Dyno Run Suggests The Audi RS4 Makes More Power Than Advertised
Well, this isn’t particularly surprising, is it? A modern German performance car - in this case the Audi RS4 - is putting out more power than the official figures claim.
It’s something we’ve seen plenty of times before, with a recent example being the BMW M5. A dyno test for the new all-wheel drive super saloon suggested that it could be making almost 100bhp more at the crank than the Bavarian manufacturer claims.
In the case of this RS4 - a long-term test car belonging to Car Wow - the gains aren’t quite as dramatic: the test reveals it to be making 16hp and 37lb ft more than Audi’s figures. Also, that is an estimated figure derived from wheel horsepower (the primary measurement given by rolling roads), so the increase from the factory figures could be a little less. Or even a little more.
Audi even admitted not so long ago that its cars will generally accelerate faster than advertised. The company’s technical development chief Stephan Reil told Car Advice that “I’ve been in this job for nearly 20 years, and with all the cars I’ve worked on, the performance numbers we published were conservative…I simply don’t want to hear, when you guys write ‘well, they claim 3.9, but we got 4.0’.”
Growing up on a diet of World Rally Championship highlights and lengthy Gran Turismo 2 sessions, a life in cars was as good as inevitable for Matt.
Comments
“Oh really? Do tell! “ Said the car with a similar situation.
The 1.9tdi always made more than advertised. There’s dyno runs of the pd130 making as much a 160bhp in stock form.
Ford and Chevy were at it throughout the late ‘60s as well. The most famous being the Camaro Z28 from 1967 - which was advertised at 290bhp to keep insurance costs down, but many thought it was very underrated due to the seriously quick 1/4 mile times and actually kicked out something closer to 400!
The Gentleman’s Agreement’s happening in Europe, it seems.
VW have always lied about performance.