car will vault to the 50mph limit, oblivious of the red light waiting for us less than a mike down the road. Under those conditions it simply accelerates too fast and is then forced to come to a screaming halt when it finally detects the stopped traffic. Keeping it set at something like 40mph and accelerating up to 50 on my own is the answer there, but definitely not a "set it and forget it" experience like it is on the highway.

Jury is still out on stop/start as well. First, there are times when it completely surprises me, and second, I'm not sure I'm really seeing a mpg benefit so far. Time will tell. I've thought about deactivating it, but willing to keep it on until I hit the 10k mark in about a month or so.

I have the Bose as well, and find it inferior to the similarly priced B&O system I had in my S4, but not so inferior as to warrant spending money to upgrade it with aftermarket parts. What I may do though is look out for a CPO B&O equipped S6 when/if I decide to move on from the A6. I say "if" because it is by far the most impressive combination of luxury/tech/performance car I've ever owned, and comes in only second in cars I've driven to an armored S600 I piloted around Iraq for a while.

Superfly_A6

No LED lights?

I bought my car off the lot, I didn't want to wait 3 months to build one. However, if I had a choice in building one, I would chose LED, s-line, night vision and HUD. I have tried the M-B's E class with acc and lane assist, and I didn't like it. Not the part of how it does it, just a general idea of the whole system. I'd like to drive my own cars, not trust a computer. Furthermore, I can't imagine how much it would cost to fix out of warranty if those systems fail.

NV and HUD is a combo that I have elusively been hunting for but could not have both in some my previous cars.

Nice colour though, same as mine

DB22

ACC:
The ACC is very good in its execution, particularly in Comfort mode - it is way more gradual on its acceleration and deceleration.
I have never used #4 - the gap is way too large and cars pull in front of you.
I wish it remembered what you had set it to. It defaults to #3 every time you set Cruise and then you need to change it.

Lane Keep Assist:
Its effectiveness is very dependent on the width of the lane and the quality of the lane markers. Here in Southern California they are still learning how to build a road and those that they have built are riddled with ghost lanes that tend to confuse the LKA.

Bose Stereo:
It is obvious that just because it says "Bose" that does not mean that the system attains a certain standard. Some Bose systems are very good and some are not, unfortunately this system falls down the middle as being very average. Of course, if it was good then they would never sell the rip-off B&O.

Stop/Start:
It works well in my town where red lights for wasting time, money and gasoline is the objective. My only complaint is that when I'm waiting at a red light and the engine turns off then I pull on the parking brake and take my foot off of the brake pedal then the engine starts again. I like the feature of waiting at a light and not having to push on the brake pedal but, again, the software writers are living proof that they have never driven a car.

Performance and efficiency:
I have no complaints about either from my 3.0T but I only have 1300 miles on the odo. In the EU and particularly the UK, the majority of Audi's are diesel. I am frequently in contact with a relative in the UK who drives an Allroad diesel on an A6 chassis but that product never made it to the USA.

in2dwww

Two things I couldn't justify:
LED lights
B&O

In the US, the Prestige model is the S-line exterior trim.

Night vision and HUD are a package in the US for ~$1,100

The price difference between the LED and HUD package is around $2,600 which means I could get a TFSI with all the tech or a TDI.

There was no definitive proof that the LED lights were better than the Xenons - not a single comparison photo on the internet. I had a loaner A7 with HUD and it's cool but it doesn't pick up lane markings at night - so I consider it a novelty.

in2dwww

I love it. I've heard that ACC and blind spot in the Audis set of radar detectors on the Ka band. I saw one driver in front hit the brakes after I activated ACC.

From the land of Google Autonomous Cars, you'd figure that CA would have paint on the road. Good grief!

The best Bose stereo was in my 1994 S500. Runner up was the 1998 Jetta GLX VR6. The Bose iPod docking station might be slightly better than the A6. But I'm pondering buying the B&O amps and plugging them in place of the Bose amp. I will get around to it in the summer, maybe.

LOL. Yeah, SoCal did that to urge everyone to buy a Prius. Now everyone has a Prius and fuel sales are down so they need to encourage more fuel consumption. So time the lights longer and make every intersection a stopping point. Northern Virginia does this too - and it's normal to wait 3 minutes. I think that the stop/start activates after a certain time at standstill regardless of brake pressure. At least that's the impression I get.

There are a lot of pissed off AllRoad fanboys. Not only is the AllRoad now just an A4 avant, it doesn't have all the goodies that made it a badass to begin with.

DB22

I also think that the Blind Spot indicator could be better. I should count up in the number of LED's with each LED representing 10 feet until the adjacent car is beside you and all of the LED's turn from yellow to red.

Autonomous cars and cars such as the A6 would perform much better if the standards in the USA were improved: Lane recognition would be far improved if they used the type of reflective paint for lane markers that they do in Europe. Secondly, Amber turn signals are very easy to differentiate by sensors which would really help the intelligence of the ACC. Here in the USA we use red for everything: rear lights, turn signals, brake lights and emergency flashers. It makes as much sense as a traffic signal changing from red to red to red.

in2dwww

The blind spot works perfectly for me. The light turns on in advance when people come blitzing down the left lane. The sensor knows the approach and warns me in plenty of time.

The passenger side is a little different. It tends to stay OFF when someone is lingering behind my tail. The mirror makes it look like the car behind is right on my tail. I know it will ignore the car if I'm overtaking, but in stop/go traffic, the passenger side has a small margin and provides no causeway like the driver side.

You know how it goes, "Clowns to the left of me, jokers passing on my right, here I am, stuck in the middle behind you." I hate passing on the right. Hate it with a passion.