A3 1.9TDI Special Ed, 10'000 mile/6 month review

[deanos3]

This is pretty long, and badly written so apologies in advance!! [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/sportifs2.gif[/img]

My 6 month old A3 has now reached its 10400th mile and therefore, I thought it was about time I shared my ill-informed views on the most expesnsive piece of tird, I have ever had the miss-fortune to own.





I’ll start off with why I bought this car. The criteria that the car had to meet was….

New, or nearly new so that I could hand it back if it broke
Reverse gear so I didn’t have to worry about parking etc (my corrado at the time decided it didn’t like reversing, this is what actually made me go and buy a new car).
Aestheticaly pleasing
Cheap to run and maintain
16 ish k / £275 per month max
Comfortable on long journeys
Cheap insurance

If my father didn’t happen to be a salesman at an Audi dealership I probably would have thought about my choices a little harder, rather than just ending up with an A3. Looking around now I realise I could be in one of those nice Alfa things, a sporty clio, Golf GT a mini etc etc…..first mistake out of the way and done with then.

Onto the review then….

Basic spec –
A3 1.9TDI Special Edition
105PS (form a queue ladies)
IBIS white

Options -
Digital climate
Concert CD head unit
Fogs
Dis

TZE arrived without DIS, I thought I was advised that DIS was standard, turns out I wasn’t and I had just misread an email….second mistake.

After almost 3 months yes, 3 months for an A3 Special Edition! TZE landed at the dealers.


Laughable standard ride height.

I had asked them not to clean it on arrival…third mistake!! The car was absolutely covered in train brake dust, they use acid to remove it at the dealers and it proves to be very good and, I imagine, a lot less of a pain in the backside than using a poxy bloody clay bar!! Ibis white is actually a really easy colour to keep clean and, unlike black cars when they get a little dirty they still ok. I washed TZE for the first time in 2 months today!

After it was cleaned and thoroughly checked over, it was time to get to grips with the car and spend a week or so mincing about below 2500 RPM. My initial thoughts were that the car was pretty nice if a tad underpowered. It turned a lot of heads, was returning a quite frankly ridiculously high MPG figure and was great in town pottering about.



So, after the running in period it was time to sort out the bog standard 16” Special Edition wheels, and the laughable ride height. Rochford supplied the RS6 reps and APS dealt with lowering TZE by 55mm (eibach springs), the ride improved immensely!

After about 7k miles though I began to get extremely bored of it, this probably isn’t helped by borrowing some rather smart cars for photos (Astons, S5’s, RS4’s etc etc). The truth however, is that I just don’t like it.

Here’s my ramblings on why…. I’ve had a few electrical gremlins with the car. Windows sometimes don’t one touch, or one will and the other won’t (differing sides each time). The dash beeps at me sometimes but doesn’t show any messages, my wipers sometimes don’t wipe when spraying the wash and, they loose their intermittent program timing thingy me bob. Also, the drivers door has dropped a centimetre due to loose bolts…very queer. I haven’t had the car looked at as of yet, I was going to save it until the first service.






The interior is plastic fantastic, this is mainly due to myself not ticking a few options but come on Audi, a fecking plastic steering wheel…are you having me on?? The seats are terrible, there isn’t a driving position at all, it’s just a position that you have to get used too. My arse after 1hr is aching like mad and as for my back….don’t even go there honey!



The ‘performance’ is shocking (durr, it’s 105 PS diesel), there just doesn’t seem to be much torque at all and the noise from the engine is god damn awful. I think this 1.9TDI unit is over 5 years old and unfortunately, nothings changed. It sounds like a tractor! It’s so slow it doesn’t have a 0-60 time. Seriously, I think I could run quicker than this white, underpowered, overweight tird. Handling……hahaha you’re kidding me right? How does understeer to brake grabbing ESP sound to you? Fun right? The steering is rubbish, there’s no feedback what so ever, you can’t tell when you’re reaching limits and you have to take multiple stabs at corners (might be due to the cheap tyres though I guess).



The brakes are, to be fair, pretty damn good, but I think someone in the factory forgot to add some kind of modulation control to them, they’re either on or off and again, there’s no feel to them!



So, I’ve come to the conclusion that it isn’t a Lotus. Well done Dean, your 2 year old niece could have told you that.

I find it strange how I hate it so much yet, it does exactly what I wanted it to do. I can reverse. I can get 500+ miles to £55. I don’t need an MOT or any tax, I don’t have to worry about a coil pack failure or worry about being called a nob by a bunch of youths. But most importantly, it is cheap to run and when you’re in a bit of a financial trouble like I am, it’s great not having to worry about MOT’s, performance car MPG and the like.

So, once I’m out of debt I can treat myself to a VX220, and with that in the garage, I might be able to appreciate the finer things of A3 ownership. Obvisouly, there are options that can be added to the A3 that cancel out some of my bad points, if I was to re-order for example, I would have gone for a sport spec.



This is, all in my opinion. Opinions are like arse holes though aren’t they? Every fecker has one, it’s just that some are more ****ty than others.


[img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smashfreakB.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smashfreakB.gif[/img]

[Chav]

Yep - that interior looks ****e.

You're better off with a Ford/Vauxhall than a poverty spec german car in general.
It looks much better lowered though!!

Shame you didn't get an s-line one! [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/169144-ok.gif[/img]
(or one with a proper engine!)

[farmerpalmer]

I get the subtle impression you are not too keen on TZE [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/suicide.gif[/img]
But, it does look good in white - great photos [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/169144-ok.gif[/img]

[deanos3]

I've just been doing a bit of workings out, covering 10400 miles in this A3 means I have visited the pumps 20 times (rounded up). This mileage in the TT I had previously, would have seen me visiting the pumps 30 times (throwing in £55 worths of fuel).

That's £550 saved. Put that on top of a service, MOT and the insurance which was twice as much on the TT and you have one much cheaper car to run...hooray



It's still ****e though. [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/fekr.gif[/img]

[Sparky]

[ QUOTE ]
1.9 TDI 105PS

[/ QUOTE ]

There's the first problem [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]
Steering wheel looks a little large.

[Muppetboy]

Those photos are amazing [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/notworthy.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/notworthy.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gif[/img]

[deanos3]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
1.9 TDI 105PS

[/ QUOTE ]

There's the first problem [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]
Steering wheel looks a little large.

[/ QUOTE ]

The first of many! The steering wheel is gigantic, not only that, but after 30 mins of windy roads you start to get friction burns from the plastic. [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/jump.gif[/img]

utter garbage

[deanos3]

[ QUOTE ]
Those photos are amazing [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/notworthy.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/notworthy.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

Why thank you sir, the multi-storey shots are shocking but as of late I have not had the time during the light hours of the day to shoot any pics of it.

[gizze]

The first thing I noticed when I got the S4 was just how massive the steering wheel was, and thin!
Having come from the CSL and the 120d M-Sport it seemed like it was meant to be on a bus.

The other problem, and probably the main reason I sold it, was the driving position, I just could not get comfy, the seats were actually alright, as long as you didn't need to reach the steering wheel and/or the pedals.
Get the pedals right and the steering wheel was in teh wrong place, get the wheel right and the pedals couldn't be reached properly. I got a numb bum after 30 minutes, back ache after an hour and had to stop every 1h30mins and walk round for a bit.
Get a position where I ddidn't get back problems and I got cramp in my shins after three quarters of an hour because of how I had my foot on the accelerater pedal. Pulling off the fast lane of the M11 onto the hard shoulder on a busy friday afternoon because of cramp was the final straw.
I started using Fionas 120d instead, when I needed to go anywhere more than 20 minutes away, after a fortnight fighting over the 120d keys we decided to sell it.

Shame, great looking car, plenty fast enough really, but so many niggles.

[Sparky]

[ QUOTE ]
The first thing I noticed when I got the S4 was just how massive the steering wheel was, and thin!


[/ QUOTE ]

Shame they don't use the same steering wheel size as they do in the S3, in the A3. My S3 steering wheel feels smaller than my A4 one did too.