Hot on the heels of the new TT sports car comes the
Audi S3. Oddly, the S3 gets a more powerful version of the turbocharged direct injection engine from the VW Group, so the S3 steals the thunder. The new engine has a larger turbocharger and intercooler, with a number of other mods, to push power up from the 200 bhp of the TT to 265 bhp at 6,000 rpm.
The car gets the styling treatment you’d expect, with dark interior relieved slightly by aluminum trim and a fashionably sporty steering wheel with a flat part of the rim at the bottom.
Externally, the car is unmistakably A3 but with a few minor mods. Of course, there is a revised front end, which gets dummy lower side grilles a la VW Golf GTI, the now-familiar deep one-piece main grille, now with an extra little grille below. All pretty predictable stuff, as of course was the styling of the original A3.
Uprated turbo gives plenty of all-round power
But don’t be fooled. With this uprated turbo, the S3 sports hatch can get to 60 mph in about 5.5 seconds – that’s more than half a second quicker than the Audi TT two-liter, despite its aluminum body. It is also a shade quicker than the 3.2-liter TT. Hmmm.
Despite the larger turbo, maximum torque of 258 lb ft (350 Nm) is available all the way from 2,500 to 5,000 rpm, so this is an engine with bags of power at almost any speed. Mind you that is a feature of the other VW 2.0 liter direct injection turbos. Incidentally, this is a conventional four-valve per cylinder engine, unlike the five-valve units used in Audis previously. Still, the new engine clearly does the business.
Six-speed manual or sequential and four-wheel drive
The car comes standard with a six-speed manual gearbox and an uprated version of the quattro system used on the TT. This system relies on a multi-plate clutch to send more power to the rear wheels when it is needed – in normal circumstances, driving characteristics will be close to that of a front-wheel drive car. There is a little more power going to the rear wheels than on the old TT, but even so, this is a quattro system for slippery roads and snow.
The suspension has also been revised to suit more sporty drivers, with the car sitting an inch (25 mm) lower on its suspension than the A3, and the links are made of aluminum to reduce weight. At the rear, the car gets the improved multi-link suspension from the VW parts bin, which keeps the wheels pointing where you want them to.
To give fast response, there is electro-mechanical steering with sportier characteristics. Mind you, electrical power assistance does not always give the feel you get with hydraulics, so it remains to be seen how well this one works.
The one disappointment is that the S3 is a bit of a heavyweight owing to the all-steel body. It weighs in a 3,200 lb, which is 250 lb (120 kg) more than the
Golf GTi, so it really needs that extra power.
