kismetcapitan
December 27th, 2012, 03:31
just enjoyed a lovely Christmas adventure with my wife and the RS6, and what a testament to how close this car is to being a do-it-all-and-more car!
sedate highway cruising.
we were only able to get two out of three nights booked at a casino hotel in North Carolina, so the car pulled camper duty again in a phenomenally scenic Smoky Mountains location.
heavy rain and near-zero visibility kept the Cherohala from being truly fun, but no fog and intermittent sprinkles allowed the RS6 to have a ball on the Tail of the Dragon. I'll be back with my bike of course come springtime, but damned if that wasn't the best 11 miles I've ever driven in my life! Despite a completely wet road surface, the RS6 still managed to pull hard Gs in all of these hairpins, and what I really found delightful was how unexpectedly quick the car was in fast transitions. I shifted manually, keeping the car in 2nd and 3rd the entire time.
The car still weighs two tons however, and with corner entry speeds as fast as I dared with a passenger on board, I used 2nd to engine brake as much as I could. I still cooked the brakes; no fade at all, but the rotors were so hot that I could feel a wave of sauna-like heat just from taking a close look at them. 2nd gear also started to whine as if it were a straight-cut race transmission, and I smelled ATF (I think? Might have just been baked brake pads?) after the run...hope that wasn't anything permanent, and on the drive back home it all went away as the car cooled. My wife threw up at the end of the Dragon...oops :(
we hit snow west of Knoxville on the way back, and it didn't slow the car down at all. I often forget that non-Audis struggle in snow; it's barely any different than heavy rain for the Silver Bullet :)
Perfect road trip car in luxury and comfort (minus the rock-hard suspension, which isn't a problem on most interstates anyways). A spirited run on the Dragon. A romantic night in the mountains...sleeping in a car sounds so, well neither romantic nor luxurious, but we've gotten the system down to a T, and how many hotel rooms are completely covered in leather and alcantara? :P Then safely home, where it was either raining or snowing the entire time, with extremely fierce winds to boot.
My wife has forbidden me from ever selling this car (I was thinking of buying a USA-legal Nissan Skyline GT-R as I do miss my old one). I've found that the RS6 isn't particularly good at autocross. But other than that, I'm really hard pressed to think of anything it CAN'T do!!
sedate highway cruising.
we were only able to get two out of three nights booked at a casino hotel in North Carolina, so the car pulled camper duty again in a phenomenally scenic Smoky Mountains location.
heavy rain and near-zero visibility kept the Cherohala from being truly fun, but no fog and intermittent sprinkles allowed the RS6 to have a ball on the Tail of the Dragon. I'll be back with my bike of course come springtime, but damned if that wasn't the best 11 miles I've ever driven in my life! Despite a completely wet road surface, the RS6 still managed to pull hard Gs in all of these hairpins, and what I really found delightful was how unexpectedly quick the car was in fast transitions. I shifted manually, keeping the car in 2nd and 3rd the entire time.
The car still weighs two tons however, and with corner entry speeds as fast as I dared with a passenger on board, I used 2nd to engine brake as much as I could. I still cooked the brakes; no fade at all, but the rotors were so hot that I could feel a wave of sauna-like heat just from taking a close look at them. 2nd gear also started to whine as if it were a straight-cut race transmission, and I smelled ATF (I think? Might have just been baked brake pads?) after the run...hope that wasn't anything permanent, and on the drive back home it all went away as the car cooled. My wife threw up at the end of the Dragon...oops :(
we hit snow west of Knoxville on the way back, and it didn't slow the car down at all. I often forget that non-Audis struggle in snow; it's barely any different than heavy rain for the Silver Bullet :)
Perfect road trip car in luxury and comfort (minus the rock-hard suspension, which isn't a problem on most interstates anyways). A spirited run on the Dragon. A romantic night in the mountains...sleeping in a car sounds so, well neither romantic nor luxurious, but we've gotten the system down to a T, and how many hotel rooms are completely covered in leather and alcantara? :P Then safely home, where it was either raining or snowing the entire time, with extremely fierce winds to boot.
My wife has forbidden me from ever selling this car (I was thinking of buying a USA-legal Nissan Skyline GT-R as I do miss my old one). I've found that the RS6 isn't particularly good at autocross. But other than that, I'm really hard pressed to think of anything it CAN'T do!!