We desperately want to know how the Audi e-tron measures up against a base Tesla in an acceleration test. There's only one drag race featuring Audi's first EV out there, and it's pretty bad. So instead, we decided to share an independent acceleration test.
AutoTopNL is one of the best European channels for that, while the supply of e-trons in America seems pretty tight right now. Of course, they used an unrestricted section of the famous high-speed road network to ensure everything is legal.
There's going to be more than one version of the e-tron quattro SUV, but the 55 is the first one to come out. This number indicates how much power the car produces, which places this in the same category as a 3.0 TFSI model like the Q8 55 TFSI.
In its regular driving mode, the two electric motors produce 265 KW and 560 Nm of torque. However, for short bursts, it has 300 KW or 408 HP plus 664 Nm of torque. The official acceleration number is 0 to 100 km/h in 5.7 seconds and in independent tests, it does this in 5.56 seconds. It also reaches a top speed of 201 km/h, one more than officially claimed.
Now, we're not saying that it's blisteringly fast, just establishing that it's not an underperformer. We've seen the Q8 do worse than claimed in these kinds of tests. The 95 kWh battery weighs about 700 kilos, but overall weight is still "only" about 2.4 metric tons.
Costing from €80,000 in Germany and measuring 4.9 meters long, this SUV can be an alternative to the Q7 you were originally looking to buy. The 36-cell battery comes with a 9.6-kW charging system. 11- and 22-kW charging is also possible, and DC fast charging can take the battery from zero to 80 percent in 30 minutes at 150 kW.
This year, Audi will reveal the Sportback version of the e-tron SUV, followed by a sedan in 2020.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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