<< Well my experience of the A3 2.0 TDI is that it's virtually inaudible at
idle, and at 60-70 (and higher cruising speed, the road and wind
noise tends to be more intrusive than the engine tbh. >>

The 1.9 litre, 90Hp TDi is the only one I've driven but I found much the same
thing. The 180Hp 1.8T in my GTi is hardly what I'd call excessively noisy, in
fact I think it's tottally unobtrusive. It simply doesn't have the fuel economy
of a TDi. OTOH, we've tottally ignored the presence of Hybird's here. Toyota
and Honda are both building some really neat Hybrid autombiles. Toyota is
coming out with a Gas V6/electric hybrid version of the RX330 that's said to
have the power of a V8!

 

Toby Groves wrote:
> Well my experience of the A3 2.0 TDI is that it's virtually inaudible at
> idle, and at 60-70 (and higher cruising speed, the road and wind
> noise tends to be more intrusive than the engine tbh.

I have to agree on this one, although I have 2,0 FSI model. Especially
in the northern Europe, where the roads are pretty rough, the tires make
more noice, than wind & motor combined.

I've seen lots of people having 2,0 TDI here, but none have used 2,0 FSI
in this thread. Weird . I personally chose 2,0 FSI since it's actually
cheaper to me in use. This is because there's diesel taxes, and it only
becomes cheaper, if you drive a lot. But in the matter, if diesel is
more quiet than petrol one, I can't really say that 2,0 FSI is noisy
one. At motorway speeds, ~120 km/h, it's only running at about 2500
rpms. The noise of the motor can't be heard inside the car, only tires.

- Yak

 

In article <bt7tgm$47rot$1@midnight.cs.hut.fi>, Michael Burman
<pesukone@kylpyamme.whuppa> writes
>Toby Groves wrote:
>> Well my experience of the A3 2.0 TDI is that it's virtually inaudible at
>> idle, and at 60-70 (and higher cruising speed, the road and wind
>> noise tends to be more intrusive than the engine tbh.
>
>I have to agree on this one, although I have 2,0 FSI model. Especially
>in the northern Europe, where the roads are pretty rough, the tires make
>more noice, than wind & motor combined.
>
>I've seen lots of people having 2,0 TDI here, but none have used 2,0 FSI
>in this thread. Weird . I personally chose 2,0 FSI since it's actually
>cheaper to me in use. This is because there's diesel taxes, and it only
>becomes cheaper, if you drive a lot. But in the matter, if diesel is
>more quiet than petrol one, I can't really say that 2,0 FSI is noisy
>one. At motorway speeds, ~120 km/h, it's only running at about 2500
>rpms. The noise of the motor can't be heard inside the car, only tires.

I'm not sure whether the diesel is actually quieter than the petrol, it
may depend on how fast the engine is revving at any given moment.

For comparison, when cruising at 70mph (112kph), the 2.0 TDI revs at
exactly 2000rpm, which makes for very civilised cruising.
--
Toby

 

Toby Groves wrote:
> For comparison, when cruising at 70mph (112kph), the 2.0 TDI revs at
> exactly 2000rpm, which makes for very civilised cruising.

The difference is quite small, and I don't personally hear any
difference between 2000 rpm & 2500 rpm, difficult even when car is
standing. So at those speeds the revolutions can't have too big impact,
if the engine is even heard on either of the models

- Yak