Auto Motor und Sport’s Erlkönig prototype hunters tracked down Audi’s smallest car yet, testing before a 2010 European launch. Pricing and currency issues are blamed for the A1’s Euro-restricted habitat, and with a base price of €16-18k for a 1.2 liter engine, it’s no surprise that it won’t show up stateside. The possible 200 hp, AWD, seven-speed DSG S1 version sounds worth a grey market import, but at an estimated $36k, you’d have to be pretty fanatical about hot hatches to even think about it. And good luck finding a VW dealer in America who can work on your twincharger engine.
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There’s nothing such as a grey-market import on this continent any more. Not to the YSM (since 1989) or Canada (ever), unless you want to wait til the car’s 15 years old and then import it to Canada, or 25 years old and then import it to the YSM.
Looks like someone took WWI warship dazzler camouflage patterns to heart….
What’s wrong? It’s got exactly the same profile as a Hyundai Accent hatchback.
YSM?
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In spite of auto stateside journalist’s love for Audis, the car buying public here have (correctly) judged them as over-priced and over-rated.
Yanided Stace o’Merka?
Daniel Stern: Does that mean my dream of bringing a previous gen Euro Accord (TSX) diesel wagon with cloth and manual to the US is dead?
Diesel? Wagon? Cloth? Manual?
I’d KILL myself if I had to drive that! That’s like all the most unsexiest car attributes in the same car!! Next, you’ll want manual window openers and ugly amber turn signals!
A hybrid coupe-sedan (ala CLS/CC) with leather and full automatic (no paddles or anything please) for me please! Europe, keep your expensive, polluting, uncomfortable, cramped hatches to yourself!
Good luck finding a VW dealer in America that can fix a VW sold in America. I have no interest in the A1. However, it would be nice if Audi would consider bringing the S5 Sportback here.
Think of it as a plush, refined Honda Fit that can cruise the highway, only with much better fuel mileage. I already have a CL-S, and the auto is unreliable and boring, MPGs are so-so, the leather is hard and slippery, and I can’t fit enough dead bodies in the back (and I don’t like the unsafe red turn signals). I’m also not in need of a sexy car…
Robert Schwartz,
I think it’s a yolk sac membrane.
With the twincharger and DSG, this would be what the TT dreams of being once it grows out of its current state as a second rate Cayman wannabe.
Yankovic Salient Malaprop ?
Your Sh*tty Market?
Anyway, what’s wrong with the picture is the high beltline. And the paisley print doesn’t go with anything in my wardrobe.
In European markets, gasoline is taxed through the roof, and there are taxes based on engine size and on the weight of a vehicle. In such a situation, an Audi A1 is a way to navigate small midieval streets in style without filling government coffers in an absurd way.
Sabastian wrote:
It’s got exactly the same profile as a Hyundai Accent hatchback.
Or a (shrunken) A3 3-door hatchback–which is probably what Audi intended.
I will probably like it, from what I’ve seen so far. But then again, I think we’re all horse’s asses for driving machines that consume far more resources to manufacture and operate than necessary. It’s just my inner engineer preferring the most efficient and practical solutions.
Its a FWD Murcielago with a third the hp. I can see a market for this. Like the Reventon or Veiron, the’ll lose mony on everyone they sell, excepts its because of economies of scale.
drifter :
October 17th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
In spite of auto stateside journalist’s love for Audis, the car buying public here have (correctly) judged them as over-priced and over-rated.
Check their recent sales history…it contradicts your argument.
Audi A1 thy name is VW Polo.
One thing that may be right with that car is that I bet a police officer’s radar gun couldn’t get a reading on it!
Nice sounding car…I like diesel, manual, wagon, etc…200hp out of 1.2L sounds nice!
This would be an interesting car for $20-$25k.
$36k is absurd. You are near bmw 135 range, no?
Sheetmetal looks too much like a Hyundai Accent coupe.
@PeteMoran :
Audi A1 thy name is VW Polo.
It will be a more upscale version of the Polo – there is nothing at all wrong with that. The first Polo in the 1970s was a straight rebadge of the audi 50 after all.
The Audi A1 will sell like hotcakes. The only problem is that it would have been much smarter to already have it 10 years ago.
Frankly I’m too lazy to scroll thru the prior comments to see if this has already been stated (though I suspect it has). The proportions of this car are horrible. Fugly. No bueno.
Nothing wrong really, just a continuous, endless supply of boring FWD econoboxes somewhat marketed as “premium” cars.
There is such a thing as too small, Audi. That design just screams dull as well. If you’d told me it was some lower end Asian brand, I’d have believed you.