Last year was the most successful in Audi's history. The marque name first seen in 1910 drifted into the Auto Union combine of the Thirties, then disappeared for a couple of decades. It reappeared post-war under Mercedes control, only to be sold on to Volkswagen,
eventually becoming the VW Group's premium line.
While being a major player in the modern European motor industry, Audi likes to remind people of its past glories too. For next month's Festival of Speed at Goodwood, for example, it has entered not only a 520bhp Quattro S1 rally car from the Sixties,
but also two magnificent V12
and V16 rear-engined Grand
Prix cars from the Thirties.
In 1997, for the first time ever, Audi delivered more than 500,000 cars. The UK is its second-best export market, just a few
thousand sales behind the perhaps unexpected No. 1, which is Italy.
The company's south German factories are at Ingolstadt and Neckarsulm - the town from which the old NSU company took its title.
However, Audi has also made a great success of its major
investment in eastern Europe. Its Hungarian engine plant at Gyor boosted output by almost a
quarter compared with the figure achieved in the previous year.
The top-rated executive saloon is the A8, a car which shows the company's pioneering work
in the use of aluminium. Audi was the first European manufacturer to co-operate with Alcoa - the Aluminium Company of America - when US car makers were not interested in hauling down the weight of their own gas-guzzlers.
It makes the A8 available with several different engine options. And this is currently the biggest car in the catalogue to use the company's famous quattro four-wheel drive system.
Audi's one-size down design, the A6, still fits easily into the executive category. It comes with eight individual engine options, petrol and turbo diesel, and in quattro specification if you fancy that.
Now, exactly a year after the introduction of the current A6 saloon, the corresponding estate version has gone on sale. However, Audi still shuns the industry-wide ''estate'' tag and continues with its own model name Avant.
There are nearly a dozen
different versions of the A6 Avant available now, sensibly adapted for estate car use, and well equipped in their different price brackets.They all offer electronic ABS, brake force distribution and
traction control as standard.
Engine choices include a 2.8-litre petrol V6 and a strong-pulling 2.5-litre five-cylinder turbo diesel, which comes as
standard with a six-speed manual transmission using a long-legged top gear. The V6 Avant quattro features alloy wheels, lower
profile tyres, a centre differential and lowered suspension all round.
Comprehensive though the
present A6 Avant range may seem, within the next few months it will also include a really high performance version in a specification also to be made available with saloon bodywork.
Decoded, the A6 Avant 2.7 T quattro designation reveals that the new car will have a five-valve 2.7-litre 230bhp engine, an
intercooled twin-turbo arrangement, very strong torque, and the
familiar four-wheel drive system to put all the power on the road.
It will be in the showrooms in the summer, with prices to be announced nearer the time.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article