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Audi celebrates diesel milestone with triple-charged RS5 TDI concept

Diesels are typically slower than their gasoline counterparts, but leave it to Audi to turn that notion on its head. After dominating Le Mans and the international endurance racing scene under diesel power for the better part of a decade, the German automaker toyed with the idea of an oil-burning R8 for the road and ultimately made its first performance crossover a diesel. It's made the letters TDI a battle cry, and now it's yelling even louder with the RS5 TDI concept.
Set to be unveiled in a couple of days at the Leipzig Auto Show to celebrate 25 years of the TDI engine, the concept ditches the gasoline-burning 4.2-liter V8 in the production RS5 in favor of a 3.0-liter V6 twin-turbo-diesel with an electric supercharger added on to combat turbo lag. Output comes in at 385 horsepower and 553 pound-feet of torque, which means that while it has 65 fewer horses than the gasoline model, it packs a staggering 236 lb-ft more torque.
The result of the triple-charged madness is a 0-62 time around four seconds flat, trumping the 4.6 seconds for the road-going model. Top speed, of course, is electronically limited to 155 miles per hour, which is a bit of a shame because we bet it'd be a kick to pass a Porsche on the Autobahn in a diesel, now wouldn't it?

Audi Quattro concept production hopes still alive, could be more radical

Remember the gestation period of the Lexus LFA, the one that, in automotive time, took so long that its origins could have been carbon dated? We feel like it's deja vu all over again, as Yogi Berra would have said, this time featuring the Audi Quattro and Audi Sport Quattro. It was 2010 when our cameras first glimpsed the Audi Quattro Concept (pictured right) at the Paris Motor Show, and we tasted its turbocharged 2.5-liter, five-cylinder powerplant not long after. Last year we met the hybrid, 700-horsepower Audi Sport Quattro concept at the Frankfurt Motor Show, but we got no closer to finding out if there'd ever be a version we could buy. A report in Autocar keeps the flame of hope burning, quoting Audi design chief Marc Lichte at the LA Auto Show saying, "We are working on Quattro, it is still alive." Lichte went on to say, however, that the next imagining is "more extreme" than those we've seen, and, "There will be surprises." Those words alone are a surprise. The last we heard about the Quattro revival was Audi boss Ulrich Hackenberg saying he wanted a more accessible homage to the original, and we don't know how "more extreme" jives with that. Seeing that Audi is serious about the idea, at least, we shouldn't have to wait long to find out. Just don't get your hopes up about its affordability yet.

Evo drives the Audi R18 E-Tron Quattro on track

Audi invited Evo scribe Richard Meaden to the Misano circuit in Italy to drive the Audi R18 E-Tron Quattro - and not just any R18 Quattro, were such a thing possible, but the No. 2 car that took first place at Le Mans this year driven by Marcel Fassler, Andre Lotterer and Benoit Treluyer. Meaden got just four laps in the diesel hybrid racecar - a warm-up, two hot laps and a cool down lap - so this wasn't about testing the R18 E-Tron's limits. In fact, Meaden makes it clear that such a thing isn't even possible for less than a professional driver; when driving at his limits (admittedly in Audi's very expensive car being watched by dozens of Audi engineer eyeballs), the data showed he was using 60 percent of the pedal effort of the professionals. Nevertheless, Meaden does have a lot to say about how the car delivers its massive ability, and with the wide-view shot of the cockpit we also get to see how busy and how intimate an endurance driver's office is. Check it out in the video above. News Source: Evo via YouTube Green Audi Racing Vehicles Videos evo