We still need a few additional Audi owners and their diesels to join us at IKEA in Tampa for the drive to Mt Dora onNovember 10 and lunch at the Bavaria Haus. Walter reports that we have one A3 TDI and one Q5 TDI which will be coming from Jacksonville. The mini MPG diesel challenge will be starting from Tampa. The Davids at Crown Audi and Audi Tampa have also agreed to field a A6 or A7 TDI if one is available. Therefore, we would like at least one more A3, and an A6, or A7, in order to have our Dieseling to Dora MPG rally. Let us see who can go home with some bragging rights and perhaps a few goodies. Participants from the Citrus Region will meet at the Audi North Orlando dealership. Make sure to register and obtain additional information from Walter at [email protected].
The Tampa Auto Show will be November 22-24, so mark; those dates to not only see what is new from Audi but also the other makes. If there is a group that would like to get together and attend, give me a shout at [email protected]. Perhaps we will start our weekend early with a Friday afternoon gathering.
It will not be long and we will be into the first Saturday in December with our annual Toys for Tots at Reeves. As mentioned in previous years we are all very lucky and along with some hard work, to be driving Audis. This event will give us an opportunity to make sure some child whose circumstances are not as fortunate will have a few gifts for Christmas. I understand from Jeff at the Reeves Motorsports facility, Audi will be the featured marque, so join us for a big turnout of the Four Rings.
January of course brings the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona, check the dates, and be sure to make your hotel reservations now. If I am lucky enough to score a ticket, once again I plan to pull an all nighter in the suite. Between the cars circling the track and the Ferris wheel constantly changing its lighting pattern, it becomes almost mesmerizing.
Table of Contents
Down the Road
Event Listing
ACNA & Chapter News
Other Items in the News
Classifieds and Audi Tradition
As Seen/Members’ Photos
…but then there’s more
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November 10, Drive and Luncheon, this is our first Sunday event since 2009 to allow those who work on Saturdays (Especially some of you Brand Specialists) to participate. Groups are starting from Tampa, Orlando, and Jacksonville. The group starting at IKEA in Tampa will meet at 8:30 AM, Audi North Orlando at 9:30. All participants as per ACNA rules must sign an insurance waiver.
November 16-17, The Audi Club of Georgia is hosting a 2-Day Driving School at Atlanta Motorsports Park
December 7th, Toys for Tots, Reeves Motorsports
January 26-27, Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona
November 2, 2013
Cars and Coffee Reeves Motorsport Tampa
November 22, 2013
Tampa Bay International Auto Show
December 7, 2013
Toys for Tots/Cars and Coffee Reeves Motorsport Tampa
Palm Beach Region
[email protected]
Citrus Region (Orlando)
[email protected]
ACFL Events in Florida
November 10, 2013
Mt. Dora Drive and luncheon event. Contact Walter at [email protected] for additional information, start times and starting locations. Please RSVP for the luncheon as space is limited.
Driving Events with Performance Driving Group
Contact David at [email protected] for additional information and dates.
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ACNA S5 Raffle
This is the last call, if you have not purchased your raffle ticket and are looking for a new car; here is an opportunity to win one for the cost of a $25 raffle ticket. There continues to remain a number of you who have expressed an interest in purchasing tickets so please follow through and contact Andreas ASAP at [email protected]. He has tickets available and will give you all the details. A thank you, goes out to all who have already purchased raffle tickets, your support is appreciated. It would be great if one of our members won the car. Raffle tickets will be available at our Dieseling to Dora event in November.
Spend $50 to save $3,000 on a $50,000 MSRP Audi
If you have been an ACNA member in good standing for six months, you will be eligible for a 6% discount from MSRP on the purchase of certain Audi models. Yes, a few of the usual suspects have been excluded, the R8, RS5, TTRS, and a few others, but check out the details at ACNA Membership Benefits. If you plan to be in the market for a new Audi, it literally pays and saves to be an active member of the ACNA. Just do the math on the Audi of your dreams.
Welcome Aboard
Welcome to our new ACNA members. Our membership numbers are growing, which means additional critical mass in different regions of the state and hopefully more events and participation. Those of you who are new to the ACNA will receive an on boarding note from David Loppert, if you have; any questions feel free to drop either David [email protected] or me [email protected] a line. I also suggest that if you have not had a chance yet check out both the ACNA website, and the Audi Club of Florida website. There is a great deal of good information plus some excellent photos of member’s cars.
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And now for the numbers
Thirty-three consecutive months of record sales is certainly an achievement worth noting, unfortunately, when compared to a marque that has been in Audi’s cross hairs for quite some time, the numbers are not so great. I can only imagine the discussions behind closed doors with the calls from Ingolstadt and the subsequent communications out to the field. I distinctly recall the phone calls from corporate asking, “who forgot to unlock the doors yesterday?” A few years back, an Audi Area General Manager once told me that it did not matter if there was neither inventory nor what the customer wanted at the dealerships and this business regarding long transit times to the POE (Port of Entry), simply not acceptable excuses for not making planned sales figures. It has to be even more difficult for the folks in communications to put the appropriate spin on the figures.
In September 2012, BMW was selling 1.77 vehicles for each Audi sold. September 2013 has seen that number increase to 1.80. To maintain market share that number must be equal to 1.77 or to improve market share it needs to be lower. The year to date figure sales ratio in 2012 was 1.85 BMW’s per Audi and in 2013 it went up to 1.86, still heading in the wrong direction.
Lighting as a Form of Architecture
After being successfully used in the 1939 Berlin Olympics, lighting and as now specifically applied to autos is on the leading edge in design following function, Audi’s new headlight initiative.
Some Impressions of the new Audi TDI’s
A short Diesel Driver magazine article on a spin in the DC area with the new A6, A7, and Q5 2014 TDIs.
Video Tutorials
Not the first time this has been posted but for those of you who have purchased new Audis recently, here is a site, which provides video tutorials on many of the car’s operational features. Audi Video Tutorials
The new A3 versus the MB CLA
It would look like the A3 is a winner when compared to the MB CLA. A3 vs. CLA
Starting Price for the New A3
As mentioned in the newsletter below, things are heating up. The base price for the new A3, which will include bi-xenon headlights, panoramic sunroof, and leather seating surfaces, is the same as the new Benz CLA. The cost of those three items is not in the base price of the CLA. A3 Pricing Release
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If you have a special Audi such as one of the S or RS models or a pre 2000 that you would like to sell, we will list it once in the newsletter. I will need the year, model, color over interior color, and your email address. Longer and non-member postings can be placed in the website. We will also list DKW, NSU, and Wanderer motorcycles. If you are looking for a particular car, once again S, RS or pre 2000 model plus a bike, we will also try to accommodate you here.
For Example: Wanted: Wanderer or DKW motorcycle of motorbike pre 1950 [email protected]
You can also use the Classifieds Forum on the Audi Club of Florida web site.
Time for Daydreaming
Here is an interesting listing of not just German Pre-war vehicles and motorcycles but also those from other countries. Prewar Classifieds
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Have a picture of your car or some Audi-related news of your own you’d like to share? Send your photo to Walter Moore [email protected]
Shannon Tillman from Tallahassee submits a picture of her freshly washed Ocean Blue A3:
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With the arrival of the new A3 and MB CLA class joining the 1ers from BMW that segment of the Überklass market will be heating up. Some of the good news is that it will drive Audi to offer more variants of the A3 to compete with the 135’s and possible AMG iterations of the CLA, which of course would be the S3. I see that there is even a RS Q3 available, but unfortunately not here. Perhaps we may receive the Cabrio version to compete with BMW. Then there are the 2.0 diesel iterations of the A3. In Germany, this engine has gone from 140 HP to an available 150 HP and 184 HP. With those numbers and the commensurate increase in torque, it will be easy to light up the tires. Word on the street is that the new A3 diesel sedan during an over 500-mile run with an average speed north of 60 MPH topped 55 MPG. I am not sure a viable case could be made for a Hybrid variant of the A3 model.
I have just returned from my bi-annual 2,200-mile trek to the Amish country of PA. It is here in York where well over 13,000 grown men act like little boys (nothing new on that score), buying, and selling old toys and in particular trains. A long day and a half, 1100-mile drive in an Audi, can give pause for much contemplation. The Audi purred along at 65, 70, 75, 80 MPH as if it is just loafing with only an occasional staccato thump from seams in the road to distract one from wondering. One item that struck me was the price variation of diesel fuel, not sure, if it was state tax driven but doubt it as the price within a state could vary twenty-five cents a gallon within 25 miles. There are enough savings on 20 gallons to buy oneself that ubiquitous travel meal of a big Mac, fries, and a soda. The lowest fuel price was at mile marker 104 on I 95 in VA north of Richmond, with diesel at $3.62 a gallon, the highest was east of Lakeland on I 4 at $4.05 a gallon. For comparison, It is $3.72 a gallon in St Pete and $3.69 in York, PA.
During this sojourn north, I often take a drive to Gettysburg and visit the battlefield site where the tide clearly turned against the south in our second civil war. You historians out there have probably heard that our revolution is often referred to as our first civil war. It was then that Patriots fought Loyalists, families split, and many cities remained loyal to the crown. After the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, there was a mass migration of Loyalists to Nova Scotia. These colonists in turn paid a high price for the defeat and had much of their real property and assets confiscated and or were sold off at very distressed prices. However, back to Gettysburg, what I found fascinating was on this trip and because of the government shutdown; our friendly park rangers became not so friendly. Sort of like cranky bears waking up after a little hibernation. They wasted our tax dollars erecting barricades and placing orange pylons in front of our memorials to the fallen on both sides. It was evident and in numerous acts of not to be condoned civil disobedience that park visitors had thrown pylons in the ditches, drove over them or even driven across these long since blood stained grounds to bypass some of the barricades.
In probably the last ten visits to the park, I had yet to see a ranger, lots of ground keepers, cutting grass and removing fallen limbs from the road but not a ranger to be found. Except for the visitor’s center being full of rangers, the battlefield is an open-air memorial best viewed devoid of the numerous visitors and as the sun rises through the early morning mist that casts a warm glow on this hallowed ground. This time, Ranger Andy and his cabal of campaign hats, were trying their best to inconvenience visitors and the actual owners of the park, while wasting time and money building barricades. Then to add more insult to injury, seemed to be flying over the park in a helicopter to make sure no one was trespassing. Who knows, perhaps for security reasons they may even had made the airspace above the battlefield a no fly zone for those who wished to view the park from the air. I asked a friend of mine from Kempton, Germany who attends the York train meet twice a year and is a purveyor of some unbelievably expensive old trains, if they ever closed their equivalent of our national parks such as the Zugspitze. His reply was an incredulous “That is simply not possible; I have never heard of such a thing, are you kidding?”
Cheers and Safe Motoring,
Bob Greving
President
Audi Club of Florida, Chapter ACNA