Audi Q5 facelifted

The hotshot RS Q3 might have stolen Audi’s SUV honours at the Beijing Motor Show this week, but don’t think Audi is ignoring its bread and butter.

The premium German carmaker has also let slip that an updated Q5 will arrive this year with five engines plus a hybrid version. The face lifted machine will also bring design, chassis, suspension and infotainment upgrades, along with a mix of front- and all-wheel drive.

Its biggest trick will be combining the Q5’s three diesel and two petrol engines – plus the petrol-electric hybrid powertrain – all in the same updated chassis architecture.

The entry level will be the 105kW/320Nm four-cylinder, 2.0-litre turbo-diesel, which is mainly aimed at Europe and is an unlikely starter for Australia. It’s also the only front-wheel drive Q5 in the lineup and is also the only one with a six-speed manual gearbox. On the upside, it’s the lightest (at 1755kg) and the most economical, using 5.3 litres/100km with a 139 gram/km CO2 figure.

There is a more powerful version of this engine, with Audi mating Quattro all-wheel drive with a seven-speed double-clutch gearbox to cope with its 130kW of power and 380Nm of torque. For all that extra performance, though, it doesn’t suffer much at the pump, posting 6.0 litres/100km on the combined cycle.

The Australian lineup will start with the 2.0-litre TFSI turbo-charged petrol-fed four-cylinder, which thumps out a useful 165kW of power and 350Nm of torque. While Audi hasn’t released performance data on the base car, it has admitted it will suck up 7.6 litres/100km on the combined cycle and will weigh somewhere on the heavier side of 1700kg.

A pair of V6 motors – one petrol-powered and one a turbodiesel – will top the Q5 family. With a 6.5-second sprint to 100km/h and an astonishing 580Nm of torque, the TDI version is almost certainly going to be the easiest to live with in everyday driving.

It boasts a 225km/h top speed thanks in part to 180kW of power and drives through the seven-speed double-clutch gearbox (which is dubbed S-Tronic in Audi’s language, or DSG over at Volkswagen).

The fastest of all the updated Q5s will be the 3.0-litre petrol motor, complete with 200kW of power and neatly double that in Newton-metres.

Audi claims it will haul to 100km/h in 5.9 seconds and hit 234km/h (which is hardly relevant here), but it suffers at the bowser, posting an 8.5 litres/100km figure. It’s also the only member of Australia’s Q5 family to eschew the double-clutch routine for its self shifting and switch to a traditional eight-speed, torque-converter automatic as standard equipment. This gearbox, familiar to A6 buyers, is optional through the rest of the range.

Audi has also done some fiddling of the gearboxes throughout the range, shortening up the bottom three ratios for better acceleration but lengthening the taller gears for better cruising fuel economy.

There have also been tweaks to the all-wheel drive system, which is normally split to send 40 percent of the drive to the front axle and 60 percent to the rear, but changes instantly depending on where it can use its performance.

The all-wheel drive’s cleverness is geared up to help the Q5 stay on the road in tricky circumstances (or when its driver has been too optimistic), and it’s helped by the addition of torque vectoring technology. Once the preserve of the VW Group’s sports car brands (like Porsche or Audi’s own R8), torque vectoring constantly measures the difference between the car’s intended line and its actual path through a corner, then fiddles with the torque delivery to the wheels and the brakes in its attempts to make them overlap.

There are also change to the dampers, springs and anti-roll bars, though the suspension remains rooted in its five-link front end and trapezoidal-link rear architecture.

The Q5’s off-road ability is enhanced by its electronic control systems and can be surprising, but it’s limited by 200mm of ground clearance, a 17-degree ramp-over angle and 25-degree approach and departure angles.

In practical terms, it’s now only a touch different, with a 4.63 metre overall length, 1.9 metres of width (including the mirrors) and 1.65 metres high, with a 2.81 metre wheelbase. It also delivers 540 litres of luggage space, which can pump out to 1560 litres when you drop the rear seats flat.

Those same rear seats also have backrest adjustment standard, and the interior delivers some tweaked designs for the instruments, the steering-column stalks, the steering wheel and the key.

Three-zone air conditioning is standard, too, while there are minor tweaks to the design of the front and rear bumpers and the rear grille. While the headlight shape remains the same, Audi has fiddled the daytime running light design of the optional LED Plus light, while it also has the additional option of Audi’s superb adaptive lighting system.

The top end of the interior range delivers a Bang & Olufsen sound system with a seven-inch MMI screen, complete with 3D graphics and a DVD player, and the ability to turn the car into a rolling WLAN hotspot. It’s optional in most versions but standard in the Q5 Hybrid.

And the Hybrid?
Continuing Audi’s insistence on running hybrids as top-end models rather than relying on their often-questionable fuel economy benefits to bring customers, the Q5 Hybrid comes full of Audi’s best fruit.

True to form, it’s not the most economical Q5 – indeed, both of the 2.0-litre TDIs are more economical and the thumping V6 TDI falls just a tenth of a litre/100km shy of making that three.

Nor is it the quickest, posting a 0-100km time of 7.1 seconds and a 225km/h top end.

… All of which explains why Audi insists on making it the most luxurious.

It combines the 2.0-litre TFSI turbo-charged, direct injection four-cylinder petrol engine with a 40kW electric motor to create its urge, running it all through the eight-speed auto transmission.

At its peak, the petrol engine delivers 350Nm of torque and the electric motor instantly musters up 210Nm, but delivery quirks (we’ve explained it before) mean the two-motor combination has a maximum of 180kW of power (albeit very briefly) and 480Nm of torque.

It’s not a plug-in hybrid, so it relies on energy regeneration from braking and coasting to charge up its 1.3kW/h lithium-ion battery to deliver pure electric cruising. Audi claims the system can be driven in pure electric mode for 3km but this is extremely optimistic in our experience.

Still, besides getting the Bang & Olufsen system standard and the best interior kit, it also gets 19-inch wheels, but they’re not reason enough not to buy the V6 TDI if you’re after the best Q5 flagship.

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