HPA R32 Stage II Test Drive

(That's Marcel and the R32 in the pic)

BACKGROUND

After reading the recent reviews of the HPA R32, I decided to put a deposit down with HPA to hold a Jan/Feb spot for a Stage II R32 conversion. Before committing fully, though, I wanted to take a test drive, so I extended a west-coast trip to visit HPA on the 17th and took a drive in their "house" Euro-based R32 Stage II.

My main interest in the R32 was to get sub-4-second car with good handling, steering, and traction that can be a primary or 2ndary road car. Initially, I had an M3 and was thinking of getting an AWD car anyway, so the extra $ for the R32 didn't seem too bad for the performance. I traded the M3 (2002, w/ SMG) for an RS6 a few weeks ago, so I now have a "pretty fast" AWD road sedan. As background, most recently before the M3 I had a 2000 M5.

My key questions:

- How good a daily driver would it be?
- Seats, clutch, gearbox, seats, suspension, overall handling, stereo.
- How hard is it to drive?
- How fast is it?
- How does it drive, accelerate, and handle at speed?

Comments/questions on this to: hpa@freedman.net

One note: Many of the roads we too, especially where we did street starts and cornering, had salt and gravel on the road from the "monster" few inches of snow they had in the Vancouver area. This didn't help traction, certainly.

BOTTOM LINE

I'm going to go for the Stage II HPA mod. The only thing I've asked for, to ensure I can use it as a main car, is a power-control switch to take the car down to 320hp-ish, or even 400hp, as 550 can be a bit of a bear to drive gently in 1st and 2nd.

REVIEW SUMMARY

It's definitely an amazing car, in the tuned-viper class - well above the M3, M5, RS6, and tuned S4s I've driven. Vicious and linear torque from 3500 to 7000. Minimal turbo lag; almost none if kept above 3500.

Steering, seats, clutch, shifter, ride - all good. Good enough for daily driving. Tight but smooth. More below.

The combination of instant torque and relatively little throttle travel means that you need to be light as a feather on the throttle. You do NOT want to get oscillation going in this thing...

In terms of handling, well, it may take a bit of driving to get used to ripping around corners well - in part due to the throttle travel and response, and in part due to the intense torque and lack of wide 20" tires in back.

Stopping was very strong but unlike the throttle, not overly sensitive.

The bad $ news: the modifications, with brake, suspension, and gear upgrades, are going to exceed the $25k reported cost.

The good $ news: even with a new R32 as food, the whole thing costs less than the $75k for a used low-mileage RS6 or new 2004 E55 AMG.

Compared to the M3, M5, and RS6: Clearly better acceleration, enough that pulling seriously from any of them is not going to be an issue - and with clearly better traction than the Ms. The RS6 isn't nearly as linear in delivering its 450-520 (tuned) hp - even with the same
turbos as the HPA kit.

Better handling than the M5 and RS6 - probably better than the M3 but the touchy acceleration and modified steering response on the HPA car leave me unsure.

Compared to the E55 and S55 AMGs I test-drove: This has the same or better neck-straining torque WITH much more traction. It still fights for traction, but actually puts a lot more down than the AMGs can.

Highway driving comfortably (ride harshness, road noise, straight-line comfort at speed) is better than an M3 and a bit under the M5 and RS6 - but as good as any $30-45k car I've driven, including the G35, and good enough for long trips.

Most importantly, I'm comfortable that HPA understands the reliability issues with the engine and transmission. I'm not a software guy, and am not a serious car geek myself, but I know enough to recognize fellow geeks when I meet them. These guys know their shit.

DAILY DRIVING

Daily driving summary: To be a comfortable daily driver, you are going to need to get very good at throttle moderation (see below), but all else is good to great for daily use. I may keep two cars mainly to have a non-stick car I can drive easily on trips to and around the traffic hellhole that is the DC area.

Details:

- Acceleration. This thing is a roaring beast. To tame it, you need to be sensitive. Once you're moving and past 2nd there is no problem in the straight, or for lane changes.

The great news: Throttle response is damn fast, and the torque curve comes up relatively low, serious by 3000rpm-ish and constant to near-redline. You definitely need to ease into and out of it if you don't want the g's to cause violence to the passengers or wheels. Very little turbo lag.

The not-so-great news: Unless you're a track star, cornering is going to be a bit of a challenge. Even getting a fast start without upsetting g-sensitive people or attracting the cops is going to be a challenge in the Stage II config. I've asked to get an intermediate power mode that works on the fly to crank boost down, using the last 150hp or so during daily driving as a safer period of super-boost when at speed.

We actually took a brief drive with the control for the boost disabled, taking the car to 320hp or so. Even then there was some ability to do more than just chirp the wheels in 1st but it was much more manage-able at low speed - though I'm not sure it was as fast as the M3 in that mode.

- Traction control. With traction control on, it was very drive-able. Once Marcel realized we had it on, he disabled it for the rest of our run. I played just a bit with it on vs. off, but didn't get a good enough feel for whether I'd want it on usually.

- Braking was great, and fast without being overly sensitive. Engine-braking was easy, no nastiness involved.

- The armrest was installed on the HPA R32 and I didn't put it down; maybe Marcel can comment on whether it interferes with the shifting when down.

- Seats were good. I'm moderately wide-body myself and I could see driving a few hours in the seats. Like the M3 and M5 seats, they're not plush. I can drive 3-4 hours without trouble in the M3 and the M5, but some people (mostly fellow wide-bodies) can't.

- Clutch/shift action was good (both are modified for Stage II). Throw was good, finding gears was easy. Not in the same class as the Integra - no "snick snick" on shifting, but the gears were easy to find and the throw was nice with the HPA-installed gear set w/ short-shifter. Gearing was good for driving, with the HPA gears. You could hold the clutch in for a light cycle pretty easily if you needed to.

- The steering on the HPA R32 was modified and felt sloppy. It wasn't that the car didn't handle well, but it didn't FEEL as connected as the M3 and M5. Not even as connected as the RS6. HPA says that's because of the way it's tuned, and the mods won't change the stock tight feel.

- Ride height on their R32 was a bit low for my preference, but not insanely low. HPA says they can keep the car at stock height even with the suspension upgrade, and have it perform well. One issue we had was some crunch-down on the front tires on hard cornering. Marcel showed me what was up - they had wider-than-stock tires on and the front wells are thicker at top than the rears, something that will be addressed as part of the mods.

- The exhaust sound was good until 4000 rpm or so, but then had a slightly uncomfortable note, like the engine was being choked or like vaguely bad bearings. It wasn't really unpleasant, but it wasn't as nice as the M3, M5, and RS6 notes are throughout the range. Part of the mod being explored is apparently a bypass of the exhaust beyond 4000 rpm-ish.

When we got back from the drive, I noticed that the twin exhaust was sticking out a bit from the back. It turns out that the exhaust EXPANDS by an inch or so with spirited driving...

- Tight ride, but comfortable over gravelly concrete, concrete, and asphalt. Ride quality was better than the M3, about the same as the RS6, maybe a bit more harsh than the M5 - but not much more. Very much more comfortable than an Evo or STI.

- Road noise: Moderate. The R32 was > the M3, which was > the RS6, which was more than the M5. But clearly less than an Evo or STI.

- In terms of reliability, I get the feeling that this really should be a reliable car. With 5k miles on it, the HPA car has had its clutch, transmission, and just about everything else nailed many times and it is still tight, no rattles, no slippage, and easy to drive. They had a beetle apart to slap AWD in and if it isn't clear from their web site, these guys clearly are experts in what the VW systems can do.

FAST DRIVING

This car is just as confident going fast as the M3, M5, and RS6. While it doesn't look heavy, the 3600+ lbs lurking under the shell obviously helps a lot. It was comfortable even with the sloppier-than-stock steering response.

We did a couple of runs, won't say where or how fast, but let's just say that the scenery seemed to be running by faster than the one 140mph+ track experience I've had. And the speedo needle was cranked almost all the way to the lower right.

Aside from wondering why we hadn't achieved liftoff velocity yet, the car really felt well controlled and confident even at the high 1XX speeds.

Turbo lag, again, not an issue. Throttle response, almost instant. Have to be careful until you're in about 4th not to spin all four wheels...

I won't ever be taking it that fast, but it's easy to feel that it can do 200+mph. Marcel claims that properly launched it should even be able to do 3 sec 0-60, and that the first run on one of the reviews was < 3.4. I believe it.

RANDOM NOTES

- HPA is planning looking at jacking into the digital LCD between the gauges that gives oil alarms, to provide a boost gauge.

- HPA says the US-spec R32 will have a more aggressive traction control system that would seriously fight the car to 60 (and I bet beyond). Apparently there's some R&D to be done to modify that.

- There is an unused spot on the dash where a pop-out nav/dvd system could go. Good news, if that translates for the US model.

- As mentioned above, in order to be comfortable selling the RS6 and making the Stage II R32 my daily driver, I'm probably going to need a detuning toggle to take it to the 330-400hp range for around-the-town driving. I need to be able to do at least m5 speeds without having to
do super-violent 4-wheels-spinning launches.

EDITORIAL NOTE ON DRIVING IN THE NORTHWEST

By the way, I can't believe how bad and slow the drivers are in the Pacific Northwest. It seems to be pretty standard to hang out in the left-hand lane going 5 miles under the speed limit...

I notice this every time I go up there. Seems like driving the R32 around would be an exercise in frustration, even stock :)