Competent, Consistent Audi e-tron S Impresses
Audi’s Compelling Electric e-tron S Easily Overcomes Short Range, Cost
More than just another missile in its arsenal, this e-tron S Sportback quattro is a compelling electric motoring option from Audi. Ingolstadt certainly is doing its fair share to fill the holes in the rapidly growing executive electric car market. Even if this one must deceive a little, in order to flatter.
Audi’s first S-badged electric car, this e-tron S is built on platform originally designed for combustion engines, rather than its own, dedicated EV architecture. Newer electric Audis like the Q4 e-tron, e-tron GT, and upcoming A6 and Q6 e-trons, are designed from the ground up as battery electric cars. Still this Sportback S is unique in the e-tron range.
Nothing Out of the Ordinary to Look At
Taken at face value, this Audi e-tron S Sportback electric SUV quite ordinary to look at. In a gas car sense, that is. It shies away from wearing that dunce hat electric cars have become so famous for. Being an S-car, the grilles look hungrier, while broader arches barely fit the optional 22-inch cartoon wheels. It certainly looks the part.
Dripping in gloss black and bonus Nappa leather, there’s even a bit hard plastic in there. Comfy diamond driver-memory power stitched Valcona hide front seats lack ventilation or massaging. The power-adjusted S steering wheel is however heated. Legroom is ample on the firm rear bench. Headroom isn’t bad either. And The 21.7 cu-ft boot grows to 58.7 cu.ft.
Step aboard and Audi’s fine digital dials are easily set up. One tab has a neat, if puzzling Google Maps view. The haptic touch Infotainment and climate screen are intuitive, neat and logical. Navi prompts local parking and charging info and the pinch to zoom doesn’t drop a pin every time. There’s an easy re-centre button if you do. But you do miss real knobs and buttons in there. E-tron S also has excellent 705W 16-speaker Bang & Olufsen sound.
E-tron S is Packed with Great Spec
Brilliant LED automatic Digital Matrix projector headlights bring comic level animation. Other e-tron S trinkets include a phone charger, tyre pressure monitoring and an auto-dimming interior mirror. Add keyless go, LED taillights and puddle lamps, rain sensing wipers and a power tailgate. This one had real old school power folding wing mirrors. Rather than the video gizmos you can specify if you think you’re Vader’s niece.
Moving under the skin, the beefy 208 HP 261 lb.-ft motor normally fitted in the back the e-tron 55’s shifts to this car’s front axle. It makes place for a pair of smaller 177 HP 227 lb.-ft electric motors at the rear. They are mounted with the transmission in a transaxle. Which means it has power vectoring rather than a differential. To allow the rear torque to dance between the wheels. ‘In the interests of agile cornering’, they say.
All that makes for 40-60 front-rear split electric all-wheel-drive in normal conditions. Combined overall output is 429 HP and 595 lb.-ft. Nudge the gear knob down to S and it will give you 496 HP and 717 lb.-ft for eight seconds. That’s double the time it needs to blast to 60 mph. And just enough time to reach an eighth of a mile at 88 mph.
More Ways to Brake
Clamp braking, for whatever reason, feels a tad contrived. Regenerative braking is via an auto recuperation mode. Use the crisp left paddle shifter to manually step it up in three levels. Unlike the 55 however, where the car retains your selected regen level until you alter it or park it, S defaults back to auto regen after every throttle application.
Audi claims that the e-tron S will travel as far as 215 miles on a full charge, according to the WLTP test. However, we never saw more than 242 miles on the clock on full charge. We did manage to improve on that quite handsomely with some frugal pedal work on the road to deliver closer to 195 miles on a charge. But there’s far more to it than just that.
Those three electric motors are powered by the e-tron 55’s 95 kWh lithium-ion battery. It is charged via two handy ports, one on each side of the car. Your 11-kW home charger should do the trick overnight. Audi has recently deployed 150 kW DC fast chargers along our local national routes. They deliver 80% charge in 30 minutes. Or a full charge in three-quarters of an hour. The trick there is to make the distance between those stations…