Calling car experts

[izzy]

Have wanted a semi sports car for awhile. After a lot of searching & review a loaded Audi S5 seems to bring together much of what i want in terms of performance, creature comforts, road noise, year round drive-ability yada.

Any car experts with Audi experience / expertise?

Yay, nay, wtf?

Thanks den-mates. _thu_

[100 watt]

No Audi experience, but I dig that new Scion Coupe Ive been seeing on TV comercials. Good looking little whip.

Rear Wheel drive too

[izzy]

They be very cool, albeit under powered, under tired, and less room etc compared to what im looking for, but by all accounts, and i bet ive seen >> than a dozen video reviews, the BRZ / FRS is great fun for the coin.

[phrophus]

I have a lot of experience drooling over audis, the S5 being one of the more drool-inducing specimens. I know that doesn't help your decision in any way.

[mitsu13gman]

I don't know if they've resolved them, but VAG (VW/Audi Group) has had a pretty long history of electrical gremlins. I was researching a sporty car about 5 years ago, and the general consensus was that, when you get a good VW, they're immensely reliable and life is good. When you a get a bad one...

The problem is you don't know which one you've got until you've had it for a while.

My research ultimately put me in a Lexus IS350, and I could not recommend that car enough. You get in, hit the button, and go. It's frightfully quick (I held dead even from 5-60 with a dyno-certified 450hp A4,) but it's so smooth and well-behaved that you have no sense of it being a "fast" car. Until it is.

In your budget, at least test drive the IS-F. You'd be amazed what short gearing can do for a car. And with the 8-speed in the IS-F, I'd bet it's even more pronounced than mine!

Obviously, I put reliablitly ahead of absolute performance, you may not be as much of a weenie. Either way, have fun car shopping, dude!

[PunchedDrunk...]

Anecdotal time...My brother had one, IIRC an A series convertible, and it was constantly being serviced. It was around the frequency of 3 per every oil change on my car (95 Accord doing ~12k miles a year). I soon began to here the saying, "an Audi is only as good as the warranty on it." He got rid of it when it was close to expiring. The worst problem I saw his car have was it losing a cylinder b/c the spark plug was covered in oil.

The only fact that I learned from his experience was that Audi's are expensive to maintain. But I should've expected that given Audi's status as a brand.

[GuitarBilly]

My ex-gf had a S4 and frankly I loved that car until the day the taillight went out and the dealership told us it was $900 to replace it.

Maintenance on Audi is ridiculously expensive and they're not very reliable to begin with. Buyer's beware.

[marshallnoise]

I think the S5 is sexy as hell. But I have experienced the electrical shit that VW puts out and the experience has turned me off to all things VW/Audi. You open the passenger door, all the doors lock and the windows roll up. Tons of issues. Not a fan.

[TyroneBiggums]

No car expert but here, but I do know that you live in Canada. I too inhabit the barren frozen wasteland that is the North.

My dad has an STI that is hands down the best driving car on snow I've ever had the pleasure to drive. It's amazing.

[izzy]

Hey guys, thank you for the input. Hate the prospect of those kinds of maintenance woes or costs. Fuckity fuck fuck fuck.

Good gawd, the lexus line used to be meh to ok aesthetics wise, but fuck me charlie, the 2014 line up is predator fuck face ugly. Fail.

Neve been a Subaru fan but will take a fresh look at the line up, tho the BRZ is out.

Abbreviated iphone response is abbreviated, but gratitude for feedback is immense!!

[Harvest]

I like the S5 as well, but I've heard those same stories about Audi maintenance. I've been thinking about getting an S4... 2007ish. Not sure why exactly.... the lure of AWD I guess. That and almost every Subaru out there has been bagged/modded to shit.

Other than that one, not sure what I'd get. I'd like a proper drivers car... BRZ/FR-S would be fun, or a used Cayman, maybe an E46 M3. E90 M5's are not all that expensive either... dat V10 (probably costs a fortune to keep running).

The reason I keep talking myself out of it is that I don't drive much at all. I put maybe 8000km on my car this year, and another 4k on my bike. That's lots of rapidly depreciating bling sitting in the parkade (and the insurance man's pocket).

[mitsu13gman]

I can honestly tell you that what you're looking for is two cars. Get one simple people-carrier for the day-to-day grind. Then get the second car for fun. The biggest problem is that seating capacity and luxury add weight, which are both the enemies of performance. Current luxury-performance thinking is to overcome that with power. Trust me - big weight plus big power equals big repairs. If the curb weight for your prospective vehicle nears 4k lbs, look elsewhere.

If you already have a daily-driver, look into a light 2-seater for the fun car.

[izzy]

Dunno if this factors at all but i am buying new, full warranty. Still, warranty or not, i don't want to buy something that statistically has a high rate of failure. The last 3 vehicles i owned, all as new purchases were all japanese: honda accord, toyota 4-runner, toyota rav-4 and all were great. But the new accord's dash was designed by a confused noob and toyota has no sports car offering. The scion frs looks sweet and is fun at low speed but is absolutely gutless to the point of being dangerous when it comes to highway driving. And well the new lexus line, as mentioned, is unfortunately predator fuck face ugly.

tl;dr: first world problems

[mitsu13gman]

Before you dismiss Lexus entirely, just test drive an IS-F.

There's so much more to that chassis than just the looks.

For example, going by a cop at 80mph (my 350 is black) and being completely invisible - they don't even turn on their radar!

Hell, try an IS350 for giggles - it's so much faster than your Accord it'll stun you, and it sounds like a muted F1 car at over 4000rpm. But at typical cruising speeds it just disappears.

The sad truth is that what you and I are looking for just doesn't exist. The Corvette does big power/low weight at a reasonable price, but doesn't have the reputation of the Japanese cars. Honda/Acura and Toyota/Lexus/Scion don't have a dedicated sports car right now, and I've heard too many issues with Nisan to recommend the 370Z, which is only marginally faster than the IS350 anyway.

When I make a car purchase, I usually join the user forums for the cars I'm looking at and see what issues people typically have. That helps narrow the search, which combined with a few test-drives usually gives the answer pretty quick.

See what else is out there and come on back - there's enough knowledge here to keep you out of a problem car and still keep the fun factor.

[izzy]

Crazy buzy at work so no time to post tho i sneak in reads here & there. Good stuff, keep it coming!! Thanks!!

[indienoise]

Dunno if this factors at all but i am buying new, full warranty. Still, warranty or not, i don't want to buy something that statistically has a high rate of failure. The last 3 vehicles i owned, all as new purchases were all japanese: honda accord, toyota 4-runner, toyota rav-4 and all were great. But the new accord's dash was designed by a confused noob and toyota has no sports car offering. The scion frs looks sweet and is fun at low speed but is absolutely gutless to the point of being dangerous when it comes to highway driving. And well the new lexus line, as mentioned, is unfortunately predator fuck face ugly.

tl;dr: first world problems

As long as you're buying new, if it's what you want, go for it. Just make sure you dump that thing before the warranty is out. I wouldn't want one once the warranty is gone.

[ovid9]

Are you buying the Audi new and live relatively near a dealership?

If yes to both of those, go for it if you like it.

I would also suggest buying an extended warranty when the factory warranty is about to run out as parts and labor tend to be insane on them.

I believe they've gotten their reliability up in the past few years, but in general they are expensive as hell to fix things on.

[izzy]

Yep, the S5 is new. Fully loaded c/w 4 year warranty. They also provided a fee structure if i wanted to extend the warranty another 3 years. Dealership is about 15 minutes from my house.

[ovid9]

Yep, the S5 is new. Fully loaded c/w 4 year warranty. They also provided a fee structure if i wanted to extend the warranty another 3 years. Dealership is about 15 minutes from my house.

If you loved it and with that warranty available, I wouldn't shy away from them at all man.

You know having a warranty means nothing expensive will go wrong!

[izzy]

lulz!!

Dont love the S5 -- that feeling ive never had for a vehicle except a porsche -- but of all the OTHER cars i test drove -- and i drove them all multiple times -- the S5 experience ranked very high. That, in concert with fit & finish, creature comforts, stereo system et all (call all this "enjoyment") had it rank high on perceived value. Subtitle: Practicality for this car purchase is a secondary consideration, performance etc is #1.

Simply put (im doing this from my fucking mobile):

Driving "enjoyment":
01. Boxter (wow)
02. TTS
03: S5
04: S4
...
99: Camry (meh)

Practicality:
01. Camry
02. S4
03: S5
04: TTS
...
99: Boxter, but who cares how impractical it is, FUCK me that mofo is fun!! I'm still toying with getting its hard top brother, the cayman.

[Harvest]

Your conundrum might make for a good episode on Drive. I would email them :P

Chris Harris just did a review on the new Cayman. It's a better looking Boxter with a permanent top. Not that you can drop the top more than 10-12 days a year here in Calgary anyways :P Maybe the best pure sports car out there right now:

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wT2wkhg6LTQ[/video]

[izzy]

Funny you should mention the cayman. I've gone the rounds on that one. A buddy at work is a cayman expert, and has been providing lots of info. A couple will be here in a month or so and I'm in line for testing. Just don't know if I want to lay down that kinda coin but I'm pretty sure ill be fucked if I drive one because driving a 2013 boxter (twice) was honestly, a life changing experience. I really can't articulate the experience but it was hours before I could wipe the stupid fucking grin off my face. Fucking amazing.

[izzy]

Resurrecting dead thread: long story short -- on my third sports car since starting this thread -- a 981 Boxster S -- fucking love, love, love it -- and I waited many miles until making this post (> 3500) -- winding this thing up > 5000 rpm is a fucking song that defies description.

tl;dr: fuck old guys and their toys.

[madryan]

Nice man.

I'm gonna snag the STI version of that BRZ that's coming out soon. It's gonna be brutal. Gotta get done with college and land a job first though.

[izzy]

Didn't try the BRZ but I did try it's cousin, the Scion FRS -- fun car -- surprising given it's modest power plant. The beefier STI BRZ should be very satisfying to drive (hope they beef up the chassis and suspension -- not just the engine).