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My previous car was a 2011 Audi Q7 Prestige TDI. Accordingly, while I had absolutely no intentions of replacing it, the buy-back offer from Audi was not something I could pass up. This also allowed me to go all out and order it (almost) completely loaded.
Options:
· Prestige package
· Ink Blue Paint
· Gray with Black Walnut inlays
· Driver Assistance
· Luxury
· Adaptive Chassis
· Cold Weather
· Night Vision Assistant
· Black Alcantara Headliner
· Running Boards
· Audi Beam on all doors
This was ordered in June and arrived the last week in August in Rhode Island; then at my dealer in Devon PA in mid-September. The wait from RI to PA was due to a random QA check on the batch of Q7s that arrived. I was told (and got in writing) there was absolutely nothing wrong with my Q7.
Impressions
What a gorgeous looking SUV! It sits lower than my 2011. The lines are nicer than my 2011. The interior is stunning and surprisingly quiet compared to my 2011 and my wife’s 2015 A4. The ride is what I have come to expect from Audi and this did not disappoint.
Driving at the moment is limited to short trips around the area. My office is 5 miles from my home, and the shore is a 100-mile trip one way. That said, it will go back to RI (family) around Thanksgiving and then to Florida (more family) around Christmas. At which point, we will get a really good feel for its performance on a long trip.
Coming from a TDI, my initial impression was the engine seemed sluggish off the line. I have since played with drive select and set Individual to Auto and Sport depending on the attribute. This has improved performance off the line and I feel confident when merging and driving in our aggressive traffic.
Driver Assistance
The first thing that hit me was active lane assist. By default it is set to Early. I left it there to see what it does, but I turned off the steering wheel vibration. It does keep you in the lane, to the point you can let the wheel go, however after about 20 seconds it will sound an alarm for you to take back control. On highways, this is fine, however on backroads where it can lose sight of the lines, it may not keep you on the road. After playing with it and going back and forth between Early and Late corrections, I have settled on Late, although Early is perfectly fine for extended, well-marked highway driving.
Adaptive Cruise Control is interesting. As expected, it keeps your speed until you encounter a slower vehicle, at which point it will match their speed. Depending on the conditions (minimal traffic), this will be gradual and can go unnoticed if the speed is close to your set speed. However, if it is a distinct drop in speed or traffic, it will brake quite abruptly. Another reason for sudden braking is if it sees a drop in the posted speed limit. Regardless of how much over the speed limit you are going (75 in a 65) if it sees a drop, it will brake and reset your cruise speed to match the new speed limit. This is about the only feature I do not like. I was on the AC Expressway heading back to PA and was doing 75 in a 65. It somehow read a 35 sign and applied the brakes accordingly to slow me down. I stepped on the accelerator and got back up to speed without incident, but had it been in heavier traffic, that could have ended differently. I have yet to try traffic assist since I am not quite sure how to engage it, and I would rather not hit someone should I not engage it properly.
Luxury
All I need to say here is, massage seats. My justification for getting the 10 year / 100K warranty was in case we burn these out from overuse. The feel great, easy to set up and coupled with heated seats, these are awesome, especially after a hockey game. The Valcona leather is well worth the upgrade from the standard leather. The Alcantara headliner looks awesome and makes the interior stand out from all other vehicles.
Adaptive Chassis
I had the air suspension in my 2011 Q7. So, the big addition here for me is the 4-wheel steering. I am already proficient at parallel parking; however, the 4-wheel steering makes a huge difference. Also, the alley at the shore is quite tight with all the cars. My 2011 had to be positioned just right to make it into my driveway, however the 4-wheel steering makes it much easier and I do not need to concern myself with positioning.
Night Vision
I live in Southeastern PA. Between the deer, runners/joggers, dog walkers and kids, the night vision option was a no-brainer for me. My only complaint is the camera angle could be wider to detect more objects on the side of the road. When a deer is detected, an alert shows up in the HUD along with a beep. In the instance I am thinking of, it was a very wooded area and the deer was behind a tree. It was on a cure ahead of me, so I was pointing directly at it upon detection. It was dark and without the NVA, I would have never seen it. It stayed put and never presented a danger, however knowing it was lurking made me slow up in case it decided to jump out. That experience alone reassured me this is a great option to have.
Miscellaneous
The soft-close doors are a nice feature; however, I end up yelling at my passengers for slamming their doors. I have also noticed when I get in my wife’s A4, the door does not close all the way since I didn’t close it hard enough.
The running boards look great, but were not as needed as they were with my 2011 Q7. The adaptive chassis now sits the vehicle lower, thus do not always require a running board. That said, I do have seniors and vertically challenged members of my family who appreciate them.
The bird’s eye camera view is perfect for maneuvering into tight spaces. My father dove it and fell in love with that feature alone. He typically does not like to drive anyone else’s vehicles, but had absolutely no problem taking the Q7 for a spin. Audi beam is a cool effect and looks awesome. I opted for the rings on the front and quatro in the rear.
Ultimately, I am very happy with my purchase and look forward to many years driving in luxury and technology. This is a great vehicle and I recommend it to anyone who is looking for a luxury SUV.
My previous car was a 2011 Audi Q7 Prestige TDI. Accordingly, while I had absolutely no intentions of replacing it, the buy-back offer from Audi was not something I could pass up. This also allowed me to go all out and order it (almost) completely loaded.
Options:
· Prestige package
· Ink Blue Paint
· Gray with Black Walnut inlays
· Driver Assistance
· Luxury
· Adaptive Chassis
· Cold Weather
· Night Vision Assistant
· Black Alcantara Headliner
· Running Boards
· Audi Beam on all doors
This was ordered in June and arrived the last week in August in Rhode Island; then at my dealer in Devon PA in mid-September. The wait from RI to PA was due to a random QA check on the batch of Q7s that arrived. I was told (and got in writing) there was absolutely nothing wrong with my Q7.
Impressions
What a gorgeous looking SUV! It sits lower than my 2011. The lines are nicer than my 2011. The interior is stunning and surprisingly quiet compared to my 2011 and my wife’s 2015 A4. The ride is what I have come to expect from Audi and this did not disappoint.
Driving at the moment is limited to short trips around the area. My office is 5 miles from my home, and the shore is a 100-mile trip one way. That said, it will go back to RI (family) around Thanksgiving and then to Florida (more family) around Christmas. At which point, we will get a really good feel for its performance on a long trip.
Coming from a TDI, my initial impression was the engine seemed sluggish off the line. I have since played with drive select and set Individual to Auto and Sport depending on the attribute. This has improved performance off the line and I feel confident when merging and driving in our aggressive traffic.
Driver Assistance
The first thing that hit me was active lane assist. By default it is set to Early. I left it there to see what it does, but I turned off the steering wheel vibration. It does keep you in the lane, to the point you can let the wheel go, however after about 20 seconds it will sound an alarm for you to take back control. On highways, this is fine, however on backroads where it can lose sight of the lines, it may not keep you on the road. After playing with it and going back and forth between Early and Late corrections, I have settled on Late, although Early is perfectly fine for extended, well-marked highway driving.
Adaptive Cruise Control is interesting. As expected, it keeps your speed until you encounter a slower vehicle, at which point it will match their speed. Depending on the conditions (minimal traffic), this will be gradual and can go unnoticed if the speed is close to your set speed. However, if it is a distinct drop in speed or traffic, it will brake quite abruptly. Another reason for sudden braking is if it sees a drop in the posted speed limit. Regardless of how much over the speed limit you are going (75 in a 65) if it sees a drop, it will brake and reset your cruise speed to match the new speed limit. This is about the only feature I do not like. I was on the AC Expressway heading back to PA and was doing 75 in a 65. It somehow read a 35 sign and applied the brakes accordingly to slow me down. I stepped on the accelerator and got back up to speed without incident, but had it been in heavier traffic, that could have ended differently. I have yet to try traffic assist since I am not quite sure how to engage it, and I would rather not hit someone should I not engage it properly.
Luxury
All I need to say here is, massage seats. My justification for getting the 10 year / 100K warranty was in case we burn these out from overuse. The feel great, easy to set up and coupled with heated seats, these are awesome, especially after a hockey game. The Valcona leather is well worth the upgrade from the standard leather. The Alcantara headliner looks awesome and makes the interior stand out from all other vehicles.
Adaptive Chassis
I had the air suspension in my 2011 Q7. So, the big addition here for me is the 4-wheel steering. I am already proficient at parallel parking; however, the 4-wheel steering makes a huge difference. Also, the alley at the shore is quite tight with all the cars. My 2011 had to be positioned just right to make it into my driveway, however the 4-wheel steering makes it much easier and I do not need to concern myself with positioning.
Night Vision
I live in Southeastern PA. Between the deer, runners/joggers, dog walkers and kids, the night vision option was a no-brainer for me. My only complaint is the camera angle could be wider to detect more objects on the side of the road. When a deer is detected, an alert shows up in the HUD along with a beep. In the instance I am thinking of, it was a very wooded area and the deer was behind a tree. It was on a cure ahead of me, so I was pointing directly at it upon detection. It was dark and without the NVA, I would have never seen it. It stayed put and never presented a danger, however knowing it was lurking made me slow up in case it decided to jump out. That experience alone reassured me this is a great option to have.
Miscellaneous
The soft-close doors are a nice feature; however, I end up yelling at my passengers for slamming their doors. I have also noticed when I get in my wife’s A4, the door does not close all the way since I didn’t close it hard enough.
The running boards look great, but were not as needed as they were with my 2011 Q7. The adaptive chassis now sits the vehicle lower, thus do not always require a running board. That said, I do have seniors and vertically challenged members of my family who appreciate them.
The bird’s eye camera view is perfect for maneuvering into tight spaces. My father dove it and fell in love with that feature alone. He typically does not like to drive anyone else’s vehicles, but had absolutely no problem taking the Q7 for a spin. Audi beam is a cool effect and looks awesome. I opted for the rings on the front and quatro in the rear.
Ultimately, I am very happy with my purchase and look forward to many years driving in luxury and technology. This is a great vehicle and I recommend it to anyone who is looking for a luxury SUV.
The feel great, easy to set up and coupled with heated seats, these are awesome, especially after a hockey game.
That's hilarious as we are looking forward to that feature for that exact reason as well!
We are also handing in our '11 TDI and, like yourself, felt it was a prime opportunity to do a once-in-a-lifetime loaded vehicle. It was cool to get a preview of what we will probably experience as well.
Why the buy-back, what did you do in order to get Audi to buy it back, and how long did all this take?
In case you havent heard of dieselgate, Audi has to fix all the emissions cheating they did, and in the case of certain previous gen Q7s they have to buy them back because there is no fix
Great write-up. I'm basically in the same boat and went from 2012 Q7 TDI prestige with air to 2018 Prestige with air and dap. I'm loving how smooth and quiet the new version is. Funny that you said that you felt like the acceleration off the line is worse, because I had the opposite reaction. I always felt like the diesel has a bit of delay between pushing the gas and kicking down or starting the acceleration. The new Q7 feels instantaneous to me in contrast, even in D but especially in S. I set the "individual" mode for "auto" for suspension but dynamic for everything else, so maybe that helps. I discovered today that the gas engine even tows my travel trailer well, so I'm totally stoked with the new car! We got a steal of a deal with the buyback, that's for sure.
10-20-2017, 07:01 AM
My New Q7, 1000 miles in...
