Audi A6 Allroad 2012 Review - International

The secret is quickly found in the car parks of Audi’s Ingolstadt HQ. Almost all the executive spots are filled with A6 Allroads, and a lot of them come with paint colours you just can’t buy on the production versions.

This is a popular car internally, and it’s easy to see why. For most of the senior Audi personnel, the working day includes starting at home in Munich, commuting out of the city over consistent low-speed road works, blasting up 70km worth of unlimited autobahn and doing it again at the end of the day.

And the A6 Allroad fits the bill beautifully. Its chromed grille sends a mirror message that it’s not to be messed with, its higher body rides better than the stock machines and it loses little in handling or economy.

The third generation of the A6 Allroad comes, initially at least, with three versions of the 3.0-litre turbo-diesel motor and just one petrol motor, the 3.0-litre TFSI super-charged V6.

All four engine variants have more power and torque, but far less consumption, with Audi having lowered the fuel required on some models by more than 20 per cent.

The diesel range kicks off with the base TDI V6, with 150kW (which we didn’t get to drive), moves up to a 180kW version of the same engine and finishes off with the Biturbo 230kW powerhouse. Even the entry-level version has 450Nm of torque, while the mid-ranger has 580Nm and the flagship motor crunches out 650Nm.

They make the petrol engine look a bit anemic, even if it’s got 228kW of power and 440Nm.

It follows hot on the heels of the smaller A4 Allroad, but differs in a couple of significant ways, besides being bigger and based off a newer architecture.

For starters, it has height adjustable air suspension that can lift the car up for off-road duty or down for high-speed work.

While it seems to be more road-focused than previous Allroad iterations, Audi insists it’s no less capable in the dirt than it has ever been (though it gave us no opportunity to sample it).

There is a wide array of optional seating for the Allroad, though you can just take the base level with its manual operation if you like. Thankfully, Audi’s Australian customer base usually demands electric seats as standard in $100,000-plus machinery.

Ease your way past this (and it’s justified by expectations that more than 50 per cent of German buyers prefer manual seats) and the equipment levels start to look better. Even for zee Chermans.

The mid range diesel has two price points in Germany, €57,350 for the Euro V spec engine and €58,451 for the Euro VI version. The top-of-the-line Biturbo is a steal at €62,100, especially as the V6 TFSI is €57,750.

Those numbers will be completely revised by Audi’s product planners before the car ever gets here (as will the specifications), but the German cars have plenty of everything.

The standard package comes with start-stop, a leather steering wheel full of buttons (some more useful than others), cruise control, a 6.5-inch MMI screen, an eight-speaker sound system, centre armrest and, well, it goes on. The going-on part includes its own 18-inch wheels and tyres, an air conditioning system that saves 0.2 litres/100km over the old model and a proximity key.

But the options list goes even further. For starters, you can have a noise-insulating glass all round, you can have up to 19- or 20-inch wheels, you can have four-zone air conditioning, smarter lighting, radar cruise control, a WLAN wifi hotspot setup, a 15-speaker Bang and Olufsen sound system… It’s almost never ending.

There are some unique Allroad features, too, including a tilt angle display (like Pajeros had 25 years ago, but all tucked away in the MMI screen). It is hunky dory until you reach 25 degrees of lateral tilt, when it lights up yellow. Hit 35 degrees and it lights up red.

And it’s fast. It hurls the big Allroad to 100km/h in 5.6 seconds (nearly two seconds faster than the 150kW version and a second quicker than the 180kW machine) and it’s limited to 250km/h.

Besides all of that, it also runs an eight-speed automatic transmission where the Allroad’s other engines are mated to the seven-speed double-clutch gearbox.

And it only uses 6.4L/100km for an emissions number of 169g/km. It’s a tenth of a litre worse than the 180kW V6 and 0.4 worse than the 150kW motor. Not bad, Audi. Not bad at all.

The V6 petrol engine is, by comparison, not Audi’s strongest point as it has concentrated on its big diesel development, but the supercharged V6 motor is smoother and punchier than we expected it to be. But this seems to come at a cost, with 8.9L/100km in its combined fuel economy figure.

They are combined with an array of seven-speed double-clutch transmissions, with the exception of the Biturbo diesel, which scores a slick but more-conventional eight-speed auto. Regardless, both units incorporate Drive, Sport and paddle-operated Manual settings.

As the name suggests, the Allroad family has all-wheel drive across the board. Unlike smaller Audis, the A6 Allroad uses a proper mechanical all-wheel drive setup, funneling 60 per cent of the drive to the rear axle in normal situations to lend the car a sportier, rear-drive feel.

It’s not just mechanical stuff whirring around, though, because it also employs torque-vectoring technology which can brake the car’s inside wheels if they begin to spin up. There’s also a sportier rear differential as an option, though this means the torque-vectoring system only works on the front wheels. Still, it can instantly switch 70 per cent of the drive to the front axles or 85 per cent to the rear, depending on where the car needs the grip and what it would benefit from most.

Its front track has grown 35mm to 1631mm, while the rear end is nine millimetres wider at 1596mm, though the mechanical layout is largely shared with the A6 Avant. Like the A6, it sits on a whopping 2.9-metre wheelbase, which carries inherent ride and stability benefits and it’s also toting a lot of aluminium in its body.

Some of the key aluminium parts finding their way into a Coke can near you in 20 years include the front quarter panels, the doors, the tailgate, the engine bay’s cross member, the front strut mounts, the dashboard sub-frame and even the bonnet.

One of the big changes compared to both the A6 Avant and the A4 Allroad is that the adaptive air suspension is standard and is also smart enough to change its own ride height depending on the situation.

For offroad driving, the system can raise itself by 35mm, though for low-speed work, the driver can add another 10mm to take it out to almost the maximum suspension travel. Then it will lower itself as the speed rises, first by 10mm above 35km/h, then by 15mm above 80km/h and down another 20mm above 120km/h for both improved handling and fuel economy.

To help with the off-road work, there is a stainless steel undertray running from the nose beneath the engine and transmission, but we wouldn’t count on it to do the job across the worst of an outback track. It also scores a hill-descent control system.

Beyond that, the Allroad can be equipped with a dazzling array of safety features, including thermal and infra-red cameras to see further in the dark, radar cruise control, lane departure warnings and it just goes on and on.

The luggage area swallows 565 litres, and that’s with the rear seats up. Drop them flat – and they do sit flat – and that blows out to 1680 litres. But it’s not just big; it’s well thought out, too. There are bag (or “curry”) hooks on both sides of the cargo area, belts for strapping things to the side so they don’t move, a hard-lined tray so you can put dirty things beneath the normal luggage area and four hooks that can also be moved. And there’s a two-site cargo net.

Look further around the Allroad and you see points that just plain make sense. The alloy roof rails are capable of carrying 120kg loads, so they’re not just there to add a tough-guy profile. It can tow 2500kg and it can carry five people in terrific comfort.

Up front, its door pockets are huge and so is its two-level centre console and the front seats offer excellent length adjustment and headroom. And, if you don’t like them, Audi has quite a few different ones to choose from.

For this car, more than any other, there are just too many rivals to mention. For example, in the Audi stable alone, you could cross-shop the Q5, the Q7, the A7, the A6 Avant, the top end of the A4 Avant range and even the A4 Allroad.

Imagine what happens when you walk into other dealerships?

The only other carmaker doing something exactly like this at this end of the market is Volvo.

The automatic choice for Australians will be to look at the petrol version and while that’s good, be sure you test drive one of its diesel siblings before you go anywhere near a chequebook.

It’s smoother than the diesels, but not by much and certainly not enough to justify 50 per cent more fuel consumption. It’s a clean spinning engine that feels every bit as powerful as the data suggests, though it could use more torque to shift the Allroad’s mass.

It’s quieter in this form than it is in the S5 and it feels brisk and clean at higher revs, it’s willing to change revs quickly and it sounds more sophisticated than it has done before.

Yet it’s not that much smoother than the diesel family, even the mid-range 180kW version. This is an engine that will appeal to a lot of people in a lot of Audis, because it offers so much strength from low engine speeds without asking you to sacrifice much anywhere else.

But the Biturbo is the big bopper. It doesn’t sound like a diesel and it doesn’t sound like a petrol engine, either. It makes its own way with smoothness, with incredible depth and with stupendously rich charm as you climb up the rev range or even just open the taps.

And, Lordy, does it go. The thing is a jet and easily the best engine in the family. It makes the Allroad feel more S6 than SUV, revving out beyond 5000rpm but showing strength from as little as 1300 revs.

The interior is largely A6 Avant fare, with a couple of SUV-ish touches thrown in to claim some unique selling propositions, but that’s no bad thing. The A6 is a pretty good starting point for interiors, and the Allroad’s is astonishingly comfortable and quiet. Tested back to back on the same roads as the A8 Hybrid, it’s every bit as quiet at 100km/h as the limo, even in diesel form.

It’s also at least as comfortable as it takes advantage of the higher-profile tyres (with pressure monitoring thrown in as standard), the extra suspension travel and the long, long wheelbase to cosset its peeps over even the most-patchy tarmac.

But it also handles, too, and it feels like it dances on its toes every bit as well as the A6 Avant’s all-paw versions. At 1855kg, we expected it to feel a lot more unwieldy on country roads, but it stiffened nicely on long, fast corners, dived left to right on switchbacks as crisply as you’d hope for and felt both alive and progressive doing it.

Sure, it’s probably softer and slightly less hard-core capable than the Allroad that preceded it, but that barely seems to matter.

For such a small change to its outlook, the A6 Allroad seems to offer so much more. It is, once again, one of the great sleeper cars of the modern era.

Read the latest Carsales Network news and reviews on your mobile, iPhone or PDA at the carsales mobile site