Drove an 09 plate A3 cab today

[Flibble]

Oh my god, what have they done to A3s?

In theory it should have been quite similar to mine - same engine but FWD vs 4WD.

In practice it was horrible.

The throttle seemed to have been wired all wrong - a light press would give light acceleration as expected. Increasing pressure gave nothing more till at a certain point it seemed to wake up and you practically snapped your neck as it shot off.

The brakes were super twitchy, almost no travel between nothing and through the windscreen.

Rear vis was comically poor, but I think that was more due to it being a cab than anything else.

Are all the new A3s like this, or did I just get a weird one?

 

[Scott]

mine seems fine but I've only drove a 06 DSG before this...

 

[royjk]

Had mine for a year now & still love it as much as the day I picked it up & am much looking forward to our drive down to Croatia in Sept:thumbsup:

 

[h5djr]

I had a test drive in an A3 Cabriolet S-tronic back in February to try out the new the combination of the S-tronic and the new 140 common-rail TDI and it was fine. Just the same as driving the 170PD Sportback that I had at the time only so much quieter.

 

[Staz]

I test drove an S3 a while ago that had very hard brakes. I said it seemed too hard and he said it's what they're like on S3s. He was talking crap, there was something wrong with it.

 

[Flibble]

Staz - that's what they were like on the new A3, really hard pedal and almost no travel between all and nothing. Made getting back into mine a bit weird as I was very gentle on the brakes expecting them to the same and of course they're not so I just didn't slow down.

I did notice the aircon was a lot colder on the new car, maybe mine needs regassing.

 

[D3mon]

When mine was new, the brakes were pin-sharp and the accelerator had the same off/on feel you describe. Having covered about 700 miles now, The brakes have softened quite a bit, I've 'learned' the accelerator and only to push past a certain point if I want it to 'go' and I've also gotten used to the overall power, to the point where I'm feeling it's a bit sluggish now!