2.0 ltr 4 cyl turbos in the 5 Series and Z4 from September, 184 or 245 bhp and 270nm.
The 5 Series are badged 520i and 528i respectively, the latter being faster accelerating than the 272bhp 6cyl 530i and lower emissions.
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You've had the same e-mail newsletter as me...:-))
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Yep though that was not too informative, I needed to trawl the website to find out more.
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Be interesting to see if they replace the 6cyl engine in the US - they've always said they wouldn't sell anything with 4cyls there.
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The problem BMW have is that their wonderful petrol six has almost become their signature feature. I just don't 'want' a four pot petrol BMW in the same way I lust after a petrol six, however technically impressive and powerful the four pot is.
The diesels have forged a class leading reputation for themselves, and are judged on merit, but to me, and I suspect a lot of people who've grown up with the "good" BMWs being six pot powered, a four pot petrol BMW just isn't the same.
That six makes such a unique noise. You can hear one being driven hard several streets away, and that crisp, metallic howl immediately identifies it as a BMW. I remember even the lowly 320i I drove a while back felt special purely thanks to the sound quality and smoothness of that engine.
I know the world is moving on, and emissions figures reign supreme, but it's a shame to see the six disappearing up the range, and probably in time, altogether. That engine is what makes me want a BMW.
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>> I know the world is moving on, and emissions figures reign supreme, but it's a
>> shame to see the six disappearing up the range, and probably in time, altogether. That
>> engine is what makes me want a BMW.
It's a sign of the times as you say. BMW like many manufacturers has to produce cars that are affordable to run and meet emissions standards. I think they do well to produce straight six engines that return 30+ mpg considering the power outputs, but I suppose they are preparing for the future by producing smaller turbo charged engines like VAG with their 1.4 TSI engines and Fiats multi air units. How much longer will we see the turbo straight five in the Volvo's? Ford already have a turbo four lined up for the new hot Focus. At least I can say that I've lived with a BMW straight six and taken full advantage of it's merits. After owning V8's, V6's, straight fives, straight fours and boxer four's, the straight six was the best combination of smoothness, power and economy.
I think that the idea of going to a turbo four in Formula 1 was a bridge too far though. Go back to V10's at least I say.
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Ford also has 1.6 turbo engines for not so hot Focus and Mondeo models.
I am surprised it has taken so long for more companies to offer small(ish) turbo petrol units. My first was a Golf in 1999 followed by a Passat in 2000. I chose the Passat and Golf because I knew benefit in kind was moving to a tax based on emissions. The Passat admittedly emitted 192g/km of CO2 but that was eleven years ago. The Golf was 189 I think.
My new car (probably built this week) will be more powerful, more torquey and have lower emissions.... a 170PS diesel.
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>> Ford also has 1.6 turbo engines for not so hot Focus .............
They're in place of the former 2 litre petrol engines. I'd sooner have a lower stressed larger capacity engine than a highly stressed turbocharged smaller engine. Turbocharged engines may well have lower exhaust emissions, but I'm more interested in reliability than exhaust emisssions.
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>> They're in place of the former 2 litre petrol engines. I'd sooner have a lower
>> stressed larger capacity engine than a highly stressed turbocharged smaller engine. >>
A 1.6 turbo is likely to be less stressed than a 2.0 n/a needing to rev lower for the same performance etc.
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I know it's probably needed for emissions and fuel economy (in the UK at least) but I've lost all passion for BMW's now. It started with the misleading engine badging, then dropping of the 2.0i/2.2i 6cyl in favour of a 4 cyl and then the fact that 90% of all BMW's have the bleedin 2.0d engine I have just lost all my respect for them and they are just another mainstream eurobox.
BMW's for me was all about their 6cyl engines and the fact they had a bit of class, but now?
EDIT - DP sums it up 100%
Last edited by: nice but dim on Fri 8 Jul 11 at 10:32
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I agree re the confusing badging, the recent 325 / 525 having 3.0ltr engines etc
On the otherhand it make sence having, for instance, different version of a 2.0d engine rather than manufacturing perhaps four engines of differing capacity.
Re the new engines, it does not make sense calling a 2.0 turbo a 528i however, better if they were 520i, 520ti etc.
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I think they are assuming most of their customers wont care about the actual engine capacities, just what it will feel like - and given that most of these will be company cars the reduced emissions will be very welcome.
I agree with all the comments about the 6 cylinder engines, lovely machines.
I think BMW have kept up their build quality whereas Merc and Audi have wobbled and they still make many cars I'd be very happy with.
MPZ
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>> I think BMW have kept up their build quality whereas Merc and Audi have wobbled
Up to a point, yes. However, one thing that you'll see reported all over the internet from Forums through to the HJ site is that their turbos are the weakest link. (Sadly backed up by my own experience).
The only way that I would have gone back to BMW in the future is to buy one with a petrol engine. Now that BMW have started adding turbos to petrol engines I won't consider them until I see convincing evidence that they have really fixed the turbo problem.
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Although I agree with what DP says about BMWs losing their lustre with the disappearance of the beloved straight six, I don't blame BMW for it.
The sad fact is that most people are so focused on paper emission figures and company car tax that they've forgotten that cars ought to have soul and verve too. Just like many (most?) BMW owners have no idea their car is RWD, they probably didn't know or care that it may have had the perfectly balanced straight six either. They may have thought it just "sounded nice" and are now happy to give that up to save a few quid on tax...
So in a sense, we as the buyer, get the cars we deserve. Of course the EU fines for having high manufacturer fleet emissions have their part to play in this tragedy too.
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Good points, oilburner and I whole heartedly agree.
It's the whole focus on fuel economy / emissions, whether it's BiK taxation for company cars, VED (including outrageous year 1 rates for high groups), the forthcoming manufacturer average emissions fines, high fuel prices and so on. This has crept into our motoring subconscious in recent years, and its only when you think about it that you realise how much it has changed the world.
Like you, I don't blame BMW, and actually I don't really blame us. There's only so much you can bend over for the Treasury before it becomes too painful. :-(
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I well understand the pain DP, the only problem is, if everyone takes one shuffle to the left to cut back on the tax bills and fuel duty, then the chancellor soon notices and moves the goal posts sharply in quick pursuit! :D
Maybe we should all grin and bear it, pay the taxes and enjoy what we get for our dough... The amount we pay in tax will always be the same (or more), so we're just boxing ourselves into a corner by trying to buy more ever efficient cars, IMHO. :)
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Has anyone actually tried one yet? Maybe reserve judgement till then. The facts of the matter are cars are getting ever more affordable, with ever increasing performance. Park the nostalgia and keep the faith!
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These can't be any worse than the current 4 pots that's for sure.
I love the BMW straight 6. Although I need to own a v8 BMW M60 or M62 at some point in my life, it has to be done. cgi.ebay.co.uk/1996-BMW-840Ci-INDIVIDUAL-EXCEPTIONAL-SPECIFICATION-/280705697739?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item415b5d07cb#ht_4564wt_1396
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Why not better than the sixes? Drop the prejudice and be open to new ideas! Stop being so conservative and embrace the change!
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I've driven the current 4's (although not the newest 184bhp / 60mpg 2.0d) and own a 6... :-)
I don't reckon a BMW fan who spent his hard earned on a Skoda can be fairly called prejudiced! It's one of the excellent 2.0TSi engines, better than any BMW 4 pot currently available, but is it better than a BMW 6 pot? Maybe in some specific areas but there's no question in my mind which is the better engine.
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Fair dues, if you have tried the new four pot Turbo petrols and don't think they are as good as the old sixers. I thought these engines were coming out later this year, so wasn't aware that they are available already.
Just gets my goat how we all carp on about how things were better in the past blah, blah, blah.
I have an octavia with the 1.8 tsi in it so share your view on these vag engines
Last edited by: nick1975 on Sat 9 Jul 11 at 07:24
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Are these the same ones as were jointly developed with PSA and are being usedy alreay?
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My personal experience of the BMW 6 cylinder turbo-diesel in the 2009 330d is that I've never driven any better engineered car let alone one with a better engine. I know their petrol 6s rev well but even the diesel lump sounds pretty good when extended and it delivers a great combination of fuel economy, refinement, power and torque - and better real world economy than VAG 4 cylinder diesels in my experience.
Alas, as a habitual company car driver I'll be looking to a 4-pot next time, but anything with decent torque and more than 200PS interests me, I'd really like the twin-turbo 2.0D (from the 123d) to be transplanted into the 3 or 5 series and I hope this happens as the de-tuned 325d / 525d become less attractive on emissions grounds.
Having driven the VAG 1.4TSi I can accept that small capacity petrols can drive well and my long held prejudice about there being 'no substitute for cubes' is quickly eroding.
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>> but anything with decent torque and more than 200PS interests me, I'd really like the
>> twin-turbo 2.0D (from the 123d) to be transplanted into the 3 or 5 series and
>> I hope this happens as the de-tuned 325d / 525d become less attractive on emissions
>> grounds.
I can vouch for the 204bhp 123d being a cracker, well your wish has come true, the new 2011 model 525d has dropeed the 3.0ltr six for a 218bhp version of the 2.0d, I am assuming it is twin turbo as per the 123d.
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Crossed wires Nick, i've driven the current 320i and the recent 320d, i don't think the new turbo's have got to even the journo's yet.
For what it's worth, i'm optimistic about the new 4 turbo's vs. current 4's.
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>> Why not better than the sixes? Drop the prejudice and be open to new ideas!
>> Stop being so conservative and embrace the change!
I partly bought my previous BMW 323i for the sound. Show me a four cylinder than sounds as good as a straight six. Although I accept that forced induction four cylinder engines can produce enough power and torque to please anyone, and create a better balance in the car due to their lighter weight.
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Modern technology means smaller capacity engines can deliver all the power and driveability of bigger ones.
But there isn't any way as far as I know of giving a four the acoustic qualities of a six.
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>> I partly bought my previous BMW 323i for the sound.
I prefer my car to be as quiet as possible, so as not to annoy residents or pedestrians.
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>> I prefer my car to be as quiet as possible, so as not to annoy
>> residents or pedestrians.
Come on mr snail, a nice big v8 with a lumpy cam burble. Your neighbours would smile and the kids would ask how fast it goes!
In reality the neighbours would demand an asbo and the kids would throw rocks :-( :-( :-(
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>> I prefer my car to be as quiet as possible, so as not to annoy
>> residents or pedestrians.
Another joy of the BMW six. Quiet and with plenty of decorum at town speeds. Only when you open it up does it sing. And you'd only open it up in an area where residents or pedestrians are not a factor.
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>> I prefer my car to be as quiet as possible, so as not to annoy
>> residents or pedestrians.
Sound and volume are two completely different things.
Last edited by: corax on Tue 26 Jul 11 at 17:24
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Interesting thread, particularly for me as I drive a VAG 2.0 TSI every day (Octavia vRS) and a BMW straight-six for fun (10-year-old Z3 2.2).
They're both brilliant engines, among the best of their kind, with excellent torque giving low-rev pulling power worthy of a diesel. Both are more economical than I expected them to be (30 - 36 mpg, and probably up to 40 if I had the patience to cruise at 60 mph on motorways). Both are exceptionally smooth: you could balance a glass of water on the bonnet of either car with the engine idling without the water spilling.
The Skoda is the quieter of the two (as you'd expect of an estate versus a semi-sporting convertible), but as DP and others well know there's something special about the sound of a six, particularly a straight-six. It'll be a sad day if the six disappears: surely the challenge now is for an engineer to come up with a six which is as eco-friendly as a four.
Is it worth keeping the Z3 for 4,000 miles a year or so? No of course it isn't, especially as SWMBO has a Mini Cooper convertible. But I'm keeping it for as long as I can afford to. After all, I didn't buy it for any sort of logical reason in the first place.u
Last edited by: Avant on Sat 9 Jul 11 at 12:19
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>>Both are exceptionally smooth: you could balance a glass of water on the bonnet of either car with the engine idling without the water spilling.
I seem to recall seeing a coin on its edge sitting on the cam-cover of a Lexus V8 !
www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHsx9G_oQ0U
There it is ;-)
Last edited by: Lygonos on Sat 9 Jul 11 at 20:58
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Lexus's achievement with the smoothness of that V8 is almost legendary.
The old format Top Gear did the water test back in 1990, taking the then new LS400 engine to 6500 RPM without a drop spilling.
For comparison they repeated the exercise on a BMW 735i and a Mercedes S Class. Spillage wasn't really the main problem, as both lobbed the entire glass clean off the top of the engine.
It used to be on YouTube, but it seems BBC Worldwide has had it removed on copyright grounds :-(
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The link I posted shows a 50p on it's edge on top of the Lexus V8 as it is revved repeatedly to 6500rpm - I'd imagine that's more impressive than than the Top Gear "water test"!
There is a vid of a BMW V12 doing something similar with a pound coin, but that's easier to balance, especially between the ribs of the camcover ;-)
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I partly bought my previous BMW 323i for the sound. Show me a four cylinder than sounds as good as a straight six.
To anyone reading this thread in twenty years' time it'll sound like dewy eyed nostalgia for steam engines and horse brasses.
}:---)
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We will soon be reminiscing about the sound of a four cylinder engine as opposed to the whine of our electric buggies
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Yes and no...the new 4 pot turbo engines can do the job of getting from a to b as well as anything, but it's the character and soul that's missing. The naturally aspirated straight six is about as perfect as engineering solution you can imagine for a 4 stroke internal combustion engine (except maybe for a V12...). Everything else is a compromise, so it's difficult to imagine that's it's really progress going to ever smaller, harder working engines, more like forced back tracking by emissions crazy politicians.
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I agree, OB: there's a satisfaction to be had from certain machines that goes beyond simply getting the job done. My hand-wound mechanical watch is less accurate than a £10 Casio but looks, feels and sounds so much nicer that I accept the compromises involved. And I may occasionally have mentioned that my five-cylinder Volvo engine is a more pleasing machine than the equally efficacious four-cylinder Toyota with which it shares our drive.
But even staying with the Volvo example, on congested Southeast roads, five cylinders don't get me home from work any sooner than four - you and I have agreed on this before - and I have no problem with adopting newer technology if it takes my share of the earth's finite resources a little closer to fair. If a multi-cylinder engine uses an unnecessary amount of fuel to do the job, it isn't a perfect solution, however nice it sounds.
Nothing crazy - for once - about the politics either. Emissions is a serious issue, not a myth or a conspiracy, and it would be a crazy politician that didn't offer incentives to the adoption of cleaner, less damaging technologies.
Last edited by: WillDeBeest on Mon 11 Jul 11 at 10:45
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You're right of course WdB. And I will grudgingly accept 4 and 3 cylinder cars and perhaps be a little pleased that my tax and fuel bill will be otherwise lower than it might have been, but every time I see a nice well kept N/A BMW (or other) straight six engined car go by, I will probably shed a little tear... :)
My point on the emissions is more to do with the share of the burden that motorists in the EU are asked to make, when other great CO2 producers (or indeed oil consumers) are largely let off the hook. Although I do think that there may be more to the science of global warming than we know at present, which might render current thinking wrong on the subject, or at least only partly correct.
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Best sounding 6 cylinder engine is the old Alfa 3 litre V6 I reckon...
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I agree with much of what has been said. We run an E220 CDI estate as our main car, which is excellent in all respects, fast, smooth and comfortable, with decent mpg. I am lucky enough to also have an E30 325i convertible for fun, which has that glorious 6 under the bonnet. Both cars have near as damn it the same bhp, but the experience is so different! The merc pulls like a train when the turbo cuts in and makes indecent progress for such a beast. The bmw takes a little longer to motivate, but when it does the metallic howl is something to behold. Makes me smile every time I hear it! I used to run a Leon Cupra with a 4 pot turbo petrol, a great engine and very quick, but just a bit soulless. I guess we're in a place where there are those that treat a car a white good, and will go with what's cheapest, the purists who will go with the heart, and the in-betweeners who will buy a BMW because it's a great drivers car, but compromise on a 4-pot because of the expense of fuel.
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And the new 1 Series 5dr features two versions of a 1.6 turbo unit in the 116i and 118i with 136 and 170bhp respectively.
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New BMW turbo petrol engines - Stuartli
