Ok, so up first I should say that much of this information will not be groundbreaking, however, I wanted to share, as promised...
This morning (Sunday) my friend and I attended the LA Auto Show for an early morning reception hosted by BMW for the LA CCA chapter. BMW put out a nice pre-show spread for the group of about 70 people that gathered in the BMW booth.
The booth itself was tucked in the back corner of one of the two halls at the LA Convention Center. It was situated directly across from the Audi booth which was showing a bright yellow S4, three TT roadsters, but no TT coupes.
Anyway, back to BMW. The vehicles on display were 323 and 328 coupes, a 323 sedan, a Clean Energy car (7-series, I think), 540 Sport Wagon, an X5 (which will be coming out with a 3+litre 6-cylinder engine soon), an Imola Red M5, and a black/cream Z8. Not shown, as the introduction of it will be this Monday in Detroit, is the 323i convertible. Once that is introduced, it will appear on the LA floor. Brochures, however, were available, and the car appears on bmwusa.com. As others have stated here before, the E46 M3 was not on display.
Tom Salkowsky, BMW NA M Brand Manager spoke for about 10 minutes, then gave the floor over to another gentleman. I did not catch his name, but if the information that I received before the show is correct, his name was Rich Brekus, Manager, Products Planning & Strategy.
After both men spoke, the floor was opened up for questions. Sometime specific questions were answered rather ambiguously, or not at all, but I suppose that is to be expected. Anyway, to the dirt (if you can call it that!)...
Regarding the E46 M3’s appearance, Mr. Salkowsky stated that, “If you’ve seen the Frankfurt Auto Show display for the M3, then you’ve seen the production car.” When questioned on the “Satin Chrome” finish, he indicated that it will not be offered. After the show, when questioned about color options, he said there would be 2-4 specific M-colors, and he seemed very enthused about them. Someone questioned him about Avus Blue and he said that the blue he had seen was “Laguna” blue. Regarding the performance of the new M3, he was very enthused, grinning as he related how much en enjoyed driving it.
The other BMW gentleman (hereafter assumed to be Mr. Brekus) stated that there “Will definitely not be a V8.” Then he said, “Delivery for the new M3 will be late this year.”
When questioned about a 4-door version, Mr. Brekus said that BMW “was trying to resolve this issue.” He stated that from the standpoint of the US, it would be yes, but worldwide, no, the 4-door is just not that popular. He said if they sold 4000 of these cars here, they would only sell 500 in Germany.
When questioned on a M3 Wagon, Mr. Brekus asked “How niche do you go?” With a small market that would buy an M product, there was a question as to the validity of being even more specific within this area. He suggested if one was interested in such a product, for now they should settle(!) for a 540i sport wagon.
When asked about an M3 LTW, the answer was “There are no plans for a lightweight.” Talking about things that hike up the weight, electronics were touched upon, but there is no way to stop the encroachment of CPUs into the car, so weight savings will not be achieved there. Power windows? Manual lifts weigh more! We could leave out the air conditioning, but that killed the sales of the E36 LTW. Mr. Brekus said that if they were to build a LTW that was stripped, they would still get requests like, “I want the LTW, but I need AC,” or, “I want the LTW, but want a back seat.” Basically it sounded like they wouldn’t be able to sell the thing, so no go.
The new seats will have lumbar support, as do the sport seats in the E46 coupes.
On the E46 compact issue, BMW is reviewing it. Various comments throughout the presentation indicated that there was going to be some downmarket M something, I don’t know what. That’s just some editorializing on my part, just a vibe I thought I picked up on.
When questioned about the sequential manual gearbox, Mr. Brekus said it was not ready. I took this to mean that it is being worked on, but won’t be here right away.
There will be no 2002 revival.
The Ultimate Driving Experience will be back this year, and registration can be carried out through the bmwusa.com website. The focus will be on the X5 this time around. One of the events described will be a stationary semi-trailer with ramps on either side. Guests will be able to ride along in (but not drive!) an X5 as they are taken up and down the ramp. This is to highlight the X5’s hill descent control, technology brought in from Rover.
I asked Mr. Salkowsky a few questions directly regarding the new M3. Regarding DSC (Dynamic Stability Control) and whether it would be in the new M3, he said that if it made it to the M5 and Z8, well, what do you think? On the interior, he said that it won’t be radically different from the regular E46. “The best thing I can suggest is to go look at the 540i Sport Wagon over there, then look at the M5 here. That’s what is most likely to be the difference.” Gauges, trim, differentiation will be in the details.
I also asked about all-wheel drive, and he gestured to the X5 and indicated that the technology will trickle down, but nothing specific.
After asking these questions, we then took a look around the booth, I sat in the back of the X5 -- comfy, but not too exciting. The M5 was nice. The we went to the Z8 -- it is very pretty in person. I was the last person to sit in it before it was roped off from the general public! The interior is very nicely trimmed, though spartan. The car has a very powerful presence, and the M Power V8 looks awesome tucked under that hood! The posted price was $128,000 (plus a few bucks, but I forgot the actual figure). I am sure it will be a wonderful ride.
There was one aftermarket tuner that had an E30 M3 and an E36 M3 (maybe it was a LTW!) side-by-side. That was a fun treat!
Well, there you have it. Sorry there wasn’t more concrete BMW info. I was hoping that there might be, but we know how these things go. Sit and wait, sit and wait. And I am sure things will change, too.
If you are in the LA area and decide to go to the show, don’t go on the weekend. The show was PACKED. I’m glad we were into the hall before the show opened, giving us a head start on the rest of the crowd, but it filled up fast. Go midweek.
Chris Moore
chris_moore_at_compuserve.com