Andrew

I am so registered.. yhus!

The scoopers at CarScoop just received an email from the product manager of the German-based creative agency Dorten about the Countdown to BMW M3 event held at the Nurburgring in Germany. The email read: “In September 2007, BMW will invite a selected group of international participants for an exclusive test-drive of the new BMW M3 Coupé at the Nürburgring race track in Germany. The two day event is called „Countdown to BMW M3″ and will be the very first opportunity to experience the new BMW M3 Coupé, at the same time as the world premiere at the Frankfurt Motor Show is taking place”. The two day event will take place on September 19 - 20th 2007. Driving sessions of the new 2008 BMW M3 will be held on the second day of the event. The winners will be selected by BMW and will be notified by August 31st, 2007. Head over to BMW’s Countdown to BMW M3 site to register. Click through for the teaser video about the event.

SAC; that’s BMW’s new term for its new BMW X6 - and that’s because it’s not really an SUV. When speculation on the BMW X6 first started, it was said to have a slanted roof line. Well now according to recent spy shots and these renderings from our friends over at CarMagazine, it is now confirmed that the new BMW X6 will be the Bavarian manufacturer’s oddest looking 4×4. As you can see from the renderings, the BMW X6 is expected to have a pretty steep slanting roofline, close to that of that Mercedes-Benz CLS. Obviously as room in the backseat is dramatically reduced, there will be no third-row seating as with the BMW X5. The BMW X6 concept is set to debut at the Frankfurt Auto Show in September with production to begin at BMW’s Spartanburg plant in South Carolina. When the production version debuts in mid-2008, expect engine sizes to be similar to the BMW X5 with a 3.0 liter petrol and diesel, as well as a 4.8 liter V8 355 horsepower range topper. Photo Rendering: BMW X6 SAC Gallery:

Seeing as they have been developed over many years of J-Stock racing and are a complete matched suspension kit. Sways, shocks, springs, camber and all mountings. I have a fair idea of how a car should handle and my racecar does a pretty good job.

More useful comments: Bring back the E30 into mainstream production. Badass

Ya don't want big and safe when your 16! any E34 worth getting is hard to get insurance on at your age.

Carl - just did the same render. Took 10 minutes on the work computer hah. (Mac Pro 8 Cores) rendering over a fibrechannel network with a 32 core render farm (the other Mac Pros)

DVDs are super compressed and very low quality video anyway.

Ladies Mile BMW Wreckers - Sam - 0800 269 992

DV PAL video is at 720 * 576 - which is the correct aspect ratio with non-sq pixels

Wow - that takes some serious talent Burnout in green 320 = GHEY

Sure - DVDs have CSS encryption - so you need DVD Decrypt (Google). That will rip the VIDEO_TS folder (the easiest way) then you can do what you want with the VTS files. Programs like Cinematize allow you to pop open individual VTSes and go straight to a native MPEG2 stream.

Hi - welcome aboard. Popped an email to you guys the other day RE manifold. Where did you get and what are the throttle bodies you used? Cheers

I think the basic jist.. and something i've said for so many years now.. It's no E30

Next year guys - no warning this year.

The latest BMW M3 is faster and more sophisticated than ever, but is that a good thing? Last weekend I caught up on some early reviews of the new 414-horsepower BMW M3. You can pretty much sum up all of the accolades in a quick factoid from Gerhard Richter, vice president of BMW M Power, who said in Motor Trend that the V-8-powered M3 clocked 3.4 seconds faster on the Nürburgring Nordschleife than the V-10 M5. That’s 8:10 a lap. He added: “I could do that while talking to you as I drive.” But there’s another side to that story. In the same Motor Trend review, Angus Mackenzie, the magazine’s editor in chief, called the E92 M3 “a pussycat around town.” And he wasn’t the only one. What Car? said it was “comfortable and well equipped, and is as eminently suitable as an everyday car as it is at home on racetracks.” AutoWeek said it was “not quite as tactile in its actions, perhaps, as the car it replaces.” And Car thought that “in trying to hit so many targets, the E92 leaves purists wanting.” Kind of sounds like the bean counters have turned the M3 into an AMG: all big engine and great numbers and a drive that’s too refined. My friend Jared, who’s had far more track time than I’ll ever see, is more harsh. “Haven’t driven the new iteration,” he wrote in an e-mail. “BMW hasn’t made a genuine M3 since the E36. Motorsport means fleet, not just fast, and certainly not fat. Americans want fat, obviously.” (He’s referring to the fact that 50 percent of M3s will be sold in America when it goes on sale next spring.) Jared also thinks the M3 has been on a downward slide since the E30, when it was a homologation special built to square up against the Ford Sierra Cosworth and the Mercedes-Benz 190E 2.3-16 in the World Touring Car Championship; when its sole purpose was to satisfy racing regulations and not to be profitable, i.e., the good ol’ days. Me? I loved the E46 M3 (Competition Edition) but can see Jared’s point. And therein lies the conundrum of the day. Just because the M3 didn’t start life as a daily driver does it mean it shouldn’t, with modern engineering and materials, evolve into one? At this point I need to admit to burying the lede. Jared and I began this discussion while driving an Audi R8 to Lime Rock Park for the American Le Mans Series race last weekend. And I bring up the R8 only because neither Jared nor I have driven the M3, and the R8 serves as a pretty good example of what I’m getting at. The R8 is fast. Its 0-to-60 is 4.6 seconds. We didn’t get a chance to put it through its paces (as if I have the ability) or even do a burnout, but on the winding roads along the Housatonic River leading up to Lime Rock, the R8 felt as good as the best cars I’ve driven on this kind of road. When the windows are down, the R8 sounds like an eruption. When they’re up, you could easily forget you’re in a 420-horsepower sports car. It’s that quiet. Which could be good or bad. I don’t have the $120,000 to buy an R8, so I don’t know if after spending $120,000 on a sports car whether I’d want to hear it or not. Remember the days when you didn’t have a choice? Sports cars were, by definition, loud and difficult. The Testarossa’s gearbox was awful. The Diablo’s rear window was useless (well, so I’m told). The two things I recall of my first drive in a Porsche 944 were the height of the seats and feeling every bump in the road. But things are different now. I’ve been in an Audi RS4 on the track… and it goes. On the road it’s as easy to drive as an S4. The same goes for the R8. But could they be too perfect, as the reviewers are saying about the M3? Purist is a word that gets thrown around, but for people like Jared, I think that simplifies the emotion. They long for some semblance of the idea (or soul or spirit) behind the original car �" or maybe they just want to feel more of the road. My position on the matter depends on the day you talk to me. For the most part, I fall for the “best of both worlds” argument. My back can’t stand up to long encounters with “track-tuned” suspensions. I rely on navigation too much. But then there are days when I wonder if there’s something we’re engineering away that we’ll never get back.

The latest BMW M3 is faster and more sophisticated than ever, but is that a good thing? Last weekend I caught up on some early reviews of the new 414-horsepower BMW M3. You can pretty much sum up all of the accolades in a quick factoid from Gerhard Richter, vice president of BMW M Power, who said in Motor Trend that the V-8-powered M3 clocked 3.4 seconds faster on the Nürburgring Nordschleife than the V-10 M5. That’s 8:10 a lap. He added: “I could do that while talking to you as I drive.” But there’s another side to that story. In the same Motor Trend review, Angus Mackenzie, the magazine’s editor in chief, called the E92 M3 “a pussycat around town.” And he wasn’t the only one. What Car? said it was “comfortable and well equipped, and is as eminently suitable as an everyday car as it is at home on racetracks.” AutoWeek said it was “not quite as tactile in its actions, perhaps, as the car it replaces.” And Car thought that “in trying to hit so many targets, the E92 leaves purists wanting.” Kind of sounds like the bean counters have turned the M3 into an AMG: all big engine and great numbers and a drive that’s too refined. My friend Jared, who’s had far more track time than I’ll ever see, is more harsh. “Haven’t driven the new iteration,” he wrote in an e-mail. “BMW hasn’t made a genuine M3 since the E36. Motorsport means fleet, not just fast, and certainly not fat. Americans want fat, obviously.” (He’s referring to the fact that 50 percent of M3s will be sold in America when it goes on sale next spring.) Jared also thinks the M3 has been on a downward slide since the E30, when it was a homologation special built to square up against the Ford Sierra Cosworth and the Mercedes-Benz 190E 2.3-16 in the World Touring Car Championship; when its sole purpose was to satisfy racing regulations and not to be profitable, i.e., the good ol’ days. Me? I loved the E46 M3 (Competition Edition) but can see Jared’s point. And therein lies the conundrum of the day. Just because the M3 didn’t start life as a daily driver does it mean it shouldn’t, with modern engineering and materials, evolve into one? At this point I need to admit to burying the lede. Jared and I began this discussion while driving an Audi R8 to Lime Rock Park for the American Le Mans Series race last weekend. And I bring up the R8 only because neither Jared nor I have driven the M3, and the R8 serves as a pretty good example of what I’m getting at. The R8 is fast. Its 0-to-60 is 4.6 seconds. We didn’t get a chance to put it through its paces (as if I have the ability) or even do a burnout, but on the winding roads along the Housatonic River leading up to Lime Rock, the R8 felt as good as the best cars I’ve driven on this kind of road. When the windows are down, the R8 sounds like an eruption. When they’re up, you could easily forget you’re in a 420-horsepower sports car. It’s that quiet. Which could be good or bad. I don’t have the $120,000 to buy an R8, so I don’t know if after spending $120,000 on a sports car whether I’d want to hear it or not. Remember the days when you didn’t have a choice? Sports cars were, by definition, loud and difficult. The Testarossa’s gearbox was awful. The Diablo’s rear window was useless (well, so I’m told). The two things I recall of my first drive in a Porsche 944 were the height of the seats and feeling every bump in the road. But things are different now. I’ve been in an Audi RS4 on the track… and it goes. On the road it’s as easy to drive as an S4. The same goes for the R8. But could they be too perfect, as the reviewers are saying about the M3? Purist is a word that gets thrown around, but for people like Jared, I think that simplifies the emotion. They long for some semblance of the idea (or soul or spirit) behind the original car — or maybe they just want to feel more of the road. My position on the matter depends on the day you talk to me. For the most part, I fall for the “best of both worlds” argument. My back can’t stand up to long encounters with “track-tuned” suspensions. I rely on navigation too much. But then there are days when I wonder if there’s something we’re engineering away that we’ll never get back.

BMW, who currently owns Rolls-Royce and the MINI line, has not ruled out taking over other auto makers as a part of a new strategy. Details of BMW’s new strategy will be given later this year according to Stefan Krause, chief financial officer at BMW. “The possibility (of acquisitions) is not ruled out in principle,” Krause said in an interview with German newspaper, Börsen-Zeitung. Krause did not name any possible future acquisitions BMW may have in mind. BMW was previously rumored to be in talks with Ford in acquiring its Volvo Car Corporation. Ford later denied those reports and said that Ford and BMW are not in any discussions regarding the interest in Volvo. Krause said that BMW’s new CEO, Norbert Reithofer, is developing and working out his new strategy which includes new products, currency hedging, improving production efficiency and collaboration on developing and fuel-efficient engines.

We're lucky to have snagged these shots of the new BMW 7 Series taken by Shadow, a friend of a Jalopnik reader, while he was out driving the Autobahn A9 outside of Munich. Although it's difficult to tell from all the plastic cladding, the new 7 Series is supposed to have a new more 6 Series-like front fascia with a wider grille and lower headlights than the current model. On the inside our sources tell us the 7 Series will be introducing an all-new iDrive and maybe even an eight-speed transmission. We're also told the 2009 model should hit streets sometime during calendar year 2008. galleryPost('2009BMW7Series', 4, 'Spy Photos - 2009 BMW 7 Series'); <h3 class="galleryTitle">Spy Photos - 2009 BMW 7 Series</h3> Source: http://jalopnik.com/cars/spy-photos/2009-b...ries-277618.php

Honda with bottle caps are HOT

And everyone looks at me funny when I say I have 1000lb/in rear springs hah

Is it still possible to get vacuum for brakes with a setup like that?

Looks like she's winning now. I recognise SO many of them from casting auditions.

Isn't the timing sorted automagically?

Ahh that makes sense. + 1 for me on that manifold.