When? The diesel version, called TDI, went on sale in April.What? Diesel-engine version of the brand's large, four-door, seven-passenger crossover SUV.If that sort of thing is more important to you than sheer utility, or ultimate value, Q7 TDI could scratch a deep itch. The Q7 TDI comes with very large Brembo-brand disc brakes and sophisticated aluminum suspension components, for instance - the type of hardware you'd favor if driving on the no-speed-limit autobahn. If you're practical, and not smitten by luxury brand names, consider that plenty of mainstream SUVs give you as much or more room for people and cargo, are handier in daily life, don't use much more fuel and are priced far lower.Īudi's more than a name, though. You have to push a button on the gate to lower it. You can power it up remotely from the key fob, but not down. Midteens not much better than some gasoline SUVs and worse than the 19-20 mpg of the (now discontinued) 2009 Chrysler Aspen and Dodge Durango full-size hybrid SUVs. Another hint: It's identified by a symbol that's meaningless unless you already know what it means.
Mundane tasks such as tuning the stereo and adjusting the wipers were annoyingly complex. Getting into the Q's third-row seats is via a narrow aisle usable only by the nimble or the skinny. TDI looks very much like the gasoline versions that have been on the road three years, but the test vehicle still got a remarkable number of appreciative scans by other motorists, even in neighborhoods where Q7's are commonplace. Reasonable people often disagree on matters of taste, though. As they say in showbiz, don't go changin'. It would be news if an Audi were otherwise nowadays. Generally well-drawn and elegantly executed. Controls operated with the ease and feel expected in a luxury vehicle. It had a manual-shift mode, but in a low-revving diesel, that's borderline irrelevant. The automatic transmission shifted commendably up or down under any circumstances. The test vehicle moved smartly off the line from a dead stop, and once the turbo kicked in fully (all passenger diesels are turbocharged nowadays), it hurtled relentlessly. Diesels have the low-speed torque that appeals to Americans because of our slug-and-chug driving conditions. They will also use the latest version of Audi's Quattro all-wheel-drive system. Power for all initial examples comes from the latest version of Audi's 4.2-liter V-8, with a model featuring a new 3.6-liter V-6 to debut later in the year. The Q7 is longer and considerably more spacious inside, with standard seating for seven in three rows. Parts commonality is 15 percent, mostly in suspension pieces. Contrary to expectations, it is not merely a stretched version of the Volkswagen Touareg. As Audi CEO Johan de Nysschen said during the recent Q7 press launch in San Diego, California, it is "the most important new model launch in the history of Audi in North America."Īudi considers the Q7 to be a third-generation performance-luxury SUV, with truck-based models making up the first generation and car-based crossovers the second. Even if SUV sales have flattened out, they still represent a significant portion of the American automotive market, and the Q7 was designed with American sales first in mind. Aren't SUVs supposed to be dead? With the introduction of the 2007 Audi Q7, the company's first SUV, Audi is betting that they're not.
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