WWAED? (What Would Audi Enthusiasts Do)

Since Audi has recently introduced Chromtec® wheels on a few of their vehicles, we thought it might be a good idea to go and meet our customers in person and see what kind of wheels and finishes they wanted on their next Audi.  We dismissed our first two ideas of hanging out at shopping malls and visiting owners door-to-door because they sounded a bit stalkerish.  Luckily Motorstadt 7 came to the rescue.  Billed as the “premier midwest car show for Volkswagen and Audi” our visit resulted in an earful.  Before we tell you what everybody said back in June, here are a few great cars we saw while there. 

Or if you are in a hurry and would rather skip straight to the results then just Click here.

Photo by Oliver Schumacher

First up is the unusual 1957 Auto Union 1000 pillarless coupe of Francois F.  Even though there were almost 200,000 produced, it is rather rare in the States.  The 1000 was a rebadged DKW 3=6 with a larger two stroke motor and the now famous 4-rings in the center of the chrome grille.  And yes, those are chrome wheels covers!  Trivia of the day:  This car was produced in Argentina under license until 1970, so if you were in the market for a new Argentinian car back then you could have this or a Kaiser-Renault.

1957 Audi 1000

A great surprise was the appearance of road and race cars in the Rally Group.  Curt E. won the class with his 1983 Group B Quattro Coupe, but there was also a Lancia Delta Integrale Evoluzione and two mid-engined cars; aPeugeot 205 T16 and a Renault R5 Turbo.  We would have happily test driven any of them if we were given the chance (in the grass, of course!)  You can see more about these highly specialized race cars at  http://groupbrally.blogspot.com .

1983 Audi Quattro

In addition to the Audis, there were a few interesting Volkswagens as well.   One example was this class winning 1995 Harlequin Jetta owned by Katie H.  (I thought VW only produced the 1996 Golf in these colors).  For those who don’t know about the limited Harlequin Editions, they were produced in one of 4 basic colors and then had their body panels swapped with other cars.  They were not terribly popular and some cars sat on lots so long the dealers repainted them in a single color.  You can find out more about these special cars at http://rossvw.com/index.html

1995 Volkswagen Jetta Harlequin

Another interesting Volkswagen appearance and class winner was John B.’s 1989 Diesel Doka Synchro (full disclosure: John is a Fan of our Chromtec® Facebook Page).  Doka stands for DOppel KAbine, which loosely translate into a Crew Cab in the US.  Based on what we know here as the Vanagon, I don’t think they were ever officially imported into the US, but there are a few of them of them running around so either they are grey market imports or perhaps they were sold in Canada.  More info on the Vanagon Synchro can be found at http://www.syncro.org/

1989 Volkswagen Vanagon Doka Diesel Synchro

I could probably spend the next hour just talking about all the different cars we saw and interesting people we talked to.  If you are interested there are great pictures on their forum at http://www.michiganvw.org/forum/showthread.php?t=60370 .

Survey and Results

So enough about the fun cars, let’s get down to the results of what Audi owners want.  Over 130 people took the 5 minute, 4 page survey.  However, we controlled the results based on participants who were interested in purchasing or leasing a new car within the next 3 years.

Taking the Wheel Finish Survey at Motorstadt 7

The most obvious question was how important wheels were to these participants.  Only 2% indicated wheels were not an important factor to them when considering buying a new vehicle. In addition, more than 1/3 indicated that wheels were important enough to influence which vehicle they would buy.  This subject bears a closer look and will be the topic for next week’s post.

We then showed the participants 4 different wheel finishes.

• Finish “A” = non-production experimental finish
• Finish “B” = standard Bright Chrome as available on the Q5 & Q7
• Finish “C” = Iridium™ Chrome (inspired by aerospace aluminum)
• Finish “D” = Brooklands Black Chrome (Spinelle™ Metal Finish as found on the Bentley Continental R models)

Almost 85% of participants indicated they liked or loved the Black Chrome finish.  

SURVEY RESULTS: Black Chrome Wins!

A couple of other comments we received about wheels:

Greg S. likes “easy cleaning wheels”.  I understand his request having owned a special edition pace car car many years ago with matching white wheels.  What if we could develop a self-cleaning wheel?  How cool would that be?

Katerine H. says while finish is important “durablility is king”, good thing our Chromtec® wheels are among the most durable on the road today.

Candice W.  wants a wheel finish that “matches other finishes on the car”, this is something we hear quite often (and we like it because we make grilles and other exterior trim as well).

Brad S., who drives a nice S6 by the way, indicated the Black Chrome is “really, really nice”.  Andrew W. indicated he thought the Iridium™ Chrome and Black Chrome were “very classy”.   Aaron D., Chris T. and others also commented on how much they liked those two finishes.

So there you have it, Audi Enthusiasts would love to see Black Chrome on their next new Audi!

Which wheel finish do you like?    Click here to take survey

If you would like to have more detailed information about this research just let us know by posting a comment here

Next Week:  Are wheels really THAT important?  Believe it or not, the answer is …………… (you’ll have to read the post)