CORRECTION 905.845.6653 www.lockwoodchrysler.com Oakville D or v al D r Ker rS t Speers Rd Wyecroft Rd QEW Please be advised that the August 19th edition of The Oakville Beaver had an error in the Lockwood advertisement. The 2010 RAM Truck showed as a monthly payment. The payments indicated are actually bi-weekly payments. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. w w w . o a kv ill eb ea ve r.c o m O A KV IL LE B EA V ER W e dn es da y, A ug us t 2 5, 2 01 0 1 8 Audi A8 L has the three Ps: Presence, Power and Poise Continued on page 17 With all the tourists, their cars and buses, the streets were clogged. And on the tiny streets in the old town centre, maneuvering the big A8 L with this 5.2- metre length and more than six feet of width (6.39 ft), it was a chore. I couldnt wait to get back on the auto- bahn to peace, quiet and the pace of the car. The 147 km from Salzberg to our hotel in downtown Munich took just under two, leisurely, hours. Sadly there is not room to list all the technological advances in this car but the control network in the A8 L has more the 1,500 individual wires, seven computer buses and 100 control units. One breakthrough is the LED head- lights that are standard on the W12 and optional on the V8 in Europe. As for Canada, well have to wait and see. Each unit houses 76 light emitting diodes (LEDs) that use only 40 watts of power per unit. Designed to last the life of the A8 L, they have a luminosity of close to daylight. As an aside, each taillight had 72 LEDs. But perhaps the best techno feature is the MMI nav- igation plus system, which operates with the aid of a high-capacity hard disk, has a touch-sensitive control pad known as MMI touch. The driver or passenger can input his/her navigation destination or a telephone number simply by writing the letters or numerals on the pad with a finger. Acoustic feedback makes this possible without taking ones eyes off the road. The navigation system cooperates with the assis- tance and safety systems in an innovative way. It regis- ters the topography of the road in advance and makes this data available to the control units for the automat- ic transmission, headlights and adaptive cruise control with Stop & Go function. Thanks to their advanced intelligence, these systems can identify complex scenar- ios and offer the driver support in good time. Lastly, the night view assistant uses a thermal imag- ing camera to identify pedestrians on the road ahead of the car. If it considers the situation to be potentially danger- ous, the image of the person on the road is shown in red and a warning signal is heard. Price, well, I was told about $100,000 for the V8 and for the W12, if we get it, there was no comment but fig- ure around $130,000-$140,000. Get ready because A8 L is poised to crack the domain of the BMW 7 Series and the S-Class Mercedes with presence, power and poise. The interior abounds in leather and wood trim. The front seats can be adjusted 22 ways and the climate control has upper and lower temperature settings.