German Car Zone

Well guys,

I decided to cancel my order in South Africa.

My dealer confirm pricing for me yesterday and was equally dismayed at the price in SA.

R595 000 ZAR for the base S4 sedan with S-Tronic.

That's about R75,000 more than a BMW 335i with DCT/automatic and sportpack. ROFL.

Super sport seats and the quattro sport differential pacakge plus drive select add another whopping R50 000 to the price.

R650k for an S4 is simply crazy money.

I can get a fully kitted E90 M3 4 door saloon with less than 15,000km on the clock for R600k and for R650k C63 AMG's with the AMG driving pacakage and 10'000km are to be had.

Simply does not compute. R650k is nearly R200 000 more than what the S4 is selling in base form for in the UK, using R13 to 1 UK pound.

Told my dealer to tell his marketing boys to go and $^%$^%^@# themselves lol.

Nooit dude. Sorry to hear... It's a pity about the pricing - quite steep. As always, us South Africans are somehow expected to pay ludicrous money relative to economic indicators compared with other countries. We're still being ripped off!

Again, a pity though as I'm convinced the S4 is the allrounder saloon of the moment.
But yeah, nearly new M3 saloon vs. brand new S4? For less money? It's a no-brainer.

Good luck with the shopping.

Martinbo "Great write up on Wheels24. Kudos. I didn't post a response to the inane commentry under your article - my local correspondent, ghusheshe, was supposed to put in a good word for the 335i LOL."

Lol... I have long stopped engaging in wheels24 "commentary".. Since its a free for all forum, my name has been used to post comments I did not post.. Anyhow.. Nice write up ACE and great car. Enjoy it..

Hey dude...

Man, I'm not phased at all - this is the internet.

I was just having a bit of fun given that someone took my comments from an M3 post and copy-pasted them verbatim on Wheels24 under your alias. ACE pointed this out to me. I don't view it as plaigerism just yet - so I'm chilled.

That's too bad. At that price at least you could guarantee exclusivity. I was expecting R540k, R565k for S-tronic. Unfortunately for you, it seems like Audi SA have a different pricing strategy to Audi UK. You haven't mentioned what is included in the standard SA spec so I don't know how bad that price actually is. That said, the SA S4 price is still much closer in price to an E90 335i M sport than an E90 M3. Past half way, imo, would be the point of close to zero S4 sales.

So what are you going to buy instead?

I had thought about a low mileage M3 saloon with DCT because the credit-crunch is seeing nearly new M3s 25% below new prices in the UK. I saw one with 3000miles on the clock for about 20% more than I paid for the S4.

I would pay:
10% over the 335i M Sport for a similarly spec'd S4.
10% over the S4 for a similarly spec'd M3 E90 with low mileage
15% over the M3 E90 with low mileage for a new M3 E90 that I could spec myself

Given this equation and the pricing that you have given above, I would (and did!) take the S4 in the UK and the nearly new M3 in SA. In another country (or if UK pricing was different) I may have landed up with a new E90 M3 or 335i Sport.

MTM are offering M-Cantronic tuning for the B8 S4. For Eur 2,491 you get:

max kW 317 (430hp)
max torque Nm 515
0-100 km/h 4,6 s
0-200 km/h 17,9 s
consumption 10,7l

mtm > Products > mtm - Product overview > Audi S4 B8 Tuning > M-Cantronic AUDI S4 3,0TFSI 430 hp (317 kW)

Those are some impressive figures. Would have thought the torque would be a little higher though.

My car has had a revo map now from amd and its kicking out 312hp and 330lbft/448 NM of torque.

Next step will be a high pressure fuel pump for more midrange torque and little more bhp. Then a full turbo back exhaust and the car should have around 360hp and 470-480nm of torque.

bit steep for a Piggyback box. I want to see a before and after from the same dyno. I'd pay 1500 canadian maybe.

With the extra boost my 91 octane gas might not work with this system. 100 octane is likely needed for 430hp crank.

After hearing about this news the S4 is ... well ... back on my shopping list.

I've narrowed it down to a S-line Q5 3.0Tdi or the S4 with limited spec.

Revo in the UK tell me they're looking for more testers for their S4 tuning - you keen ACE ?

Also - they don't believe in going down the piggyback route like MTM have the reason for the delay in their software release is purely a function of cracking the new ECU on the S4, I forget the model number.

It appears that the stock S4 ECU is dumping tons of boost through the divertor regulator valve and the software simply controls this to increase boost and hence KW/HP and torks.

Seems like audi may have just engineered a super sleeper engine of note ... I suppose the Q5 3.0T concept car with 299kw stock was a give away of what software can do ....

Who needs launch control in this car with 300kw at the fly on tap ?? Grrrrrr.

The missus and my 3 month old son are pushing hard for the Q5. I am the lone voice of opposition.

LOL, are you saying that my GCZ posts are gonna make you buy an S4? The S4's V6T has always had loads of tuning potential. It is just a matter of waiting for the tuning companies to come out with the tuning products. If the new RS4/5 use the rumoured +-335kW naturally aspirated V8 then there will be plenty of people opting for the considerably cheaper tuned S4s (and from 2010, V6T S5s). Especially those living at altitude in places like SA where for example an MTM Cantronic S4 will have more power / torque than the rumoured NA V8 RS4/5. As we both know, if you opt for the S-Tronic box, tuning potential is limited more by the maximum torque that the transmission can handle than by the potential of the engine.

I would recommend a base spec S4 over a Q5. If you are anything like me you will regret buying the Q5 almost every time you drive it. I had a tuned Q7 3.0TDi S-line before my S4 as my family car. I should do a review of that car sometime to advise people against buying Q7s or any SUV for that matter! At least the Q7 had 7 seats and huge load carrying ability. My wife wanted the Q7 (probably because everyone else in the neighbourhood has a Q7, X5, ML or Range Rover Sport for ferrying kids around) but once we had it she found it difficult to park in parking lots due to it's size and the car was so wide that there wasn't enough space to open the doors to get the kids out if you were parked between two cars. Also, the Q7s fate was sealed by me repeatedly mentioning to her that high centres of gravity and longer braking distances make SUVs less safe than a performance oriented saloon. She loves the S4 now and judging by the amount of high octane fuel going through the S4, she uses all the horses on a regular basis.

Is that Kev Hall at Revo that is looking for testers? I haven't seen them advertising for testers on their website.

btw, how do you know your 3 month old son is pushing for a Q5?