Q car appeal of the S6

Might as well do it properly…

Mboy > interiors clean up fine. The alternative is driving a miserable diesel all the time while your “fun” car languishes in the garage for the odd occasion when you fancy driving it but don’t need to carry people or things.

My “fun car” has 2 wheels and pedals I’m afraid! It used to have 2 wheels and a V-Twin engine, but these days there’s too many fun police out there!

If my fun car did actually have 4 wheels and an engine, it would probably only be something like a MK1 MX5 anyway, as that’s pretty much as good as you can sensibly exploit on the British roads these days sadly! The days of being able to enjoy absurdly quick cars on the open roads are gone, and Track Days though fun just aren’t a real proposition to most people because of time and cost implications. To a large extent bikes are the answer! 🙂

“Fun” comes in all shapes and sizes… For me I’d rather spend £300 on fuel to Scotland and back in my Diesel Passat and 3 night’s B&B so I could get a long weekend’s riding in, than on fuel and entry fees to a trackday in something distinctly faster.

Probably of no relevance whatsoever but I’ve got an audi sq5. 4wd twin turbo 3.0 diesel, 330bhp. It’s as fast as all those petrol cars listed above and still does 40mpg or More.
I can understand people buying petrol cars but for me these new diesels are the best of everything.

I’ve got an audi sq5. 4wd twin turbo 3.0 diesel, 330bhp. It’s as fast as all those petrol cars listed above and still does 40mpg or More

Yes but at £45k (before you add any extras) you could buy 3 mint condition RS2’s or B5 RS4’s, which are quicker, handle better, are uber cool, and don’t make you look like a footballers wife. Granted though 40mpg + is very good, but paying £45k (or whatever the lease sets you back) just for a ‘fashion statement’ 4×4 that does an extra 15mpg, has a horrendous depreciation problem and gets a poor Autocar review seems like a fools errand to me. Still, your money! Is it white by any chance?

Thegreatape – very nice.

My father had two ur Quattros in the 80s. Nothing Q about them. But, when my father needed the money and sold the second of them back to the “dealer” (Group B heroes Dave Sutton Motorsport in Daventry) he came away with a bland 2.2 litre Audi 100. Looked plain but went like shit off a stick. They never would own up to what they’d done to it….

Yes but at £45k (before you add any extras) you could buy 3 mint condition RS2’s or B5 RS4’s, which are uber cool

Come on, no one buys an Audi in an attempt to be cool! Surely one of the least “cool” cars on the road.

Is everyone on this forum a pretentious bore? I would have one, and I would spank the crap out of it. Believe it or not, I would do this on public roads. This thread and several others that have brought about the term “pressing on” come on chaps. Sod the naysayers you want a quick car, you are going to rag the nuts off it, and on public roads, get one ordered and ignore the morons on here, that believe doing 31mph will kill all the baby seals.

Yes but at £45k (before you add any extras) you could buy 3 mint condition RS2’s or B5 RS4’s, which are quicker, handle better, are uber cool, and don’t make you look like a footballers wife. Granted though 40mpg + is very good, but paying £45k (or whatever the lease sets you back) just for a ‘fashion statement’ 4×4 that does an extra 15mpg, has a horrendous depreciation problem and gets a poor Autocar review seems like a fools errand to me. Still, your money! Is it white by any chance?
POSTED 11 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

One of the best put-downs I’ve read in ages 🙂

why wet your pants over a blany Golf when you can find a standard A4 with over 350bhp?

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiuLvLobAs4[/video]

surley the ultiamte chuck-your-bike-in-and-rag-it mototr is an MTM tuned T5…..

473bhp, anyone?

I can’t think of any woman who’s going to jump into the sack with me because I have a “R” over a GT tdi, so I fail to see the attraction…

And save myself anywhere between £10 and 15k on the Golf,plus its so much betterer looking.

OR, buy one of these and chip it ever so slightly and you have a 300bhp 4wd small estate for £5k….

I’ve had an RS4, it got nicked. A lot of them do. Especially when you leave them parked on the drive while you use your other car for the sake of keeping it for best. It wasn’t that good either.

Hang wringers aside, the problem with that golf is that it’s not really quick enough. For the money and costs to run it, there wouldn’t be much In it between that and say, a second hand v10 rs6 and I know what’s quicker. 300bhp cars of that weight and ilk soon feel a bit meh, they’re fast but not mega fast yet your doing terrible mpg and tyres/brakes wear out much much faster. i had a late model 350z which got chopped in for the rs4. They did around the same mpg, cost the same to tax and destroyed tyres at the same rate. The audi was much faster.

Oh, and you won’t get 500bhp from a remap on an rs4. They’re N/A not turbo’d and to be fair most don’t make the 420bhp they’re meant to. A 100 cell cat and a map ‘might’ get you 430 but it depends on the individual car..

Not much difference in running costs between a golf and a 2nd hand v10 rs6………..eh?

My car allowance only covers cars up to 5 years old so if I’m in the market for a new car next year I won’t be looking at an old chipped V50 or a V10 S6 Avant (which truthfully I’d prefer), I’ll be looking at something that’s a year old at most. £360 / month (after tax) might get me an R estate if some of the recent fantastic Golf R hatch lease deals are repeated, but I’ll just have to wait and see.

Edit: flange – re: RS4 above, I think he’s talking about the Mk1 2.7TT version not the later 4.2 N/A one.

Why are people so fixated about power? It’s pointless apart from in a straight line, and passed 2nd gear in these cars.

I really can’t see a Golf 4wd estate being ‘fun’ unless you enjoy beating Kev away from the lights in his Corsa. It will have very safe predictable dull handling with under steer… If you can go fast enought to get there.

£30k gets you a BMW 3 series estate with much less power, but still plenty quick enough, 80mpg, fantastic fun handling when you want it.

Mate of mine is an ex UK class rally champion. He has had access to many cars, including a super trick Impreza AWD. the Impreza isn’t his favourite car though, as he said it was dull because too fast, too much grip to be driven safely and have fun on the road.

He much preferred a 1.4 skoda that was a snail in comparison but could be driven to its limits of grip at safe speeds, and was fully predictable unlike some of these very fast 4WD’s that grip and grip and then just snap.

Why are people so fixated about power? It’s pointless apart from in a straight line, and passed 2nd gear in these cars.

Mate of mine is an ex UK class rally champion. He has had access to many cars, including a super trick Impreza AWD. the Impreza isn’t his favourite car though, as he said it was dull because too fast, too much grip to be driven safely and have fun on the road.

Your mate just contradicted you. Assuming when he was driving too fast to safely have fun in his Impreza he was talking about other than in a straight line?

I really can’t see a Golf 4wd estate being ‘fun’ unless you enjoy beating Kev away from the lights in his Corsa. It will have very safe predictable dull handling with under steer… If you can go fast enought to get there.

I don’t think anyone is trying to make a point that the golf is going to be huge fun compared to say an M3. I said on page one that people don’t buy a car like this to live out their Ken Block fantasies, they buy them for useable all weather performance.

I used to be a petrolhead and did lots of track days etc 25 yrs ago before they were popular and expensive. I have had lots of quickish cars where money and family allowed but fell in and out of love with it and my mid life crisis was downhilling as opposed to cars. We recently bought a brand new Fiat Panda for my children to learn to drive on. I adore it, lift off oversteer and I can drive it as fast as I can as opposed to how fast I dare. On the strength of it I have ordered a Caterham 160 (had a quick 7 type car a while back but test drove the 160). I understand that huge speed is huge fun but so rare in the rare day to day world, the 160 will be my everyday driver, but have a big car and a small car for practical duties.
This headlong march towards 300bhp hatchbacks seems pointless, boring cars that are too fast unless you live in the most deserted bits of Scotland. The noise and feeling of speed is what counts as far as fun is concerned. I appreciate that i am now getting old and have probably missed the point. I rarely have to press on (and when I do, a big diesel seems to suffice at a practical level), just like enjoying myself when the opportunity arises.
The car threads are always the same on STW and i don’t really know why I joined in.

Jim why has he contradicted me? He was saying the Impreza was dull/not fun. He could go around corners faster than the legal speed limit and not come close to the limits of grip. That isn’t fun, its dull… Unless you yourself do not know what a fun car is like to drive?

The OP specifically mentioned ‘fun’ as an attribute of the Golf. Your requirements of a useable all weather performance car could be a cheaper golf with 100bhp and 4WD. I’m not sure if VW do such a dull car, but Skoda do an Octavia like that.

edoverheels
This headlong march towards 300bhp hatchbacks seems pointless

Keep in mind ed that these aren’t exactly mainstream cars. I think there’s only something like 5000 Golf Rs produced. It’s a bit of niche (insert belt driven single speed 69er pun here). It’s not as if the world is crying out for these things.

FunkyDunc
Jim why has he contradicted me? He was saying the Impreza was dull/not fun. He could go around corners faster than the legal speed limit and not come close to the limits of grip. That isn’t fun, its dull… Unless you yourself do not know what a fun car is like to drive?

Maybe I’m picking you up wrong, but when you say x amount of power is pointless except for in a straight line and past 2nd gear, but your mate says he can go way beyond the speed limit and still have grip and control it kind of illustrates to me that the cars are useable beyond second gear, or in a straight line.
I’m not arguing that unlimited grip and power is fun,in the conventional driving sense just that it can be useable and nice to have.

Oh, and you won’t get 500bhp from a remap on an rs4. They’re N/A not turbo’d and to be fair most don’t make the 420bhp they’re meant to. A 100 cell cat and a map ‘might’ get you 430 but it depends on the individual car..

Sorry I meant the earlier B5 RS4 produced in 2001 which is a 2.7 V6 Twin Turbo. Simple to remap to around 450/460hp with basic map and exhaust. A reliable 500-600hp easily achievable but obviously costs increase considerably the further you take things.

With the later NA V8 it’s very difficult to get significant power gains and this is the engine that can suffer from engine coking, leading to a loss of power for many of these later cars. Later V8 car feels significantly slower than the earlier V6 on the road due to the V6’s increased torque and turbo shove (although on paper they are roughly the same).

Jim – These cars can do over 60 mph in 2nd gear, faster than you can legally go, so what do you do with the rest of the gears and performance, you just don’t need it on the road.

Fun cars are ones as edover says, that feel quick, give you feedback, and most importantly let you play with the limits of grip. The Impreza and all these modern 4wd big bhp cars have so much grip that you have to be doing silly speeds around corners to get anywhere near the edge of grip, so therefore you can drive extremely quickly with very little skill being needed, and therefore they are not that much fun once you get over the initial acceleration being faster.

FunkyDunc
These cars can do over 60 mph in 2nd gear, faster than you can legally go, so what do you do with the rest of the gears and performance, you just don’t need it on the road.

Fun cars are ones edover says, feel quick, give you feedback, and most importantly let you play with the limits of grip.

Power has no relation to what speed a car will do in a given gear. My wifes diesel Seat would do over 80mph in 3rd gear, most cars will (on a track or closed road). That didn’t render 4th and 5th pointless. I agree with edover there, no one is saying any different. Front engined, rwd, good power to weight ratio should = fun.

The Impreza and all these modern 4wd big bhp cars have so much grip that you have to be doing silly speeds around corners to get anywhere near the edge of grip, so therefore you can drive extremely quickly with very little skill being needed.

Since you mention imprezas they are relatively low geared. Low maximum speed for quicker acceleration. Closer ratios. The speeds they’ll do in any given gear is not that different from any “normal” car. They’ll just get to those speeds quicker.

Whilst I can understand why they wouldn’t be much fun, or very engaging for a champion rally driver, a mere mortal might get a buzz going round a 3rd gear corner in the wet, all four wheels spinning, under the speed limit.

Pfft, forget 4WD….. 😉

Oh… and there are some incredibly dull people on this thread STW

The most fun car I ever owned? A Peugeot 106 Rallye.

The second most? A Citroen Saxo 1.1 Forte.

I’ve owned some reasonably quick cars in the past, and some very quick bikes. Generally the faster and more capable the machine, the harder it is to enjoy exploiting it IMO. Obviously you can enjoy a car for other reasons, such as aesthetics, engineering qualities, refinement and all sorts of other reasons. But the REAL petrolheads are the ones that their own car, despite access to much more grandiose machinery, is much more basic and readily exploited. James Hunt’s Austin A35 Van is a good example of this… When do you feel at your most alive? When you’re literally closest to death. And you’d get FAR closer to feeling like death on every journey in an A35 van than you would in a brand new Golf R or the like! It’s why (though I could) I ride a basic (but nice) 29er HT for 95% of the time these days. I could ride an all singing all dancing 6″+ full sus trail bike that would be ridiculously capable but also I wouldn’t get near its limit most of the time. This was proved a couple of weeks ago when I tried out a Whyte G-150… It was an incredible bike, and if I was after that kind of bike it’d be my first choice, it was effortlessly quick on the descents so much so I felt I could really end up in a lot of trouble if I wasn’t careful. But it was complete overkill and my HT would have been more easily exploited 90% of the time.

FWIW I loved my 106 Rallye, it really was a fun car. Sold it cost I mistakenly thought I needed more power and a faster car… The 1.1 Saxo was also ridiculously good fun, as it was soooooo basic (it was a runout special edition, the only thing it had was a CD player, no power steering or anything so it was light). By rights it should have been crap compared to the much more focussed 106 Rallye, but precisely because it was so basic it was damned good fun. Driving at 7/10ths in the Rallye could get you in trouble with the law if you got pulled over (try 7/10ths in a modern diesel repmobile even, you’d get an instant 12 month ban!), but the 1.1 Saxo could almost be driven at 10/10ths without raising an eyebrow! It also returned 50mpg no matter how hard I pressed the throttle (the 106 Rallye never returned more than 35mpg even if being nursed!), cost next to nothing to tax, tyres were about £35 each for a decent brand and… Well, it didn’t fit many bikes in and I got back into MTBing in a big way so sold it to buy a big estate car.

Anyway… IMO much as I love cars, if you’re looking to get your thrills out of a car on the public roads in this day and age and you’re looking at anything more powerful than something like a Fiat Panda or a basic MX5, you need to ask yourself if you plan on keeping your license for long and how you plan to get around when you lose it. By the very fact you’re on this forum it suggests that you enjoy a hobby that you can get your speed thrills out of much cheaper than in a car, and nobody is yet stopping you from going as fast as you want!

mboy – Member

The most fun car I ever owned? A Peugeot 106 Rallye.

The second most? A Citroen Saxo 1.1 Forte.

I’ve owned some reasonably quick cars in the past, and some very quick bikes. Generally the faster and more capable the machine, the harder it is to enjoy exploiting it IMO. Obviously you can enjoy a car for other reasons, such as aesthetics, engineering qualities, refinement and all sorts of other reasons. But the REAL petrolheads are the ones that their own car, despite access to much more grandiose machinery, is much more basic and readily exploited. James Hunt’s Austin A35 Van is a good example of this… When do you feel at your most alive? When you’re literally closest to death. And you’d get FAR closer to feeling like death on every journey in an A35 van than you would in a brand new Golf R or the like! It’s why (though I could) I ride a basic (but nice) 29er HT for 95% of the time these days. I could ride an all singing all dancing 6″+ full sus trail bike that would be ridiculously capable but also I wouldn’t get near its limit most of the time. This was proved a couple of weeks ago when I tried out a Whyte G-150… It was an incredible bike, and if I was after that kind of bike it’d be my first choice, it was effortlessly quick on the descents so much so I felt I could really end up in a lot of trouble if I wasn’t careful. But it was complete overkill and my HT would have been more easily exploited 90% of the time.

FWIW I loved my 106 Rallye, it really was a fun car. Sold it cost I mistakenly thought I needed more power and a faster car… The 1.1 Saxo was also ridiculously good fun, as it was soooooo basic (it was a runout special edition, the only thing it had was a CD player, no power steering or anything so it was light). By rights it should have been crap compared to the much more focussed 106 Rallye, but precisely because it was so basic it was damned good fun. Driving at 7/10ths in the Rallye could get you in trouble with the law if you got pulled over (try 7/10ths in a modern diesel repmobile even, you’d get an instant 12 month ban!), but the 1.1 Saxo could almost be driven at 10/10ths without raising an eyebrow! It also returned 50mpg no matter how hard I pressed the throttle (the 106 Rallye never returned more than 35mpg even if being nursed!), cost next to nothing to tax, tyres were about £35 each for a decent brand and… Well, it didn’t fit many bikes in and I got back into MTBing in a big way so sold it to buy a big estate car.

Anyway… IMO much as I love cars, if you’re looking to get your thrills out of a car on the public roads in this day and age and you’re looking at anything more powerful than something like a Fiat Panda or a basic MX5, you need to ask yourself if you plan on keeping your license for long and how you plan to get around when you lose it. By the very fact you’re on this forum it suggests that you enjoy a hobby that you can get your speed thrills out of much cheaper than in a car, and nobody is yet stopping you from going as fast as you want!

Oh… and there are some incredibly dull people on this thread STW

Jim – These cars can do over 60 mph in 2nd gear, faster than you can legally go, so what do you do with the rest of the gears and performance, you just don’t need it on the road.

It’s a good question, the answer is quite simple but not very pc. IME of 300+ hp road cars, you can use much of the performance except for Vmax in top gear. Depends a lot on where you live too.

But the thing for me is handling. The modern high powered Euroboxes just don’t cut it for me with their dead steering feel, over-assisted brakes, dubious ride quality and of course terminal understeer. BMW are the exception in this respect, but still no match for a dedicated sportscar like a Porsche Cayman or 911 and even those can seem a bit too sanitised compared to earlier classics.

I’d say the most fun car I’ve ever owned was a 1973 Porsche 911 2.4S. Just over 1000 kg with 190 hp and skinny tyres by today’s standards. Epic drive on a twisty B-road and no electronic nannies keeping you out of the scenery. I do like modern Porsches too, which in contrast are ridiculously easy to drive very fast. Still have great steering feel though and the handling is sublime. Back to the quoted point, you could lose your license very easily! You really do have to reign yourself in, but still a lot of fun to flick down a decent piece of B-road. I don’t push it at all on motorways and d.c’s. I don’t see the point in driving fast in a straight line when even serious 3 digit speeds feel like nothing. It’s always on these bland roads where boy racing middle-aged IT consultants come up behind you in their Audi diesels (or occasionally a full blown RS6) looking for a race. What’s the point? It’s not like anyone in their right mind is going to risk hitting Vmax in a 185 mph car on the M40.

I’ve been using my wife’s Panda 100hp for the last couple of days. That is a fun car. Much slower than my merc, but I was smiling all the way to work.

I’ve had this RS6 for 9 years

I prefer to travel like this now to save on the fuel costs. 505hp makes one thirsty car

Actually this ride was when the alternator broke. The only time it’s let me down in 50,000+ miles

MM

Strangely I do play football and it is my wife’s car! It’s Not white though so I failed there 🙂

http://sniffpetrol.com/2014/11/20/golf-r-estate-kills-off-all-other-cars

hahah that’s class 🙂

I drove the new Golf R and loved it. Great wee car. Plus you could rent one for £200-250. If the pricing is similar for the estate then it’s a bargain at that price.

Nah there will still have to be a car for mithering halfwits who like to drive everywhere at 41mph

Should keep a certain korean manufacturer in business

And people who like to drag a small really shit version of their house behind them

That RS6 is very nice indeed. Far to many fun police activists on here! I had an E46 M3 last year and absolutely loved it, I would just go for a drive and “make progress” whenever I could… Didn’t kill 1 single person or myself! Unfortunately the prospect of unemployment meant I had to sell it.

I have driven lots of fast cars but nothing wanted to head butt the horizon or begged to be driven properly like the M3.. I bloody miss that car, 1 day I shall have another..

Drive what you want, but don’t expect me to sit behind you as you dither around in a dull, unimaginative, under powered collection of metal resembling a car.

mithering halfwits who like to drive everywhere at 41mph

The last time I looked at the average speed thing on my car it was less than that, around 50kmh.

If mithering halfwit is how you describe someone respecting the law, how do you describe those bragging about breaking it on here? The only place I consider 41mph anti-socially slow is on a motorway with a higher limit.

And people who like to drag a small really shit version of their house behind them

What about..

Oh never mind. This thread’s brought the arseholes out of the woodwork, someone please close it.

If mithering halfwit is how you describe someone respecting the law

The don’t respect the law though the key word you missed was “everywhere”

Through the village with a 30mph limit at 41mph. Down the clear well sighted A- road with a 60mph limit at 41mph. Motorway slip road, 41mph. National speed limit DC – 41mph. Past the school yep you guessed it 41mph.

Ok so some people drive at 40mph everywhere.

That’s not me, and it’s not most people on here. Why are you bring them up? There’s a middle ground between 40mph grannies (who annoy me as much as they do you) and someone ragging the nuts off a Golf R.

Ok so some people drive at 40mph everywhere.

That’s not me, and it’s not most people on here. Why are you bring them up?

Who said it was you? Jeez not everything on STW has to be about you Molgrips 😉

I was referring to this:

http://sniffpetrol.com/2014/11/20/golf-r-estate-kills-off-all-other-cars

And suggesting that there are at least two categories of drivers that the Golf R wouldn’t suit.

Although I must admit it would probably tow a caravan rather well too (it might break the crockery though)

molgrips

I don’t need to imagine that, happens all the time. I relax, wait, and when it’s safe I go. Doesn’t take long.

molgrips
40mph grannies (who annoy me as much as they do you)

I thought you didn’t get annoyed? Don’t you just go into some kind of sanctimonious, pontifical “Zen Diesel” state? It’s probably a frame of mind us child murdering, kitten stomping, road jihadis wouldn’t understand unless we spent fifteen years waiting patiently behind a Mondeo.

Good grief, there’s so many self-rightous sanctimonious bletherers on here!

I would like one for my next car because I don’t need anything bigger than my present car (MK1 Octavia VRS estate) but I live up some very steep hills. It needs to be auto because my wife can’t drive a manual very well, 4wd with winter tyres will help in the inevitable dreadful weather and lack of road clearing and being a Golf it’ll be a pretty nice place to be inside. I quite like being able to drive reasonably quickly without killing people.

Pretty much my perfect real world car.