Test drive Audi A3 2003 - 2008 hatchback

All photos Audi A3 2003 - 2008

Three in the boat

The car seemed simple and reliable in management, and some lack of power is quite excusable: after all, there is an automatic machine, and for the city this is a great good. I think that if Sportback is really sport, then it’s not a sprint race, but rather chess.

ESTHETE
Nikolai Svistun
drive heading editor
Tightened, sports, assembled, purposeful portrait of a typical young careerist. The costume is not yet Valentino, the clock, too, apparently, is not yet Breitling. When asked about the model of his car, he, without spending a share of a second in vain, throws a kind of weighty and sportbek. Exactly. In one word. Without Audi. And without A3. They will understand their own.

After work (young careerists work until late), he, clicking on the key, approaches the sportsbek. Alone (the bossal Mercedes and BMW fled two hours ago) the car looks quite seriously. And even solid. The frowned eyebrows of the hood crawling to the head optics, the brilliant edging of the radiator grille, the massive front bumper continuous manifestations of strength and aggression.

Apparently, the design was done in front: the ascending window sill and the falling arc of the roof clearly scheduled the meeting somewhere at point X and was very in a hurry to the place of Randev, simultaneously giving the car a rather swift look. Which, however, is completely lost when looking at the profile on the side is an ordinary universal-hatchback, in which Beck is clearly more than sports. And the window sill line in such an angle seems too deliberate, and the door handles are simply archaic: to push them is already unmarried and unsportable. Although it hardly worries the careerists to fly home. Or somewhere else.

Fly? No, perhaps, is unlikely. What are the flights with the engine in 102 forces? And the salon, frankly, does not have. Instead of, like the older brothers A3, to extol the driver, the designers and components of the treshka humiliate passengers: there is no review (high window sills), and there is no place very much. And let the driver not be upset due to the lack of cockpit built around him. God with them, with flights. It is better to just get away more comfortably, put your hands on a stylish steering wheel and roll yourself, slowly, pondering plans for tomorrow. True, it will be possible to relax only by non-smoking ashtray shyly hidden somewhere almost under the central console. Oh yes, how could I forget? Young careerists do not smoke.

MASTER
Kirill Brevdo
deputy Chief Editor
Yes, we need such a sport! Although he is ready to argue: for sure someone will seem strange to the fact that the Germans attached a pathos and meaningful word Sport to a five-door almost a station wagon, and not to a compact three-door, with which the A3 of our modernity began with you. It is still good that not a sport-sedan, as they love now. In A3 format, any attempts to depict a representative car look at least far -fetched. And here is a fairly functional and honest machine. All 68 mm, on which the treshka lengthened, fell straight into the trunk.

And this was right in the back seats and there were enough space before. Let the suitcases now feel humanly! But the loading height of the trunk could be less. By the way, the undoubted benefit of additional doors is not only that they allow you to penetrate the second row with a direct flight. From now on, in order to fold the back row of seats, you do not have to dive into the bowels of the car, you can do entirely with a completely elegant movement of the hand. We have been waiting for this for a long time. Sportback is friendly and helpful. Inside, everything is thought out to the smallest detail (the quality of performance and ergonomics) and for trifles (pockets, troughs and other containers). The presence of a separate chandelier over the heads of the rear passengers pleased. Separate climate control is effective, and it is intuitive to control it.

The car seemed simple and reliable in management, and some lack of power is quite excusable: after all, there is an automatic machine, and for the city this is a great good. I think that if Sportback is really sport, then it’s not a sprint race, but rather chess. Without emotion, but with a thought.

DRIVER
Leonid Klyuyev
chief Editor
The idea to call the Sportback car and bestow it is hardly successful. One excuse for the basic version with an old 1.6-liter engine allows you to keep the lower price bar at a competitive level. But when the low -power engine is also loaded with an automatic box, albeit as perfect as Tiptronic, things gain a sad turnover. Rides boring and sour! And the fashionable floor gas pedal with its dullness only exacerbates the situation. It will not work to get the car decent for the Audi brand so rightly press on the floor, you will not lose. Do not count on all sorts of manual and sports modes of the machine: it will not work out faster.

Surprised by the setting of the ASR anti -wings system, too long allowing the drive wheels to rotate helplessly on the spot. True, the ASR shutdown even more complicates the start on slippery coating. Where is ESP? Do not believe the option! Well, the brakes here need: powerful, but not nervous, and ABS does not panic ahead of time.

The potential of the chassis is impressive, it will easily digest and a much more serious engine. This is a typical autobas -tank chassis with excellent course stability, with an impressive energy intensity of the suspension and characteristic controllability: smooth reactions, not very sharp, but a very informative steering wheel. And in steep turns, Sportback holds well as well as trying to slide the face to the side of the road (but this is a plus of a light engine). But at low speeds, the steering wheel is numb, and the machine has to be controlled by the touch.

I note that all of the above contains an amendment to the studded winter tires of Nokian. On the other hand, the five -door car practically does not differ from the three -door in the identical configuration with its habits, which visited the wheel test a year ago.

Autography
Audi A3 Sportback
Predecessor
A3 5D (1999)
Platform
Volkswagen Golf v
Premiere
june 2004
Body
hatchback
Engines
1.6-3.2 l (102-250 hp)
Production
Germany
Expected replacement
2010/11

Text: Nikolai Svistun, Kirill Brevdo, Leonid Klyuyev
Photo: author