Brand new Audi... Dangerous... Where do we stand?

[Gonzo0]

Evening,

We have recently got a new Audi A6 Avant C8 40TDI. Its a very nice car but day to day we have found it quite dangerous to drive at times.

This all stems doen to the frankly shocking gearbox lag. When wanting to pull away from junctions into a gap the car takes up to 2 seconds sometimes to engage, at this point your foot is probably at 50% throttle so once the car does decide to move it throws all the power to the front wheels and you end up sat halfway in the road wheelspinning with the traction control going mad.

Putting the gearbox into sport helps the issue slightly but to me this shouldnt be needed as a workaround.

I raised this with Audi and the car went into the dealership for analysis. Basically they said no fault found and the car was behaving as expected. They couldnt take it any further.

I feel this issue is not only dangerous but also taking a real big shine off an otherwise very nice car.

What do you think our next options are....part of me feels like rejecting the car, it really has taken the shine off the car. Looking around it appears other owners have a similar problem.

Thanks

[jamoor]

What kind of box is it

[Gonzo0]

7 speed s tronic daul clutch. Its very slow enaging reverse too.

[rjfp1962]

Did you road test one before buying?

[courty]

looking at the Audi forums, this is a well known issue.

https://www.audiownersclub.com/forums/topic/12809-...

https://www.audi-sport.net/xf/threads/my-a6-avant-...

Edited by courty on Thursday 10th December 19:56

[Gonzo0]

Unfortunately not, it was an in stock car that we got an amazing deal on and the dealer did not have one available in our spec.

[RUSTILLDOWN]

Have u had automatics before that were noticeably better? If so, may be worthwhile mentioning to the dealership

[Gonzo0]

We have had an Audi TTS with s tronic and a Macan GTS with PDK, both were night and day in difference compared too this.

I feel like its a software mapping issue and audi have focussed too nuch on efficiency, hence needing a lot of throttle to get the car moving

[anonymous-user]

Sounds like the first gen smart car gearbox. Surely they just update gearbox ECUto latest version?

[PurplePJ]

This has been a trait of all Audi/VW group diesel automatics that I’ve driven in the last 10+ years. Not as bad as a Smart car I once owned!

I’ve got a Tiguan at the moment as daily driver and it’s exactly the same, learnt to drive round it and plan ahead a bit more.

[RUSTILLDOWN]

Perhaps more related to being a diesel? Sooooo slow until it hits 2k revs (or whenever it’s turbo kicks in)

[Pica-Pica]

RUSTILLDOWN said:

Perhaps more related to being a diesel? Sooooo slow until it hits 2k revs (or whenever it’s turbo kicks in)

No. It won’t be that at all. Plenty of autos in diesel and petrol existed before turbos came along.

[RUSTILLDOWN]

0-60 is much slower than your previous cars, suggest u time it to compare to the official performance

[Riley Blue]

If you really think it's dangerous, reject it. The decision is that simple.

[Toaster Pilot]

“dangerous”. Right.

Sure you’ll get used to it.

[anonymous-user]

You didn't test drive it and you have now found something you don't like. Audi will just fob you off, it will be called a 'characteristic' and you are basically stuck with it.

Either learn to 'drive round it' or get shot of it.

I sympathise as a loaner A6 I had years ago was the same and I came to the same conclusion as you have.

[Jumpy Guy]

As the dealer says "they all do that "

I've had an A4, and a Tiguan in the past 4 years, and both did this. As others said, you learn to plan/ drive around it.

[MrGTI6]

Gonzo0 said:

7 speed s tronic daul clutch.

When Audi told you the car performs as expected, they were telling the truth. The DSG/S-Tronic is useless when pulling away suddenly (onto a roundabout or onto a busy road from a junction, for example). More so in diesel cars from my experience. The massive hesitation while the car refuses to move with the revs hovering around the 2000rpm mark is to be expected, as is the eventual and jerky launch.

In contrast, the eight-speed torque-converter in the 3.0 BiTDI model is silky smooth. It's a shame they don't use that gearbox for all the autos in the range. Despite all the hype, dual-clutch autos are crap.

[Sheepshanks]

PurplePJ said:

This has been a trait of all Audi/VW group diesel automatics that I’ve driven in the last 10+ years. Not as bad as a Smart car I once owned!

I’ve got a Tiguan at the moment as daily driver and it’s exactly the same, learnt to drive round it and plan ahead a bit more.

Wife has a Tiguan diesel DSG and it's absolutely fine at starting from rest. You can catch it out a bit if rolling, and it does take a second to figure out what it's doing if you slam it into reverse. Reverse to forward is fine.

It's just a matter of having faith and not mashing the throttle. I don't drive it much but it doesn't cause me any concern when I do.

Years ago we had a Mondeo diesel auto demo at work and that was horrendous - had to hold it on the brake and spool the engine up. Tiguan is nothing like that.

[Schermerhorn]

I have the older generation Audi A4 B8 2.0 Tdi. It has the CVT gearbox. From cold it's pretty slow, clunky and revs way too high when moving away from the lights.

Once it's warmed up it's pretty nice and smooth but in slow traffic the nature of the box means that MPG suffers considerably. I've only ever seen 50mpg a handful of times and that's with very regular motorway driving.

I guess it's just an Audi thing.