2018 Audi Allroad Order Guide
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Tweet. Pinterest. Email Call the an SUV influencer - its size, style and agility have made it the blueprint for this breed of luxury crossover. No other vehicle has evolved the class more profoundly. The Q5’s bones were good enough for to use when it developed the.
And other luxury marques have aped the Audi, too. Recently, Mercedes-Benz tossed the boxy design of its GLK in favor of the new, whose rounded roofline and rear sheetmetal are a near clone of the Q. The popularity of small luxury crossovers has exploded over the past decade.
And has occupied the top spot in this hotly contested class since 2013. When the hit back in 2009, the company struggled to move more than 14,000 of them. Last year, the company sold over 50,000 - one-quarter of Audi’s total U.S. That was an increase of almost 23 percent over the previous year, impressive for a vehicle in the twilight years of its lifecycle.
Special ordering has become an increasingly attractive way to buy or lease a new Audi. By waiting just a few short months, you can get your new Audi.
No surprise then that Audi didn’t stray too far from the previous model in terms of design. It may look familiar, but take in the new Q5 from every angle and the lines look crisp, handsome and far more muscular than the old one. And make no mistake: Everything beneath that similar skin is completely new. Don’t think this is just a lifted A4.
The Q5 shares less than 10 percent of its makeup with that car. “One big reason it doesn’t share much of its suspension with the A4 is that that model line does not use an air suspension,' says Q5 chassis project manager Christian Schneider.
“There just isn’t space in the packaging for an air suspension.” Cars coming to the U.S. Will ride on steel springs with optional adaptive dampers. But an adjustable air suspension with a 2.4-inch lifted “off-road” mode is optional on European market cars. The new Q rides on a 111-inch wheelbase, up a half inch over the old one. Length has been stretched by an inch, too. However, this Q5 is fractionally narrower than the old one, if you don’t count the side mirrors. That longer wheelbase contributes to more room in the backseat (up a half inch in legroom) and a cargo area that, when the seat is folded, can swallow 60.1 cubic feet of gear.
That’s an increase of 2.8 cubes from the last one. And to allow more seating and cargo flexibility, the rear seat can now slide fore and aft. And that’s something that the small families who buy the Q5 will appreciate. Under the hood is the sweet 2.0-liter TFSI four-cylinder with 252 hp and 273 lb-ft of torque.
It comes paired to a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission. Not surprisingly, the torquey diesel options will not be offered. But a more potent SQ5 with air suspension will arrive soon after the more pedestrian Q5s go on sale. A plug-in hybrid model is also planned. Quattro all-wheel drive is standard here, but the system is far more advanced than the one in the old Q5. This new all-wheel-drive system operates in front-drive until traction to the rear wheels is required. “We wanted to make a system that has the full performance of a traditional all-wheel-drive vehicle but with the fuel consumption as close as we could get to a 2WD,” says head developer of all-wheel drive Dieter Weidemann.
“Eighty percent of the losses come from the rear differential spinning. So by deactivating that differential, it’s a big savings.”.
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On a specific 62-mile test loop, Weidemann says his team was able to save 0.08 gallon over the fuel consumed by Audi’s traditional all-wheel drive. The system is predictive, digesting data from sensors and performing calculations 100 times every second to decide precisely where and when to send torque. “We are always looking 500 milliseconds into the future, and this is enough because we only need 200 milliseconds to engage all-wheel drive,” says Weidemann.
“The moment you need it - you have it.” The new system can send more torque - now up to 100 percent - to the rear axle than the previous model. And because its clutches operate so smoothly, there is less torque shock to the axle components, according to Weidemann, so they can be made smaller and lighter. Instruction manual for vizio smart tv manual. Indeed, the new quattro system itself is lighter by 10 pounds.
Weidemann says this new system can be used on Audi vehicles with an engine torque peak below 369 lb-ft. However, this system does not mechanically vector torque across an axle - that work is the exclusive domain of Audi’s Sport Differential. The Q5 will be available in three trims - Premium, Premium Plus and Prestige. The sweet spot in terms of sales, Audi predicts, will be the Premium Plus with Navigation.
That model brings some important tech, including Audi’s Virtual Cockpit, blind-spot monitoring, cross-traffic alert and pre-sense rear, which can prepare the vehicle’s systems if a rear collision is anticipated. But no matter which trim is selected, all Q5s will come with pre-sense city, which can spot people and vehicles that cross the Audi’s path and initiate a full autonomous stop at speeds up to 52 mph. Tech like adaptive cruise control is part of the more comprehensive Driver Assistance package. The new Q5 is assembled exclusively at Audi’s new plant in San Jose Chiapa, Mexico.
In terms of luxury marques, only Lincoln produces cars in Mexico. But others will follow. BMW is scheduled to join Audi producing vehicles south of the border by 2019. So it made sense that Audi invited us to drive the new Q5 in Los Cabos, Mexico, some 1,300 miles northwest of the factory. Of course the rough roads and harsh conditions of Baja stand in sharp contrast to this plush Audi. From the driver’s seat, the new Q5 borrows a great deal of the elegant materials and style from its big brother, the Q7, and that’s no bad thing. Our top-level Prestige-trimmed cars not only had leather sport seats that were heated and ventilated, but well-padded leather covered every armrest our elbows found.
2018 Audi Allroad Reviews
The Q5 is a serious contender for best interior in its class. Audi’s 12.3-inch Virtual Cockpit display is gorgeous, as is the four-color head-up display. Like other new Audis, our Q5 has a handwriting-recognition function built into the MMI infotainment system.
In fact, only adjustable dampers and the aforementioned driver assistance package were missing from our U.S.-spec cars. Smartphone users will be glad to know that interfaces for both Apple CarPlay and Google Android Auto come standard on every Q5. The Q5’s powertrain feels strong and responsive.
Though displacement remains the same as the last one, the increase of 32 hp and 15 lb-ft of torque makes a real-world difference. According to Audi, acceleration times have dropped from 7.0 seconds to 60 mph to 5.9 seconds. Although we couldn’t feel the new all-wheel-drive system working, quattro development chief Weidemann has an app on-board our car to measure just how much torque is being sent rearward. He says that under hard acceleration, as much as 75 percent of the torque is sent to those rear wheels. As we explore the twisty two-lane roads outside of town, it’s clear the Q5 has no trouble putting the power down smoothly. And it clearly hasn’t lost any of its handling poise or agility either. We switch to dynamic mode to bring more weight to the steering, and that helps us place the Audi easily on these tight switchbacks.
2018 Audi Allroad Premium Plus
The steering feels even more natural and more precise than before. But honestly, back-road hustling isn’t where the Q5 needed an upgrade. “When we started this project, we said, ‘OK, how are we going to improve driving comfort?' ' said chassis manager Schneider. “That was a big reason why we brought prototypes to test on the U.S.
Motorways.” After sampling the Q5 on the rougher, slow-speed roads near Todos Santos, it’s clear the ride is far superior to the old model, impressive considering we’re riding on the large 255/45R-20 wheel package. The impact isolation and noise suppression from inside the cabin is so much better than the previous Q5, it feels like it should weigh at least 500 pounds more than it does. But in reality, the new one is lighter by about 50 pounds. Off-road, on Baja’s sandy dry washes, the suppleness of the suspension is superb. Switching to the new off-road mode engages the rear axle and changes the steering and throttle settings. Even when we flat-foot the throttle in deep sand, we simply can’t feel those tires slip.