Why The Audi TT And Audi R8 Look Totally Different In Canada

Nearly 26 years since it entered production, it’s safe to say that the original Audi TT is iconic. Not only is it a brilliant example of taking a relatively normal platform and dressing it up well, but its Bauhaus-inspired styling is unmistakable, and generally considered beautiful. For the most part, it was beautiful, except in Canada, where differing bumper laws led the Mk1 TT to grow strange protrusions from its bumpers.

See, while Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards and Canadian Motor Vehicle Safety Standards are closely aligned, they aren’t always exact. For instance, Canada mandated daytime running lights way back in 1990, but daytime running lights aren’t mandatory in America.

While that’s a relatively small thing to sort, the previous misalignment of bumper laws was a much bigger deal. I’ll let the Canadian government’s own document from when bumper laws were changed do the talking:

Canada and the United States introduced safety standards for bumpers in the early 1970’s. When the Canadian and the United States safety standards were originally introduced, they were harmonized with a test speed of 5 mph (8 km/h) for front and rear impacts and 3 mph (4.8 km/h) for corner impact tests. However, in 1979, the United States added more stringent requirements that included cosmetic damage criteria, while maintaining the original test speeds and safety components damage protection requirements. In 1982, the United States reduced the test speeds to 2.5 mph (4 km/h) for front and rear impacts and 1.5 mph (2.4 km/h) for corner impacts, and maintained their cosmetic and safety damage requirements

Yep, while Canada never pursued the same cosmetic damage requirements as America’s bumper laws, its full-width test speed of 5 mph, or 8 km/h, stayed in place long after 1982. In fact, harmonization with U.S. bumper testing speeds wasn’t announced until 2008. Now, this wasn’t a huge deal for most cars that were engineered to Canadian standards from the start, but the Audi TT was a bit different. For whatever reason, the American bumpers didn’t pass Canadian bumper testing, and Audi needed to come up with a solution quickly and on the cheap.

Some members of the TT community call these ‘tumor’ bumpers, partly because they’re unsightly lumps and partly because they can be removed with a little bit of surgery. See, they’re held on with hardware that goes through holes in a normal bumper cover, so you can theoretically remove the bumper covers, remove the hardware, pull off the bumper sausages, fill the holes with plastic repair compound, sand smooth, and have the bumper covers repainted, but it’s a rather labor-intensive process. However, if you leave them be, they do offer an odd appearance.

They almost look like echoes of old-school metal bumpers trying to burst through the skin of the car, and while the rear one could be acceptable, the front bumper bulge looks, well, bad. It’s hard to imagine these tacked-on alterations sitting well with the designer because they seriously affect the minimalist looks of what was a landmark car from a styling standpoint.

Believe it or not, the Mk1 TT wasn’t the only Audi to get Canada-specific bumperettes. Since the law wasn’t amended until mid-2008, some early Canadian-market Audi R8s sported bumperettes of their own, and man, were they ever lumpy. Sure, they were only mounted to the front of the R8, but check out this photo of a Canadian-market 2008 R8 that sold on Cars & Bids. Not only do they look tacked on, they quite literally are tacked on, held in place with a mixture of fasteners and adhesives. A good body shop can remove them, but it’s definitely not a DIY activity.

While Audi’s tacked-on bumperettes are awkward and labor-intensive to rectify, they certainly beat the approach that Pontiac used for the Holden-built GTO, and Mitsubishi used for any Evo prior to the tenth one — simply skipping Canada. Even though we at The Autopian are generally fans of bumpers that can actually take a bump, the form factor of these Canadian-market devices leaves something to be desired. Call it great intentions but bad execution. Mind you, there might be people with global bumpers who actually want the Canadian-market add-ons, and vice versa, so who knows? Maybe you can do a bumper exchange in the comments.

(Photo credits: Kijiji seller, Cars & Bids)

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Thomas Hundal

Thomas is a Nu Rave-blaring, heel-toe downshifting, maple syrup-swilling, chassis-geeking, junkyard parts-hauling, floppy-haired Toronto-based scenester who’s been writing about cars since college. His current fleet includes a 2006 BMW 325i with the six-speed manual gearbox and a 1999 Porsche Boxster with the five-speed manual.

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