It’s a busy fall and I suspect things will only speed up before it all ends two months from now. This past week held lots of school work, a stats tutoring session hosted by me, the birth of a second niece and a one day race that included a new personal best lap time and my best finish of the year. More on those last two as soon I can get some proof online. In the meantime, lets take a look at the six month review of my newish car.
The Numbers Stuff
- Miles: 4400
- Hours: 133
- Average Speed: 33.1 mph
- Fuel Consumption: 22.2 mpg
- Time/Day: 44.6 minutes
- Distance/Day: 24.0 miles
The Bad Stuff
- The car is sprung way too high and soft. It’s not nearly as tight as my previous two cars (E36 M3 & B5 S4) and has a tendency to travel within the lane at highway speeds. I think the height also make it difficult to see where curbs are in parking lots. As soon as money is no object I’ll probably put a pair of STi Pinks on it lower it and stiffen it up a bit.
- The turning radius can be annoying at times. I still struggle swinging it into tight parking deck spaces at times and that shouldn’t happen after six months.
- I guess you could fault it for the fuel consumption. It gets 27 highway, 21 city… but since most of my driving is sitting at a light in the 4 miles to work, I ended up on the city side. I’m okay with 27 mpg highway (never really seen anything higher in my other cars) and if I wanted to save money of gas, I wouldn’t drive a 250 hp sedan.
- The windows are really slow. The driver’s side has auto-down, which helps, but I would have preferred they all be auto-up/down like the S4.
- The “next station” on the wheel mounted audio controls seeks instead of going to the next preset. As a result, I still have to use the radio mounted buttons to change station.
- There are no places to attach trunk tie downs. It’s got a big ass trunk so anything small is going to slide around a lot. Why they put them in the wagon and not the sedan, I’ll never understand.
The Good Stuff
- The engine is rated similar to my previous cars but surprises me at times. The car defaults to the “Sport” throttle map so I end up driving around in it most of the time. When I actually put it in “Sport Sharp” it’s like a brand new car… and a fast one at that. I’m sure it’s purely psychological but I’m okay with that.
- The OEM satellite radio and navigation systems work well. While luxuries, they’re part of the reason I chose the car I did… and I’m glad. The GPS is comprehensive enough to add value in getting me to the smallest points of interest and Sirius combined with an impressive set of speakers makes driving long distances less annoying. A six disc MP3 CD changer is a nice bonus for when I can’t find something to listen to.
- The onboard computer is the best I’ve had. Not only does it have all the stuff I’ve grown accustomed to (outside temp, distance to empty, trip computer), it also has other things I’ve grown to like (automatic trip timer, time on tank).
- The car can actually fit four adults and several suitcases comfortably. I don’t use it for this very often but it’s nice not to eat steering wheel when driving to lunch to carpooling somewhere.
- There are a lot of little things that work in the car: great cup holders, two power outlets, envelope holder on the visor, auto headlight shutoff, seat memory, etc.
Overall, I’m happy with the purchase. There are definitely things about the car I don’t like, but you’ll notice most of them are minor design flaws and not critical deal breakers. I like the car’s looks and get a lot of compliments from older “car guys” about the balance of sportiness, features and cost. It’s not going to win any awards with the younger crowd but it’s probably the perfect car for 30-something to daily drive. I’m too old for a boy racer-mobile and too young for a midlife crisis car so it fits.