2017 Audi Allroad

Started by MiniDave, August 29, 2024, 08:19:52 AM

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MiniDave

Yes, we did it again.....

This time we traded in the black 2014 Allroad. According to what I've read and heard these cars (2013 & 2014 B8) are supposedly a grenade with the pin pulled after 80K miles. Ours has been trouble free but had 80,660 miles on it and we didn't know if we were about to have a problem or not. The bride found this one at the local Mercedes dealer - one owner and 25K miles on it. The "B9" generation do not have the same reputation - I checked with everyone I know and they seem to be pretty bulletproof - as much as any German car can be - but our hope is that with the low miles on the car and the few miles we drive per year we'll get a lot of service out of both of these cars.

The 2017 and 2018 we bought are equipped exactly the same with just two small differences - the 2017 has the arches painted in body color (A $1000 option only available on three body colors) and it has "sports" seats, that have a small amount more bolstering and extendable thigh support. Other than that I can't find any difference in them, and they both drive like new cars even tho 6 & 7 years old. The interiors are almost the same, both have grey seats, but the white 2017 has a black headliner.

The bride isn't really a fan of the white car or it's mostly black interior, so she'll take the silver one and I'll drive the white one.

I've driven Audis since the 70's and always had pretty good luck with them and I figure these may be the last cars we buy since we're getting up there in age, and tend to keep our cars a fairly long time (my 2009 MINI Clubby for 15 years, her 2004 Audi Allroad for 16 years and so on)

We bought the black one right at the start of the pandemic (July 2020) with 68K on it so we only drove it about 12K in the time we had it, including several trips to North Carolina, Colorado and our yearly drive to Manhattan for Thanksgiving and as I said it's been trouble free - so much so that the dealer already has it for sale on his lot. I'll be curious to see how long it lasts there as they have it priced higher than what we paid for it 4 years ago!

Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

94touring

Ok now figure out the hitch and tow lights!

MiniDave

#2
Not sure I'm going to put a hitch on the white one, since I already have it on the silver one and I can just use that when I need to tow the green Mini. I do need to sort out the tow lights tho.....

If I decide to do a hitch on the white car, I'll put on a 2" instead of the 1 1/4" that's on the silver car. That one's fine for towing the Mini or even my old trailer,, but if I want to haul a car on a trailer (like Clancy's lightweight one) I'll need a heavier rated one - this 1 1/4 is good for 2000lbs, but the car is rated for 3500lbs. Clancy's trailer is about 800, add a 1500lb car and I'm still good to go.

The only issue is the heavier rated hitches are 3 times the money of the one I put on the silver car, plus I need to do the lights again and that unit was another $200 - so all in about $750. I'm pretty maxed out on spending money for a while.....
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

MiniDave

#3
So it's been decided, she has taken the 2018 silver as her car and I'll take the 2017 white one. She prefers the std seats and the lighter interior and has moved all her crap into it (to me women seem to treat their car like an extra big purse - she carries everything in it!) She also has it set up for the Pups, with sheep skins for them to lay on and harness clips to restrain them in the event of a crash.

So, today I took the white one to get the tires balanced - the only thing I could find that it needed,  and investigated what it would cost to get a second key as they delivered it to me with only one - holy crap! $900 for a key and it only can come from the factory - can't buy an ebay special and have it re-programmed!

To their credit they've contacted the previous owner who says the extra key may be at their other home in California, and they're checking to see if it's there. Sheesh!

I'm going to hold off on buying a hitch at this point till I see if I have to buy an expensive key first.

The dealer also had this emergency kit for the car that I picked up today - no idea what one of these costs. It has jumper cables, a multi tool, gloves, emergency triangles, and even a poncho in case you have to change a tire in the rain!

Edit - found it on Audi's website - $85 from the dealer.

Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

MiniDave

#4
I've put about 400 miles on the white Audi the last two days running back and forth to Prather's....so far so good. No issues of any kind, tho I did get a bit of a surprise when a guy braked suddenly in front of me and turned a corner - the car put up a red warning triangle and LOUD alarm right in the middle of the cluster - apparently it's part of the driver safety package. Scared the crap out of me, cause a red warning symbol usually means fatal engine damage or something.

I also got the tires balanced and it's smooth as it can be now.

Got an unhappy phone call from the dealer on Thursday saying that my check had been returned from the bank! I went to them and got a cashier's check to replace the personal one I wrote and Monday me and the bank are going to have a "conversation" about it. It was the right account and there was more than sufficient funds to cover it.

BTW, we've named the two Audis Hans and Frans    :grin:
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

94touring


MiniDave

So the white Allroad has been trouble free so far, the fuel mileage is very good, I'm averaging in the low 30's including town driving so overall I'm pretty happy with it.

Still no joy on the key - the folks who traded it in have a home in Palm Springs - which is where this car lived - and I'm betting the extra key is there, sitting on a desk or something and they just haven't been back out there. I'm not hopeful that they're going to spend any effort finding and returning the key.

However, I'm not ready to spend $900 on one either......I'll just have to make damn sure I don't lose this one or I'm in deep shit!
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

MiniDave

Having put some miles on both of my "new" Allroads a few interesting things have come to light....

The first is the fuel mileage is even better than expected, I drove to Hallet for the Mini CanAm race and got mid 30's, driving down to Ozarks last weekend proved that wasn't a fluke as it showed 35.3 for that leg. Coming home was against a stiff wind, so it dropped a bit to 33.9, but still really good for a 3800lb car. Shows what progress has been made in aero and fuel efficient turbo motors and gearboxes.

On the not so great side, I'm finding the start/stop feature has its good and bad sides.

I supposed it contributes to better fuel mileage in town, but the required extra big (and heavier and I'm sure - expensive) battery and wear and tear on the starter motor make me wonder if it's really worth it. You don't feel it shut off a lot of times, but I always feel it start up again as you get a little shake as it cranks up. The real downside to me is that sometimes it chooses the wrong time to do it - I was pulling out of a driveway onto a very busy street and right when I was about to go the engine stopped, of course it fired right back up again (it starts when you let up on the brake pedal) but that delay and the delay in getting going with cars coming at me at 50 mph was disconcerting to say the least. You can shut the feature off by pressing a button, but you have to do that every time you start the car.....as far as I know, no one has found a way around it in the software.

The other thing is the frequency that it does it. If I'm in town it might do it every time I stop, whether for a stoplight, stop sign or whatever and I get tired of it. Of course the solution is right there on the dash, but that's what it's for, right? At longer lights I can see the advantage, but when it's restarting only moments after it shuts off, I dunno......

What I find I'm doing is shutting the feature off in heavy stop and go situations, out in the suburbs where the stop lights are further apart I leave it engaged.

The navigation has a speak and spell feature, but I haven't found it particularly good - it had no idea what or where Hallet, Oklahoma was and also no idea where/what Ozarks international was (OK, there's an excuse for that - it's didn't exist in 2017) but it also couldn't find the town of Lauri, Mo. So I reserve judgement for now - Rose says she thinks Audi will do one free update on it as it's never been done in the history of the car even tho it's well out of warranty.

I'm still learning how to do all sorts of things with it, but I really like the lighting features, there's a little LED in each of the outside door handles for instance, and to turn on one of the interior spot or reading lights you just touch it, then touch it again to turn it off - cool!

Rose has the 2018 set up to her liking, and even found a way to keep the grocery bags in place when she goes shopping - she also really likes the kick feature to open and close the tailgate.

I still think the 20-teens cars represent a good value in terms of technology without being over the top like some of the newest cars are, and for reasonably depreciated prices.
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

BruceK

I just spent two weeks driving a new Audi Q8 in New England on vacation with my wife and her sister and her husband. It was their car, only a couple of months old and with just 4K miles. They drove up from Florida, we flew there,  and I took over driving duties for the couple of weeks when we were traveling together in New England. 

The Q8 had the start/stop feature and by the 3rd day I had trained myself to immediately turn it off as soon as I started the car. I can't stand that in any car. Whatever gas savings it supposedly generates is more than certainly overshadowed by increased engine wear because of the unnecessary starts and extra duty cycles on the starter. Not to mention the safety aspect as you found out. It's a bad gimmick.
1988 Austin Mini 
2002 MINI Cooper S
1997 Land Cruiser Prado RX (JDM)
2014 Toyota Tacoma

MiniDave

#9
What did you think of the Q8? I think all the SUV things are just too big and clunky, tho I know they've made huge progress in making them ride and drive well.

Me, I'll stick with my wagons TYVM.

I also just reach for the "shut it off" button when I start up, then I don't even have to think about it again. At the fuel mileage the car is getting - and compared to our 2004 and its mid teens mileage - I'm ok with sacrificing a tenth or two around town.

Oh, and our 2014 is still on the dealer's lot, they've dropped the price several times but I still think they're reaching for the moon with it.......right now it's still priced higher than what we paid for it 4 years ago! They originally had it priced at $19,500!

https://www.aristocratmotors.com/inventory/used-2014-audi-allroad-2-0t-premium-plus-quattro-4d-wagon-wa1ufafl8ea097676/

There were a few things I liked better about the 2014 - I liked the wood on the dash and doors (I like the silver metal dash on the 2018 even better - I looked it up and I can get those pieces for only $2K!), I liked the 8 speed automatic even tho it's probably not as efficient as the 7 speed stick in the 2017, and I had just spent $1000 on new tires for it, and I'm going to have to do the same on the 2017 as these tires are original to the car and while they have a ton of tread left they're already 8 years old.

The nav and interface on the new cars is an improvement, and both the new ones have a far better stereo/sound system.

I can't say I can find any real difference in the ride/drive quality, and although the new ones have the adjustable shock settings, most of the time I just leave it in "auto" tho I did play with it on the last two trips I took just for fun, but usually wound up with it back in the auto setting again.
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

94touring

Funny how we all loathe that stop start feature.

Brit_in_TX

The stop start feature in general does not bother me.  I have had multiple cars with it (the feature has been in Europe for over a decade). Never had an issue with a starter or additional engine wear.  The only car I have with it now is a 2024 Honda Odyssey, and it does not bother me in general driving.  What really infuriates me is when you have come to stop, press the Park button (as it is buttons rather than a shifter) it starts the freaking engine!

BruceK

#12
Quote from: MiniDave on October 25, 2024, 07:52:10 AMWhat did you think of the Q8? I think all the SUV things are just too big and clunky, tho I know they've made huge progress in making them ride and drive well.

Me, I'll stick with my wagons TYVM.



I'm not a fan of the Q8.  Seemed to have "tech" features just for the sake of justifying the big markup over the sister VW Atlas. It drove nice and refined, but it was fitted with absurdly wide tires, which tram-lined badly when given a chance.

In my opinion, piano black should be banned forever on any car interior. It's awful. Just a perfect way to collect fingerprints and smears.  And the Q8 was loaded with piano black all over the dash and center counsole.  Nearly all switches on the dashboard were goofy haptic switches set in a piano black expanse.  Plus the piano black plastic feature extended all the way across to the passenger side of the dash and caused stray reflections to bounce into the driver's eye (mine!).

My sister-in-law and her husband preferred to use Audi's native navigation system rather than Android Auto or Apple CarPlay.  And since I was driving their car as a guest, I stuck with that system.  For some reason, Audi thinks that Google Earth view (the satellite images where you see houses and plowed fields and parks and parking lots) is preferable to a regular map view, So that's what I navigated with. At least the Q8 had a nice feature where the navigation could also be displayed on the screen right in front of the driver with a minimized speedometer and tachometer.  Maybe it was just a setting and a map view could replace that.
1988 Austin Mini 
2002 MINI Cooper S
1997 Land Cruiser Prado RX (JDM)
2014 Toyota Tacoma

MiniDave

#13
I think it's just a setting on the map.....quite a disparity in temp settings there, Bruce!

The touch screens are why we bought the years of cars that we did, we really didn't like trying to manipulate those - it's very distracting. Ours are the generation just before that so we have actual buttons. One thing I do like about the switch gear on my car is if you just touch the buttons without activating them it shows you the options that button controls - for example if you just touch the fan speed, it puts up a graphic showing what speed it's on and what other speeds are available. It's pretty cool actually.

If you input a destination into the map, as you get to the next instruction it will pop it up in the cluster, then as you pass that it goes back to the regular instrument display.

Like Craig I've gotten used to the start/stop, so most of the time I just leave it alone, and if I'm doing a lot of stop and go I reach down and hit the button to disable it.

My silver car has a textured silver dash that I really like, the white one has this charcoal colored wood which I really don't care much for, but as it has a matte finish I don't pay much attention to it.
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

BruceK

So you could read the temperature settings through all the smudges!?  :grin:

Yeah, who knew that cars having dual climate control would really allow some people to put their freak on?  The outside temperature was a windy 45 degrees, we were stopping often to take  scenic photos outside, and my front seat passenger was from balmy Florida so...

1988 Austin Mini 
2002 MINI Cooper S
1997 Land Cruiser Prado RX (JDM)
2014 Toyota Tacoma

Brit_in_TX

The move away from physical buttons is so annoying.  I have noticed that in some cars they have shifted back to having more physical buttons rather than just the software ones. 

My in-laws have just got a 2025 GMC 2500 and it has a combination of physical buttons and software ones - which was very important to them. It also has Google Maps built in rather than using some proprietary option that gets out of date. 

MiniDave

Yes, there was a lot of pushback from customers on the no buttons approach - people don't like it and it's very distracting to have to scroll thru several sub-menus to try and find a control you're looking for.....even worse trying to do that while you drive!

In my Audis, the panel is only a display.....

Maybe once they get voice recognition to actually work they can go to fewer buttons but for me, I'll stick with what I know works.
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

MiniDave

So I drove the white 2017 to Phoenix and back a couple of weeks ago and found a few things.....familiarity really helps with functionality. I got to where the nav system worked flawlessly, getting me where I wanted to go and on the route I wanted to drive.....and it got to where it could understand my spoken commands. Unlike a Garmin tho it doesn't have a variety of voices I can choose from. I also found that if I put the transmission in "S", all the start stop malarkey stopped, and in this cold weather it holds the lower gears which makes the heater work better.....we're talking running at around 2K instead of 12-1400 rpm.

The drive out and back was uneventful - I set the cruise at 82 (real speed 80-81) and averaged right at 35 going out - 33.8 coming back, I'm guessing the extra cold weather on the trip home is what cut the mileage. I woke up in Tucumcari on the leg home to 3" of snow on the car! It was very dry fluffy stuff so as soon as I hit the road it all blew off the car.....I had planned to stop off in Tulsa at Dan's shop and then overnight in Bartlesville, but I got there earlier than expected, so I went ahead and did the rest of the drive home - the roads were all clear till I got to about 50 miles south of KC - they had gotten 12-14" of snow over 1/4" of ice while I was gone - and about Paola things started getting "interesting"......I was on a 4 lane road and the right lane was clear and dry, but the left lane was full of black ice and the occasional patch that was scraped but still snow packed. I hit one of those patches while trying to pass a slow moving semi-truck......it was exciting, but the Audi handled it and I got around OK. My neighborhood had not been scraped yet, so again Quattro drive made easy work of it. 12 hours behind the wheel and tho I was tired, I wasn't beat up and my back didn't hurt.....these are really good road trip cars!

The kid's wedding was held way out in the country and the nav did great at finding the air B&B they rented for the weekend, they had a big party there the night before and another after the wedding! It was in a gated community and since I left at about 11 pm and it was oh so dark out there in the desert, the nav was the only way I could find my way back out! It did try and get me to take what I'm sure it reasoned was a short cut, but I preferred to just stay on the highway.

I think the wedding was huge success, it went off without a hitch and everyone seemed to have a really good time...events started at 3 pm and by 10 or so the music was pumping, and being an old fogey I headed home! They had to clear out of the event venue by 11 and went back to the B&B and partied all night long till they had to be out of the B&B at 10 the next morning.

I hauled a ton of "stuff" out to my boy's.....some really high end stereo equipment that I haven't used since I moved to KC that he wanted, and a whole bunch of car stuff - he has a nice waiting room in his shop with books shelves and displays so he has places to put stuff - I also took a ton of car books, tho I doubt he has time to read anymore.

A couple of pics from the trip.....first pic - going across southern Kansas in the winter
2nd pic - yes, that is a 959 driving nonchalantly up Scottsdale blvd! Behind it was a GT2RS Weissach, also just driving along....a few seconds later an Aston Martin went by at warp speed....no question Scottsdale is a car town! I saw so many high end cars.....and those goofy looking Waymos with the little lidars spinning around were everywhere!

Next is the B&B they rented for the weekend.....10,000 sq ft of party house, with a pool, two hot tubs, a pickleball court, basketball courts, tiki bar, cornhole boards, you name it - there was plenty to do.

And lastly, the happy couple!

Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

MiniDave

#18
So, I had an interesting thing happen with the Audi the other night....I drove up to Prather's in Wakarusa for "shop night", which is just a big BS session amongst a bunch of old racing buddies - and I do mean old!  :grin:

At any rate, when I went to leave we got in the car and it wouldn't do anything - this is one of those cars with the remote key, you don't insert it into a pod or anything, you just have it in your pocket or somewhere in the car - I got a message on the dash that said to hold the key in the appropriate spot to reset it, and consult the manual for the correct spot. Which I did, there were 5 pages on how the key worked and what all it could do but not one damn thing about the issue I was having!

This was the extra key we had finally gotten from the previous owners - I had put a new battery in it and had been using it for a few days with no issues.

Finally I used the end of the key to push the start/stop button and everything came back to life and the car started right up!

Edit: there is an actual key hidden inside the Fob, I took it out and used it to lock and unlock the car again - but it didn't do anything to fix the start issue.

I have not yet found anything online or in the forums to explain what happened or where the "right" spot is.....I assume the key somehow came out of sync with the car, and holding it there (or somewhere) re-syncs the key. I guess my next move is to drop by the dealer and see if they know what happened. It's a pretty scary feeling to be hundreds of miles from home and your car just ignores you!

How I pine for the old days of a key you stuck in a lock and turned to start the car!
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

94touring

These new cars are as finicky as a woman. Have to find the cars G spot now to be able to drive.

MiniDave

Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

MiniDave

#21
Oh, and Rose checked, our black 2014 trade-in is still on their lot - and the price is still pretty silly......they're asking more for it than we paid 4 years ago, and now it has about 13K more miles on it, tho it was in pristine shape when we traded it.....the interior looked like new, everything worked, not a dent, ding or scratch on it anywhere.

I'm surprised they haven't adjusted the price to the market, they have plenty of headroom based on what they gave us for it....they have dropped it to $16,500 from the absurd $19,500 they started at.
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers

Red Riley

Just FYI, Batteries Plus does the key fob reprogramming at a lot less than the dealer if/when you need to get a new key done. They have some replacements but I don't know about Audi. I got fobs for my Prius and my Ram truck from this place.  https://www.keylessentryremotefob.com  They are pretty legit, and they give you options of either knock off replacements or OEM. The ones I got from them programmed and work fine.

MiniDave

Yes, I checked with several places and they all had the same answer - Audi fobs must be done at the dealer, no ifs, ands or butts.

This one worked just fine the first three days after I changed the battery, but it doesn't work at all now. Maybe the battery wasn't any good? I'll try another 2032 and see if it works any better......
Complete failure at retirement - but getting better!

1972 Mini Racing Green
1972 Mini ST hotrod
2017 Audi Allroad - Glacier White - His
2018 Audi Allroad - Floret Silver - Hers