After what felt like decades of waiting, my new car was finally ready for collection this morning at Vindis Peterborough.
I was first collection of the day and was met promptly at 9am by my product host who's been my contact throughout the process which was great as we knew each other quite well from three months of contact.
The car was kept under wraps, and he kept me waiting by suggesting we sort the sale of my old car first so I was getting pretty twitchy by the time we were ready for the big unveiling. Having never bought a brand new car before I thought it was a wonderful experience and gets the relationship with the dealer off to a fantastic start.
We then spent a good two hours going through all the features of the car, both mechanical and electronic. Every little cubby-hole was demonstrated and all of the features and options were explained in great depth all of which meant I was really confident with the car by the time it came to drive it home.
Day 1 Thoughts:
B&O:
A good sound system was really important to me but I was a little apprehensive about going B&O after experiencing terrible crackling on the demonstrator. The good news is that mine doesn't crackle! The even better news is that it's a FANTASTIC system that causes ear pain well before I get any distortion. The sound is really well balanced (IMHO at least) straight out of the box, but I'd imagine the bass-heads would want to crank the bass and sub settings to really get the most out of it. The BAD news about it, is that it really shows up the poor quality of some of my MP3 collection. Top of the list now is to track down some high quality encodings of a few of my older albums.
ACC:
Having covered 100 miles on my first day, I'm already confident that I'd want ACC on any future car. It's a great system that (so far) hasn't been wrong-footed once and makes standard commuting effortless. The default gap (for me) is pretty much perfect and having drive select in 'Efficiency' has meant it doesn't lurch forward at every gap in traffic, instead smoothly adapting to the flow of traffic. FWIW I have the plate sensor rather than the dome.
Interior:
I've gone with the standard S-Line seats but the mono.pur interior finish. The quality, fit and finish of the interior knocks spots off anything I've driven before with the whole dash feeling properly nailed down. The seat adjustment and center arm-rest make it pretty easy to find a comfortable position but I'm sure there's still a bit of fiddling required to make it perfect.
ILP:
Was added as an option on the recommendation of the forum and I'm glad I specced it. Really makes the car look special inside at night, though having lighted footwells is going to take some getting used to.
Adaptive Headlights with Xenon Plus:
Not had all that much use just yet but they're certainly working and the throw of the xenons on full beam is really very good.
Hold Assist:
Not much to say other than it works, it's really useful and it means never having to touch the handbrake (except when starting the car without first putting on the belt...).
SE Suspension:
I did agonise about suspension choice as in my last car I'd done my best to minimise arch gap by fitting lowering springs and spacers but it did compromise the ride too much. Obviously the SE suspension does give big arch gap (see the side shots) but IMHO the shape and colour of the car mean that it doesn't look too bad and instead gives it an 'Audi Allroad' look. The ride itself is firm but not crashy and it doesn't seem to wallow in the corners. That said, I haven't really given it the beans yet so we'll have to wait and see what it's like at greater cornering speed.
The Engine & Performance:
As it's only done 100 miles I'm trying to keep the revs and the load low so it's not really shown any great acceleration yet but even within that range it feels pretty nippy and pulls well from low down. The engine note itself is very quite but ever so slightly rorty which I was actually pleasantly surprised by.
I'm assuming the engine will loosen up over the first 1,000 miles or so and improve but even fresh from the box it managed 63mpg on my 60 mile trip to work.
The Photos:
As requested...
1,000 Miles in:
To be updated!
10,000 Miles in:
(Left optimistically blank)
I was first collection of the day and was met promptly at 9am by my product host who's been my contact throughout the process which was great as we knew each other quite well from three months of contact.
The car was kept under wraps, and he kept me waiting by suggesting we sort the sale of my old car first so I was getting pretty twitchy by the time we were ready for the big unveiling. Having never bought a brand new car before I thought it was a wonderful experience and gets the relationship with the dealer off to a fantastic start.
We then spent a good two hours going through all the features of the car, both mechanical and electronic. Every little cubby-hole was demonstrated and all of the features and options were explained in great depth all of which meant I was really confident with the car by the time it came to drive it home.
Day 1 Thoughts:
B&O:
A good sound system was really important to me but I was a little apprehensive about going B&O after experiencing terrible crackling on the demonstrator. The good news is that mine doesn't crackle! The even better news is that it's a FANTASTIC system that causes ear pain well before I get any distortion. The sound is really well balanced (IMHO at least) straight out of the box, but I'd imagine the bass-heads would want to crank the bass and sub settings to really get the most out of it. The BAD news about it, is that it really shows up the poor quality of some of my MP3 collection. Top of the list now is to track down some high quality encodings of a few of my older albums.
ACC:
Having covered 100 miles on my first day, I'm already confident that I'd want ACC on any future car. It's a great system that (so far) hasn't been wrong-footed once and makes standard commuting effortless. The default gap (for me) is pretty much perfect and having drive select in 'Efficiency' has meant it doesn't lurch forward at every gap in traffic, instead smoothly adapting to the flow of traffic. FWIW I have the plate sensor rather than the dome.
Interior:
I've gone with the standard S-Line seats but the mono.pur interior finish. The quality, fit and finish of the interior knocks spots off anything I've driven before with the whole dash feeling properly nailed down. The seat adjustment and center arm-rest make it pretty easy to find a comfortable position but I'm sure there's still a bit of fiddling required to make it perfect.
ILP:
Was added as an option on the recommendation of the forum and I'm glad I specced it. Really makes the car look special inside at night, though having lighted footwells is going to take some getting used to.
Adaptive Headlights with Xenon Plus:
Not had all that much use just yet but they're certainly working and the throw of the xenons on full beam is really very good.
Hold Assist:
Not much to say other than it works, it's really useful and it means never having to touch the handbrake (except when starting the car without first putting on the belt...).
SE Suspension:
I did agonise about suspension choice as in my last car I'd done my best to minimise arch gap by fitting lowering springs and spacers but it did compromise the ride too much. Obviously the SE suspension does give big arch gap (see the side shots) but IMHO the shape and colour of the car mean that it doesn't look too bad and instead gives it an 'Audi Allroad' look. The ride itself is firm but not crashy and it doesn't seem to wallow in the corners. That said, I haven't really given it the beans yet so we'll have to wait and see what it's like at greater cornering speed.
The Engine & Performance:
As it's only done 100 miles I'm trying to keep the revs and the load low so it's not really shown any great acceleration yet but even within that range it feels pretty nippy and pulls well from low down. The engine note itself is very quite but ever so slightly rorty which I was actually pleasantly surprised by.
I'm assuming the engine will loosen up over the first 1,000 miles or so and improve but even fresh from the box it managed 63mpg on my 60 mile trip to work.
The Photos:
As requested...
1,000 Miles in:
To be updated!
10,000 Miles in:
(Left optimistically blank)