Driving my AUDI for 06 months, Here comes the Feedback!
Hope you all are doing good, Pandemic made our lives harder than before. Accept it and be safe as much as you can.
This is how it looked like when it is Imported & truly Virgin ( virgin in the sense, unregistered ) . Yes, then I registered it in SL Motor Traffic Authority. 🤫
She is 06 months old now. Have you watched my first ever car review? Just have a look. 😂
Why Germans over Japanese?
It is all about that it is in the luxurious category with high end premium quality. Yes it is. As per my personal experience,
- Driving Pleasure is really high when compared to most of the Japanese vehicles ( in my case, i compare it with my previous car; Toyota Prius which is a really good one ). Engine Horse Power and Toque is really high and you feel it when you push the gas paddle. It is worse ( here, term worse in the sense high pickup 😂 ), when you put it in the SPORT mode. Also, the Manual Shift mode gives you the feeling, “Okay bro, now you are in a Drag Race, make sure you shift at right time”. A1 Sportback got 7 gears to shift, So you really need some practice there. 😉
- Look. I personally like the look of Audis. Big Front panel with these four circles look really good. Sporty headlights make it even better. These are Xenon Automatic Headlights which comes with DRLs ( Daytime Running Lights), makes it more appealing. Headlight Washers are there too if you are looking for.
- Sound System. This is far better than Japanese ones. I swear. I do not know about new CH-R & RAIZE , but it is far ahead than the other Japanese ones.
- Options. Audis come with long list of options apart from the basic ones. This is natural with BMW,BENZ too. This is something i really like in German ones, it offers whole lot of options that Japanese ones never do until it hits 10–12 million price tag. You get some of these valuable options like, Automatic Windshield Wipers which adjust according to the rain, AUDI MMI ( multi-media interface ) with 20 GB internal Memory ( as far as i remember, it is 20G ), Automatic Engine start/stop, SPORT & MANUAL modes, Driver,Passenger and Curtain Air Bags, Side Air bags, 360^ Scanners for Collision Detection, Vehicle stability control system that you can manually on/off and etc…
Due to this pandemic, SL imports are banned and vehicle prices are touching the moon. I am pretty sure these prices won’t be going down in near future. If you are going to buy the sportback A1 which is the most cheapest one in AUDI family, 2019 A1 will cost you more than 6.5millions in Srilanka, Due to the taxes. Anyway, this is not the time to buy, because it will touch 7.0–7.5million ( 2019 A1 ) due to the pandemic.
Do i recommend Audi for my friend?
Why not? Yes of course. So i was talking about all the good about Sportback Audi A1. So, if you ask about anything negative?
- I would like to have FOG Lights and it is optional in this model. If you want to fit original fogs then you have to replace the whole front panel. So, i gave up.
- It will cost you around 25000–30000 lkr for full service. But the positive point is, Oil Change interval is 10000Kms which is not the case with Japanese ones ( in my Toyota Prius it was 5000Km and cost around 12000lkr at that time ) . So, this won’t be a big problem if you are planning to buy.
- I do not know about spare parts cost yet, since fortunately i didn’t get any issue yet. Let’s see, maybe in future i can comment on this more. As far as i know spare parts cost little higher than Japanese ones.
- I like to have Sun Roof in my car, Unfortunately that model is not in Srilanka. I saw in UK & GERMANY, there is a spec that has Sun Roof.
- I like to have more space in back seats, but it is limited since this is the sportback model. No space in back seats, like in Toyota Prius/Premio.
Overall, I am really satisfied with AUDIs. I really need to go for a Q2 in future. That is a feeling you get when you have driven a German model, you will love it for sure. But the pandemic made us to hold everything back.
