Friday, 28 October 2016

Ask the Man Who Owns One: Audi Q7 TDI

Leave a Comment
http://ift.tt/2e4Ih8M
October 28, 2016 at 11:32 am by | Illustration by Andy Potts

Ask the Man Who Owns One: Audi Q7 TDI

From the November 2016 issue

I’m finding it impossible to summon the level of righteous indignation expected of Audi/Porsche/VW diesel owners these days. My SUV is just too good.

The go-to vehicle in our family is the 2014 Audi Q7 TDI. It does it all. It schleps the kids and their friends and their gear to softball practice, to camp, to wherever the hell kids go to chase Pokémon these days. It charges away from stoplights, drawing on a store of low-down torque that can only be described as elemental. Both its interior and its ride somehow manage to be simultaneously uncomplicated and sumptuous; it’s a no-BS affair built for long, stressless days behind the wheel. I have managed to coax nearly 700 miles from its 26.4-gallon tank.

It has an understated road presence for something so very large and so very in charge. I even like the way it looks better than the new one. This almost never happens. I’m usually desperate to keep up with the product, cursing the relentless march of ever-improving style and engineering. Even though the new Q7 drives marvelously and is loaded with aluminum and all sorts of glass-cockpit electronics, I just can’t see us in it. It looks like an overfed Dodge Journey.

And now that there’s no diesel available for VW Group products, our Q7 is looking increasingly irreplaceable. I don’t want to sell it back to Audi, and I don’t want to get whatever fix is in the works, including swapping a smog-producing emission (NOx) for a greenhouse-gas emission (CO2). Like all TDIs, the Q7 has been painted as evil, a polluting scourge, a member of a toxic fleet. The truth is more nuanced. Besides, it looks great in black.


Let's block ads! (Why?)



from Car and Driver BlogCar and Driver Blog http://ift.tt/2e4Nbmb
via IFTTT

0 comments:

Post a Comment