After 40,000 Miles Does An Audi A4 Still Maintain That Old Black Magic?

A 2009 Audi A4 slipped quietly into our long-term fleet in fall of that year, with subdued styling, meager power, and a fairly high as-tested price. Forgive us if our expectations were low: In 1996, the first A4 was separated at birth from the VW Passat, and this hardly looked different—turbocharged VW Group engine, front-drive foundation, spectacular fit and finish laid over a nagging sense of impending mechanical doom. We shouldn’t have underestimated it.

Our long-term A4 began to seduce us the moment it dove into its first freeway on-ramp, and the charm offensive didn’t let up for 40,000 miles. Four iterations in, the A4 has evolved into a luxury sports sedan with real space, poise, and efficiency, a legitimate competitor to rear-drive standard-bearers such as the BMW 3-series and Infiniti G37.



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sstainba2 - 1/4/2011 12:24:04 PM

+2 Boost

i disagree... as the owner of a 2009 a4 2.0 S-line... it lost most of the appeal after about 10k miles. that was about the time i ended up with a lake in my floor boards because water was leaking through the firewall into the a/c system and travelling to my back-seat area. the engine needs more power and should be a bit higher-revving. i like the alcantera seat inserts, but the rest of the interior is so-so. it's very flat and plain in contrast to the more sculpted and driver-tilted (oriented) interior of the bmw. i'm trading it in within the next 3 months.

upwards - 1/4/2011 8:36:38 PM

+3 Boost

did it ever have magic?

tattedtwice - 1/5/2011 1:24:39 AM

0 Boost

How anyone could drop soooo much good money on a car with a rough-idling, loud, unrefined FOUR BANGER is beyond me. Especially when it's wrapped in such an odd-looking package.