Test drive Audi A8 D2 1994 - 2002 Sedan

Winged metal descends to the ground

The all -wheel drive Audi A8 is an unusually fast but reliable in management, a balanced and obedient car, and the ZF Tiptronic installed on it is one of the best, if not the best automatic gearbox today.


This year, the prices for six -year -old Audi A8 first affected $ 20,000, which gave us good reason to avoid a closer acquaintance with this machine. Therefore, when we turned up a chance to ride on an all -wheel drive A8, we did not miss it and decided to turn a frivolous walk into a full -fledged (of course, in our understanding) test.
 

Story.
In the summer of 1992, the automobile world was filled with rumors, as if Audi was going to step on the same rake for the second time. The fact is that the ambitious head of Ferdinand Pih had time to fulfill his long -standing dream - to compete with the grades of the market of expensive sedans, the mop from Daimler -Benz and the immediate neighbors, Bavarians from BMW. In 1988, a luxurious Audi V8 and even a mobile office on its base, V8 LANG (produced, by the way, was in series, was served, to which the competitors mentioned did not guess); However, neither a rich finish, nor the advanced design, which included a transmission with a constant all -wheel drive, even victory in the DTM championship could outweigh the relatively low prestige of the brand in the eyes of a potential buyer. V8 had to be removed from production for the banal of the reasons - due to low demand.
 
But Pikh did not even think to calm down. On the contrary, the new representative Audi was conceived as a revolutionary breakthrough in the automotive industry. Some technical details of the project leaked to the press in early 1993, and they made a considerable impression. According to unofficial information, at the heart of a machine built on the D2 platform, there was a spatial frame from pressed aluminum profiles, hinged body panels were also made of winged metal. Prior to that time, aluminum was used only for the manufacture of small -scale sports cars and uncomplicated Land Rover Defender SUVs, and the use of this material in mass production required the development of fundamentally new technologies, for which the Audi AG has allocated very large funds since the mid -eighties. The 450-horsepower W12 formula engine (with a three-row location of cylinders, also for the first time in world practice) with five valves to the cylinder borrowed from the Avus concept, led all the wheels through the transmission developed together with Porsche specialists. In the fall of the same year, visitors to exhibitions in Frankfurt and Tokyo were able to make sure how true these data are. The Germans demonstrated the ASF prototype (the abbreviation from Aluminium Space Frame - aluminum space frame), as close as possible to the future serial machine, with two different engines - thereby W12 and an eight -cylinder turbo diesel with a capacity of 200 liters. With.
 
But neither the same engine on the A8 model, the production of which began in the spring of 1994 at a factory in a non -Karsim, did not hit. Their place was taken by more prosaic: 2.8-liter V6 and 4.2-liter V8. But all other achievements of the Ingolstads brought to the conveyor and, most importantly, the proprietary ASF technology. The body under the factory designation 4D was indeed made from aluminum, which, in comparison with the usual steel, gave a weight of a mass of 140 kg. The spatial frame not only radically increased the hardness of the body, but also provided an unattainable level of passive safety, in the event of an accident, protecting the inhabitants of the salon like a strong cage. In general, A8 can be safely called the kingdom of aluminum - even levers of pendants were made of it, and this gave the jury of the international competition a car of the eyelid to include flagship Audi in the list of one hundred best cars of the century.
 
4.2-liter modification was serially equipped with an all-wheel drive transmission and an automatic Tiptronic transmission production of ZF with the ability to operate in a sequental gear mode, and for a simpler 2.8-liter, a front-wheel drive circuit with five-speed mechanics was also offered. Over the years, the machine has improved and received more and more modern systems. So, in 1997, A8 became the first serial car, regularly component by six airbags, a little later the list of standard equipment was replenished by an electronic stabilization system. Today, among the modifications, there is also a charged S8 with a six -speed gearbox, famous for its cannon dynamics (accelerates to 100 km/h in 5.5 seconds), and the long -standing A8 Lang, and the fastest diesel car in the world - A8 3.3 TDI, developing 242 km/ h. In the winter of 1999, the machine has undergone easy modernization, which will allow it to hold positions until 2002, when a third-generation model will replace A8, which is currently actively passing factory tests.
Well, at our disposal was one of the early 4.2 Quattro with a mileage of 140,000 km. Well, we will follow the slogan of the Ingolstads: Vorsprung Durch Technik, that is, improvement through technology, and we will improve.
 

Outside.
There is nothing in the appearance of the car that could catch a look for. Yes, in A8, one hundred percent Audi is accurately recognized, and its appearance can be described as increased in the size of A4. That's perhaps that’s all. But this brainchild of designer Dirk Van Brakel should be perceived as a whole, as a kind of monolith - only then do you realize the true beauty of the machine. The mighty case, based on an impressive wheel size, and as if falling to the ground in readiness for a jump, is extremely concise - it has not a single extra element, not a single far -fetched line. And large parts homogeneous in color and texture, such as bumpers and rear lights, give a brutality machine that is perfectly combined with exquisite body proportions and an elegant roof set. It even seemed to us that from certain angles A8 resembles Ferrari democratic models 348 GTB and F355.
 

Inside.
Another family line of modern Audi is very wide, almost on a right angle, opening doors, and the fixers of the intermediate positions of the doors were quite tight. Naturally, such a solution facilitates the landing in the car, but then behind the open doors you will have to stretch and stretch. However, with the same feature of the design, we came across in A3, A4, and in A6.
 
A salon consisting of leather, wood and electric drives is luxurious without any reservations. The front seats magnificent in shape are equipped with folding armrests and equipped with a mass of adjustments, which even provide the ability to change the degree of lumbar backup for the lower and upper parts of the back in separateness, and they are all electrified. However, like both adjustments of the steering column - in length and height, and adjusting the front belts in height; So to choose the optimal pose is not the slightest work. However, the greatest impression, perhaps, made a six -level (!) Heat of each of the four seats.
 
The rear sofa A8 is ready to provide comfort at the highest level for only two passengers.
The dashboard is quite competently organized and easily read, but there are a couple of complaints to it: firstly, the blood-red display of the on-board computer is excessively bright, and secondly, the indicator of the fuel level in the tank is not digitized, while the coolant temperature indicator Designed directly with German meticulousness. It is not entirely convenient to recognize the placement of buttons control buttons of the on -board computer, clocks and a daily run meter at the bottom of the dashboard. In full accordance with the car adopted on the Audi scheme, the car has three steering wheel switching, and on the left, which is more genuine, there is a cruise control control unit.
 
The workplace of the driver of the most luxurious today from Audi cars looks quite respectable.
 
And what level of comfort can be discussed if the optimal microclimate is not provided inside? For this purpose, a climatic installation with the possibility of setting parameters is separate for this purpose for the right and left sides of the cabin. In the front panel, we counted no less - nine deflectors, and almost all of them are adjustable and overlapped.

But here it was not without flaws: the climate control unit was planted too low, under the radio, and it is not easy to change its settings on the go. However, our regular readers know that this is a generic lack of modern Audi. The sliding cover of the glove box is equipped with fasteners for the fountain burns.
 
Continuing to study the salon, we found several more details that eloquently speak about the status of a car. We are talking about mirrors with bilateral backlight, built into anti -loner visors and about a capital drawer with mounts for three fountains. It is only a pity that at times it is impossible to completely open it, since the knees of the front passenger impede it. The built -in Autonomous Heater of the Webasto brand, the control panel of which is put on the driver's door - does not count because it is included in the list of options, and today you can equip any car with such a device.
 
The rear seats in luxury are little inferior to the front. They are equally convenient, and there are plenty of spaces here in the area of \u200b\u200bthe heads and in the legs. The services of passengers are an armrest with two containers, four deflectors of the ventilation system, individual illumination above each door and on an ashtray with a deep door pocket. It is worth emphasizing that, despite the obvious three -seater capacity of the sofa, its shape very transparently hints that the machine is intended for four, and not for five at all. The back of the rear seat does not fold - most likely, it is not supposed - but there is a window behind the armrest that, when transporting especially long items, opens access to the trunk. The car compartment in A8 seems bottomless: it is wide, not squeezed with wheeled niches, and its back wall is lost somewhere in the bowels of the machine. Special thanks to the creators of the car for the form of trunk opening, in every possible way assisting its loading and unloading.
 

In move.
First - about how accurately the driver manages to control the situation around the car. Review of backwards is greatly limited due to the wide racks of the body and narrow glass, and even the automatically folding rear head restraints do not much improve the picture. There are difficulties with the right external mirror, the area of \u200b\u200bwhich is insufficient.
 
We launch the engine, and only the extinguished control lamps and the revived tachometer report that three hundred horses woke up under the hood. And so - no sound, no vibration, complete silence. It remains to translate the automatic selector lever to position D and drown the accelerator pedal.
 
But the intensity of acceleration at the first moment was not impressed at all - rather, even disappointed. The machine with a straight -aquitable smoothness gains speed, leisurely sorting through the gears, and you have time to pay attention to the fact that switching occurs quickly and gently. However, the idyll destroys the look thrown onto the speedometer with a passage: the arrow is already flying up - Mom is dear! - to the mark 160, and the intensity of acceleration is preserved, if it does not increase, and after a matter of moments the line of 200 km/h is passed. The surrounding landscape is blurred, as if on the canvas of the impressionist, and, obeying the instinct of self -preservation, we stop experiments at speed. But what can be completely confident in is that A8 acceleration dynamics is the best for this coating. The Traction Control, or the anti -wings system vigilantly monitors the state of adhesion of the drive wheels with the road, and at the first signs of their slipping, the engine automatically strands. We tried to start with a gas pedal in the floor on the ground coating and once again pleased the unobtrusive of the system: the moment of its entry is practically not felt, while in many other vehicles the Traction Control is already caught when the drive wheels without its help gripped the clutch without its help .
 
After a series of sharp accelerations and braking, the Tiptronic box was self -adjusted, and the transitions to the highest gearboxes began to occur later, almost upon reaching the arrow of the tachometer of the red line - it is not without reason that the machine operates an adaptive algorithm that analyzes the driving manner and changes the moments of gearboxes. But even more I liked the fact that with a sharp discharge of gas - for example, before turning - the box itself encloses a lowering gear, providing effective braking with an engine, which you do not expect from an automatic transmission with automatic transmission. And it’s worth it to calm down, and go more calmer how Tiptronic is again transforming: now it switches at medium speeds, so delicately that sometimes there is a feeling that the transmission is generally basic. He put his left leg on a specially provided platform, forgot about it, and you roll yourself, overflowed with self -esteem.
 
So we got to sweets. We translate the box lever into the right slot, and now Tiptronic works manually: he pushed the lever forward - the increased gear has turned on, pulled on himself - lowered. Naturally, the electronics will not allow violence, that is, it will refuse to steal the first transmission into 150 km/h, and in any case, it will turn to the next gear upon the critical motor by reaching the motor. Therefore, in principle, with active ride, increased gear can not be turned on yourself, but the possibility of switching to lowered is very important both when moving in a dense traffic to prepare for a jerk forward and when braking in winter, as well as with high -speed movement along winding sections of the road. It should be noted that in manual mode, Tiptronic reacts to the lever does not instantly, but with some delay, after all, this is not a real mechanics - but the delay is small, and as the skill is easily predicted, so the experienced driver will be able to extract from the box provided by the box Real benefits. For the rest, manual mode will most likely serve as a funny toy.


Before starting to storm the turns, we will get used to the brakes. In fact, no addiction is addictive: the brakes work perfectly, the transparency of the drive is perfect, and ABS performs its work extremely intelligently and efficiently.
 
Having driven along the winding roads for more than an hour, we found ourselves in complete confusion of feelings. Let's try to figure it out. The main conclusion: a constant all -wheel drive is a great matter, but it is necessary to use it wisely. When passing the turns, A8 fantastically holds the road, weakly rolling and passing only a barely noticeable insufficient rotation. But the insidiousness is that in this way the car behaves at a speed of 60 km/h and 120 km/h, and it is very difficult to catch the difference. Yes, the cranes of the body are slightly more, and the force on the steering wheel is slightly higher, and that’s all. And against such a blessed background, a frightening screech of tires is clearly heard - the only signal that the limit is close and to cross it is easier. Yes, and you can not hear the signal itself - it is enough to turn on the music loudly. But the loss of an all -wheel drive clutch machine with the road most often means a sentence, because it is not to catch it from non -controling moy rotation is only capable of an extra-class racer. So the bouquet of impressions turned out to be that one: you go through a turn at unreal speed (in any case, the entire previous personal experience says) to the intoxicating feeling that a full control is maintained above the car, the car demonstrates complete calm, and somewhere there, below, Widely tires from the last forces cling to asphalt, and now it all depends only on whether they can cope with colossal lateral acceleration or not.
 
The steering also makes its contribution - very clear, but not nervous, allowing the nuances to track the trajectory and even make some kind of maneuvers on the arc of a turn. It is good and reactive effort, maybe it is a little lacking only when the steering wheel is deviated to small corners.
 
To moderately, a hard suspension is quite comfortable. It easily swallows the irregularities of medium caliber, responding to large pits with light shocks. At high speeds, the suspension generally ceases to respond to coating defects, but on gentle transverse waves provokes a slight build -up of the body. Very perfect noise insulation stands guarding the acoustic safety of the driver and passengers, letting the sound out of the eight's high revolutions.
 

Summary.
The all -wheel drive Audi A8 is an unusually fast but reliable in management, a balanced and obedient car, and the ZF Tiptronic installed on it is one of the best, if not the best automatic gearbox today. With her, the car is able to give a lot of pleasure if you have a combat mood, and get rid of unnecessary manipulations when moving in traffic jams. Compared to monopoly analogues, the bar of the maximum capabilities of the machine is noticeably pushed, which becomes obvious when driving along roads with an unstable coating. At the same time, the driver, who undertook to squeeze all or almost everything from the A8 Quattro, must have techniques for controlling such a technique and subtly feel the line. In the hands of such a person, this car will not feel equal to itself. The choice is yours.


Leonid Klyuyev,
photo by the author



 
 

Source: Wheel magazine [No. 41/2000]