New RS4 - is it 414BHP or not!

[SimonC]

Cheers SimonFV8.
Try taking an RS4 onto a construction site then being told that you'll have to finance your new exhaust/cats because the warranty doesn't cover grounding. You would also tire of "we're obviously paying him too much". At the end of the working week I have halved my fuel spend, done a bit for the planet and still trundled along in the same stream of traffic. I can park it anywhere and not worry about it. It doesn't bother me to fill the footwells/wheelarches with mud, my enjoyment of the RS4 is enhanced by not driving it every day. I also know one thing for sure IMHO I would pick my lovely cheap, small, economical Skoda over an RS4 five days a week. And for me, for the way I drive 90% of the time, for the boxes I want to tick I still remained unconvinced that cubic capacity and high revs is a substitute for the way Audi spent 20-odd years propelling their best cars.

[RussianM3_dude]

I think high rev engines don't work too well in heavy cars. In an elise, sure. However even in an M5 it's beginning to be inadequate. I think Mercedes has the best compromise between having a revvy engines and having real world acceleration (i.e. low down in the rpm range.)

[rs4v8]

I have never done a 4.8 second 0-60 time in my RS4.

I think the fair thing to say is that, in traffic, in an automatic BMW 530 I can simply bury my right foot into the carpet coming off a roundabout and unless you always drive your V8 RS4 at the top 1/3rd of its power band, until I catch the car in front of me four seconds later the BMW is faster.

In those snap moments an RS6 will be devastating because it combines the speed of an automatic downshift with the low-down shove of forced induction.

A) Mine does this very frequently and I personally believe 4.8s is conservative, but you are right to suggest the mechanicals will suffer as a result of doing it the whole time.

B) Automatic 530 - unless you have spent a fair bit of cash fiddling with the suspension, tyres, brakes etc, my entry and exit speed at the roundabout will be much higher and I will have nailed it way before you due to the four wheel drive, very slow BMW traction / stability control and fundamentally better handling long before the BMW auto box has even decided which gear to be in

C) Likewise the RS6, fast it may well be, heavy it is also - roundabouts? I'll take the rs4....

[rs4v8]

Anyone noticed that this all started with Russian dude and now 10 pages on there is no sign of him???? One thing is for sure he really knows how to stir things up on here!!!!

I may not know my car facts as much as a lot of you on here but i do know one thing for sure IMHO i would pick my lovely new shinny RS4 over a Skoda any day!!! javascript:emoticon(':D')

Sure as S**t, he''ll be back

[SimonFV8]

SimonC - I am just trying to lighten the mood on here!! Funny I have had a few Mercs in my time an I will always remember pulling up to a customers in a C200 (what a dreadfull car) and being told 'you obviously earn to much so we are not paying your bill!!! Since owning Audi's (3rd one now) I NEVER have had that even with an A4 cab and with the RS4 people who dont know there Audi's just think 'its a nice estate car'

But whilst 99% of people on here LOVE the RS4 (me included) it all comes down to the most important thing of all - personal choice, Whilst my RS is not perfect (how I would love keyless entry to start with) for me and my family it is one hell of a car that we are very pleased with and it ticked more box's than anything else we looked at

[Contigo]

They just feel slower than other cars as has been said.

Mine had done 5k miles when I got rid and it definitely got quicker with the more miles. It's a really smooth power delivery and nothing like a modded b5 in it's brutality. I have had runs with B7's and B5's and there's very little in it with a modded B5 (420bhp) up against a standard B7.

[SimonC]

Let's all just agree that they're okay if you like that kind of thing, but that if you want real performance then the way forward is either;
- A hire car or
- A renault laguna

[rs4v8]

Cheers SimonFV8.
Try taking an RS4 onto a construction site then being told that you'll have to finance your new exhaust/cats because the warranty doesn't cover grounding. You would also tire of "we're obviously paying him too much". At the end of the working week I have halved my fuel spend, done a bit for the planet and still trundled along in the same stream of traffic. I can park it anywhere and not worry about it. It doesn't bother me to fill the footwells/wheelarches with mud, my enjoyment of the RS4 is enhanced by not driving it every day. I also know one thing for sure IMHO I would pick my lovely cheap, small, economical Skoda over an RS4 five days a week. And for me, for the way I drive 90% of the time, for the boxes I want to tick I still remained unconvinced that cubic capacity and high revs is a substitute for the way Audi spent 20-odd years propelling their best cars.

No-one is criticising the vrs (certainly not me), it really is a great wee car, and your 'horses for courses' comment I completely agree with. I use my car every day of the week though (when I'm home) and find it to be a great place to spend time. Can't comment on the forced induction audi bit too much as I've only had a wee spin in a friend's rs6 which I personally found to be as quick as my car but the auto box was not to my taste.

[Contigo]

Lol my last hire car was an M6 so you're right there!

[rs4v8]

Let's all just agree that they're okay if you like that kind of thing, but that if you want real performance then the way forward is either;
- A hire car or
- A renault laguna

or a plumbers van driven by a 17yo apprentice!!

[SimonC]

Let's all just agree that they're okay if you like that kind of thing, but that if you want real performance then the way forward is either;
- A hire car or
- A renault laguna

or a plumbers van driven by a 17yo apprentice!!

Or a taxi in a 30 zone

[W8PMC]

The guy could be genuine. He also has the right to be a tad offended (why the need to be so offensive about the Russian people?).
As many of you have pointed out, the V8 RS4 feels slower when new. The same is probably true of the new M3. Therefore one must make allowances for this, but there is a risk that the car won't loosen up as much as you hope it will.
Naturally to try and tell a load of RS4 owners (ie enthusiasts) that these cars are not very good is not likely to be well received. But surely there is some validity in what he is saying, and doesn't that warrant some intelligent and constructive discussion?

My experience of a admittedly brief (20 mile) test drive of a B7 RS4 was disappointing. It lacked the feeling of muscular strength in the way you had to rev it to make it accelerate hard. My concept of power is effortless shove. It reminded me of a test drive in an Accord Type R.

My conclusion was this: My old RS4 will still go like stink if you don't take it to the red line in every gear, even if you bodge every gearchange. I am probably a slightly above average driver and spend most of my time driving marginally faster than average and about 15% of the time properly pressing on. For me a B7 RS4 seems like it would be disappointing. I would like to be proved wrong as I will be looking for a used replacement eventually and have no idea what to buy. I honestly think an S4 is the way to go for me.

My daily driver is a Skoda Fabia VRS. It is not fast on paper but probably frequently disappoints drivers of performance cars by almost keeping up. The idea of a much faster car having to change to two gears lower than the one I'm in just to pull away seems a bit pointless.

Another observation I would make is that many lower performance cars seem to provide 90% acceleration on part throttle and therefore seem pretty quick until you want to overtake and you then realise that the next 2/3 of throttle input doesn't do much more.

Russian M3 Dude has made a valid point, he just didn't make it very well. Performance is very subjective and in physical terms torque is power and BHP is just the multiplication of torque. A V8 RS4 is not a fast car most of the time.

And if you ask me to nip out to my car and photograph my hand in front of the badge just to prove that I own one then I can't. We don't all park outside our front doors. Similarly, it is easy for me to simply state my nationality as British (though this is too often cause for slight embarrasment) but that doesn't mean that everyone has such a clear allegiance.

No intention of debating as some of what you say is more opinion than fact & a 20mile Test Drive is hardly enough to understand & exploit the car. Also for the record, i DO like BMW & Merc, so am not a pure Audi person. You do make some valid points though, but some of that will be car specific & in only 20miles it would be difficult to assess the better change points & engine characteristics etc.

That said, your point about gearing & other notes about acceleration are a tad off the mark, however i was not as blown away by the RS4 i test drove to compare with the one i own. But off the line & up to 120MPH, my RS4 will happily stick with a 996 Turbo & M5 (tried & tested many times), this does not make my car faster, but defo as capable.

The RS4 is not the best car in the world, but bang for buck & taking all the boxes into consideration, i don't see anything currenty to take it's crown, although for purist RWD folk the new M3 will be their best bet.

Each to their own of course & the RS4 is hardly likely to appeal to everyone, but having come from a DMS M5 & Sportec RS6, i can vouch for the RS4 being no slower than either of these cars anywhere & in certain conditions/road types (which is what i love) the RS4 is quicker. Mine however has now broken the 10K mile mark & has been re-mapped along with a Miltek cat-back fitted, so should be more fruitful than a stock demo car.

Paul, what you been smoking?

A Chipped RS4 B7 is no way quicker than a 996 TT or an M5 in a straight line to any speed let alone 120.

A std TT is 9.1 and tested to 8.9 to 100 and there are vids of M5's taking TT's in 1/4 mile stints, are you saying your RS4 B7 does 0-100 in 8.9 secs?

Not been smoking anything. I said stick with, not beat & this is real world.

At VMAX a few weeks back, i ran head to head with both cars i mention a few times & although both cars were stock (the DMS 996 Turbo i could not keep up with) their was no gap building when gunning it off the line. The E60 M5 in fact i got a slight jump on (he kept losing some traction off the line) & yet it was only heading north of 100MPH that the M5 was able to start gaining & then passed me at 140MPH. The 996 Turbo was better off the line, but we were pretty much side by side up to over 100MPH & then it started walking away to a 10MPH higher VMAX speed through the beams.

My point is that i don't for a moment think my car is faster than the 2 i mention, however it's not really slower & the take comes more down to reaction times & balls. I was hitting the redline (albeit the higher redline) in the 1st 3 gears & dropping the clutch at about 3-4K RPM to get the best possible start & this paid dividends.

I'd not expect to hound a 996 Turbo for long around a track, unless my track skill or knowledge was higher than the other drivers. That said i'd not be scared trying to play with one either.

The stock (mfctr) claims of 0-60 for the M5 IIRC are 4.7 & the same figure for the B7 RS4 Saloon, however even if theses are slightly out, you're only talking about a 0.1 or 0.2 second difference, so a better launch can easily elimanate any power advantage.

Given the choice though, i'd take a 997 Turbo all day long if i could find a spare £100K behind the sofa

[W8PMC]

Can agree with what SimonC is saying, but a loosened up & familiar B7 RS4 will no doubt be quicker everywhere than a 20mile blast in a new demo would indicate. I drive my car low in it's capabilities most of the time, but when i feel the urge i do drive it much closer to it's maximum potential (road & condition allowable).

As for the feeling of quicker, of course a forced induction car will feel quicker, my RS6 was well over 550 BHP & it felt like a monster, however the gearchange was sloppy & the handling very poor in stock form, although i improved it somewhat, courtesy of Sportec.

Ran up against Dace (Dave) at VMAX in his very sorted (modified) Misano B5 RS4 & off the line, my car was sometimes a tad quicker & sometimes on a par, but never beaten, however every time the B5 reached a higher VMAX speed as i could only break 172MPH & i think Dave managed a 178MPH. My guess is that's down to gearing more than anything, as my VMAX speeds were all in 5th gear, as i was only just reaching the limiter in 5th at 172MPH, but had another full long gear to play with if the runway had been 2miles longer:).

[rs4v8]

I think high rev engines don't work too well in heavy cars. In an elise, sure. However even in an M5 it's beginning to be inadequate. I think Mercedes has the best compromise between having a revvy engines and having real world acceleration (i.e. low down in the rpm range.)

Compared to what?!! Maybe that M3 test drive is not going to be worthwhile?

[t_urbo]

Paul was the tt and M5 towing anything?



The power gain on a 'loosened' up engine is only going to be small, surely the fact the car feels quicker with time is because it takes some time to adapt your driving habits/skills in line with the car you drive.