Kris Hansen

Audi introduces the technologically advanced 2015 Audi A3 and S3 sedans, A3 Cabriolet and A3 Sportback e-tron® PHEV

Audi of America officially announced plans today for the arrival of an entirely new family of premium compact cars, including three body styles, five new unique engines and seven variants.

This all-new Audi A3 lineup begins with the A3 sedan, which goes on sale in the spring of 2014. The A3 sedan plays a pivotal role in the soon to be expanding Audi A3 family and will be priced from a base MSRP of $29,900. It will be joined later in the fall of 2014 by the Audi A3 Cabriolet, A3 TDI clean diesel sedan, the high-performance S3 sedan and in early 2015, the A3 Sportback e-tron® gasoline electric plug-in hybrid (PHEV).


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DennisMitchell

When can we expect order guides?

Understand only the 2.0 TFSI will have quattro. Really interested in clean TDI.

What would be the difference in handling between a FWD vs. AWD A3? Will I be disappointed with a FWD A3 compared to my quattro A4?

Thoughts

Kris Hansen

The order guides are a dealer thing, we don't have access to them..

At this point it's hard for me to even guess how the A3 TDI sedan will compare to the A3 TFSI quattro sedan, but in past experience with the previous generation A3 TDI 5 door, our basic come away was that they were insanely fun to drive. Lack of quattro means lighter weight and less drivetrain loss to name 2 advantages..

It also means you get a bit of torque steer, and with a diesel that's certainly a concern, but not a deal breaker by any means. Obviously we don't have any real world experience with the new chassis yet, but we hope to get some soon, and we hope to be able to do back to back comparisons with a quattro car and a fwd car.

Because we're so used to quattro, we did find that it was difficult to adapt to fwd on low friction surfaces, so we did find the front tires clawing for grip here and there.

If you live in an area where snow and ice really aren't a problem, I'd say you'll have no worries with a FWD car. If you want it purely as a commuter car, where you can use one of your other quattro cars on the really bad days, I'd say go for it.

oceanbreeze

The 1.4 TFSI etron powertrain is rather interesting and appealing.

But I have to wonder how this will play out long term though. If the TFSI kicks in when quick acceleration or boost is required, what does this do to the motor that might actually be cold and be called to work at higher revs right away?

I wish they'd tell us more, and I hope they have some complex algorithms that may take into account the operating constraints of an IC motor. Or is this 1.4 TFSI something special that works just as well cold or hot?

I guess we will find out more in time.