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Sedans Luxury Performance Sedans
10007 messages, Last post on Dec 01, 2009 at 7:40 AM
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While the contents of many recent posts are interesting, it's unlcear to me what relevance they have to a comparative discussion of LPS cars. On the other hand, if a question about why German brands are not wringing 300hp out of their engines has switched us over to a discussion of where can we find the most horsepower and low-end torque for the buck, then we appear to be on track ... and, then, let's not leave out the Dodge Charger SRT8: zero to 60 in 4.9 seconds; 425hp; and 0.87g on the skidpad. By comparison, in Car and Driver's road test, with 244 horsepower at 5000 rpm, the CX-7 AWD Sport hauled its 3920 pounds to 60 mph in 7.9 seconds and on through the quarter-mile in 16.1 seconds at 87 mph -- 0.84g on the skidpad. And they averaged only 14 mpg during testing, well below the EPA’s findings of 18/24 mpg which, in turn, is lower even than, just for an example, a 4000+ lb Audi A6's EPA figures.
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Replying to: domenickamarc (Nov 04, 2006 6:37 pm) I'm not sure what your point is here. Talking about the power of BMW's 530i and Audi's A6 3.2 v the competition is very much on topic. I don't think "horses-per-dollar" was ever part of the discussion. All luxury performance sedans will score poorly by that matrix...they're luxury cars. You're paying for luxury after all, not just a big lump of iron with a lot of power. The best engines in the compact ute class are currently in the RAV4 V6 and X3 3.0i. The turbo fours in the competition are slower...and thirstier. The one exception is the WRX engine in the Forester XT, which is fast enough to chase X5 and Caynne V8s. I still don't get how Subaru was able to pull that off with 224hp.
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Replying to: lexusguy (Nov 04, 2006 8:13 pm) Ironically, your last two sentences (in the excerpt I quoted) makes the point I was trying to make, but you said it more clearly. Perhaps a misreading, but while I certainly agree that talking about the power of BMW's 530i and Audi's A6 3.2 v the competition is very much on topic, I did read the comparison of a 2000 A6 w/100,000 miles versus a Mazda CX-7 as veering off in the direction of "hp/$$" as a way to the address that topic. I didn't get any other point from simply noting that there are cheaper cars which offer more horsepower and torque than the typical German LPS, but maybe there is one.
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Replying to: domenickamarc (Nov 04, 2006 8:57 pm) I read it as just a comparison of Japanese and German engine power, and not necessarily LPS vs. mainstream CUV. When I was talking about German vs Japanese engines a few posts back, I was including VW's 1.8T and 2.8, and 3.0s from Nissan, Honda, and Toyota, not just the LPS cars. I don't think the intention was to say that the CX-7 was a better "value" than the Audi, but I could be wrong.
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Replying to: markcincinnati (Nov 03, 2006 1:08 pm) For the power the Germans(BMW & MB) offered, they were always faster than their Japanese competitors, Audi had and still is has weight issues...They've come a long way, I still can't believe the 2.0t has more power than the old 2.8 v6.. I recall when the TL type-S coupe and 4dr arrived, they were supposed to "bring it" to the 3er....even with more power than the 3 then, it still didn't cut it.
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Replying to: 610looper (Nov 05, 2006 12:48 am) Hardly. The TL and CL Type S cars had very sloppy handling, lousy brakes, bad interiors, and transmissions that liked to fail. Even the Volvo C70 coupe, which was based on the 850 sedan from around 1993, handled better than the CL Type-S. BMW had no threat from Japan until the G35 arrived in '03. The IS300, if it had been done correctly, could've been one. I'm not sure that the "German horses are bigger" argument still holds up anymore. The 335i and IS350 are just about equal in 0-60 runs, and horsepower is basically the same. The LS430 is VERY fast for its 278hp, certainly faster than the 275hp S430.
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Lexusguy, OK...I understand what you're drawing attention to: German versus Japanese engines. A few thoughts (very subjective): German "premium" brands don't specifically build for U.S. the way Infiniti, Lexus, and Acura do. In U.S. auto media comparison tests, there is much weight given to which car accelerates fastest in any similarly priced group. Japanese manufacturers, I believe, build to win those contests in the U.S. press -- and it works, here. Internationally, on a scale of 1 to 10, BMW and Mercedes sell 10. Audi sells 8. It's then a long drop to Volvo and Lexus, which would (on a graph) be around 4. In the 2 to 3 range would be Cadillac, Acura, Lincoln, and Infiniti. For example, worldwide BMW sales rose by about 120,000 vehicles to 1,328,000 in 2005. Mercedes also was over one million. Audi's figure was 829,109. Internationally, and (to Mercedes, BMW, and Audi, perhaps almost as important) at home in Germany, the German big-3 outsell foreign competitors in the LPS category, unlike the U.S. and Japan. They build the smooth, refined engines and drivetrains that keep their premium image alive and separated (in buyers' minds) from Japanese brands. So far, it works for them. Whatever they're doing, it works on me. Viscerally, in response to the post about BMW 530xi versus Infiniti M35x, I don't experience the two cars as being in the same category. I think the G35 and M35 hit a mark (which I subjectively categorize as luxurious muscle cars) but don't (yet) enter what I'd call the Premium LPS realm, where "smooth and refined" meets "powerful and engaging". I found the G35 and M35 to be wicked fast and fun, but somewhat noisy, with rears that don't take bumps well, and engines that over-depend on low-geared transmissions to suck great amounts of gas in order to push cars to victory in 0 to 60 tests, while German brands put enormous effort into slowly evolving more power (with each engine generation) through sophisticated technology (such as Audi's FSI) that combines more power with better gas mileage and keeps the whole experience like "warp-speed" acceleration on the old Star Trek series, rather than a roller-coaster ride. As I said, all very subjective ... but then that's what we're sharing with each other, our subjective and visceral takes on these wonderful cars.
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Replying to: domenickamarc (Nov 05, 2006 9:33 am) I'm not sure what the LPS sales are in Japan, but here in the states BMW and Mercedes still have the lead by a largin margin in the LPS catgory, and they outsell Audi 3 or 4-to-1. The M35's version of the VQ35 is last generation, so it only has VVT on the intake side. Still, its a very highly regarded engine, being on the Wards list 12 years running. The problem is there is only so much they can do with just 5-speeds. They are down one gear to just about everyone else (two gears to the E class), except the RL which is in the same boat and also has poor fuel economy. I'm having a tough time finding the M35's ratios, as Infiniti annoyingly doesn't list them on their site. I think 5th gear is somewhere around 0.83:1, compared to 0.69:1 for the automatic 530xi in 6th. There's just no way the Infiniti can compete when it comes to highway fuel economy.
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Replying to: lexusguy (Nov 05, 2006 12:09 pm) As for Audi, they are coming along ... The brand set a new record for vehicle sales in 2005 for the tenth year in succession: 829,109 vehicles were delivered to customers worldwide, an increase of 6.4 percent (2004: 779,441). The largest individual export market is the USA with 83,066 units (77,917, up 6.6 percent), but that's still just 10% of Audi's volume. Audi sold 247,125 vehicles in Germany, 12,033 (5.1 percent) more than in 2004. In Great Britain Audi sold 81,374 (up 4.5 percent) and China with 58,878 (up 9.6 percent). The above-average growth of Audi in Western Europe led to the brand achieving a record market share of 4.2 percent in 2005.
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