Audi A8 4.2 TDI: Road test

TopGear has made a road test with the world's strongest diesel, the Audi A8 4.2 TDI.

Normally, when someone builds a prodigiously powerful V8 diesel, they take it to a boatyard and bolt it to the back of a powerboat. It's the right and sensible thing to do.

But in this case there was clearly an embarrassing mix-up, possibly involving the word 'flagship'.

You see when Audi's finest engineers created a 321bhp engine with enough torque to lug an oil rig off its moorings, instead of installing it in some kind of high-performance motor launch, some chump got the wrong idea and dropped it into a high-end executive car by mistake.

Red faces all round. And that, car fans, is the true story of how Audi's A8 4.2 TDI came to be the most powerful diesel production car in the world. Only, of course, it isn't. It happened because Audi wanted to be the first German manufacturer to bring an überdiesel saloon to the diesel-hungry British market.

GermanCarBlog, Audi A8

Source: TopGear, picture by Audi

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