RE: BMW 340i :Driven
Discussion
kambites said:
Blackbird425 said:
Beautiful motor with a great engine. Not sure how anyone can say BWW have lost it with the 3 Series. Is the XE really that good? Journalists always seem to treat Jags with kid gloves to me - they always strike me as under engineered and slightly nasty inside.
I think "under-engineered" could be applied to all modern European cars in this sector. They make the bits you can touch and see very nice but the actual engineering integrity in the bits which you can't is average at best. The XE uses all manner of techniques, range of new engines, aluminium construction and cost billions to develop, they have to make concessions to making a profit and that will always be a factor but not sure what they arent doing ?
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
I'm sure that awful white Volvo will hang onto its value much better than the BMW.If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
To summarise then, £38k is too much for a new car, but not for a used car?If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
Prawo Jazdy said:
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
To summarise then, £38k is too much for a new If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
Blackbird425 said:
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
I'm sure that awful white Volvo will hang onto its value much better than the BMW.If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
Dion20vt said:
Blackbird425 said:
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
I'm sure that awful white Volvo will hang onto its value much better than the BMW.If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
xRIEx said:
Dion20vt said:
Blackbird425 said:
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
I'm sure that awful white Volvo will hang onto its value much better than the BMW.If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
It will be interesting to see what prices the BMW will be at around 3-6 months old on the forecourt.
J4CKO said:
Not sure what you mean by "under engineered", they spend years honing things for incremental improvmeents that may just push them tot he top of the road testers leaderboard.
I mean in terms of the actual design and manufacturing quality of the components you can't easily see. Not just in terms of mechanical components, although I'd argue engines and gearboxes have got more complex faster than manufacturing tolerances have been able to keep up with. Take a door trim panel off an E36 and an F30; I suspect you'll break more clips on the F30 despite them obviously being much newer (I should point out I know nothing about the two cars in question, it's just the impression I've got of the way European cars have progressed in the last 25 years). The Europeans, with the possible exception of the very top end of the market, seem to be competing to build down to a price rather than up to a quality level. Mercedes seem to have hit rock bottom and started heading upwards again in terms of build quality and VAG and BMW are still heading downwards (although they're not as bad as Mercedes got at their worst), from what I've seen.
ETA: I'm not blaming the European manufacturers for this, they're producing what their customers want for the prices their customers can pay. If the car buying public genuinely wanted high-quality engineering I'm sure the market would oblige but with cars being viewed more and more as consumables I don't think that's ever going to happen.
Edited by kambites on Friday 17th July 10:12
kambites said:
I mean in terms of the actual design and manufacturing quality of the components you can't easily see. Not just in terms of mechanical components, although I'd argue engines and gearboxes have got more complex faster than manufacturing tolerances have been able to keep up with. Take a door trim panel off an E36 and an F30; I suspect you'll break more clips on the F30 despite them obviously being much newer (I should point out I know nothing about the two cars in question, it's just the impression I've got of the way European cars have progressed in the last 25 years).
The Europeans, with the possible exception of the very top end of the market, seem to be competing to build down to a price rather than up to a quality level. Mercedes seem to have hit rock bottom and started heading upwards again in terms of build quality and VAG and BMW are still heading downwards (although they're not as bad as Mercedes got at their worst), from what I've seen.
interesting insight that seems reasonable.The Europeans, with the possible exception of the very top end of the market, seem to be competing to build down to a price rather than up to a quality level. Mercedes seem to have hit rock bottom and started heading upwards again in terms of build quality and VAG and BMW are still heading downwards (although they're not as bad as Mercedes got at their worst), from what I've seen.
Edited by kambites on Friday 17th July 10:09
what's your view of the Japanese? i sense the engineers still focus on details but that procurement could be tighter (airbags et al)
Robert Elise said:
interesting insight that seems reasonable.
what's your view of the Japanese? i sense the engineers still focus on details but that procurement could be tighter (airbags et al)
I don't have much experience of Japanese cars from the last fifteen years or so but from what I've read, they're probably going downhill but not as fast as the Europeans and from a higher starting point. what's your view of the Japanese? i sense the engineers still focus on details but that procurement could be tighter (airbags et al)
kambites said:
J4CKO said:
Not sure what you mean by "under engineered", they spend years honing things for incremental improvmeents that may just push them tot he top of the road testers leaderboard.
I mean in terms of the actual design and manufacturing quality of the components you can't easily see. Not just in terms of mechanical components, although I'd argue engines and gearboxes have got more complex faster than manufacturing tolerances have been able to keep up with. Take a door trim panel off an E36 and an F30; I suspect you'll break more clips on the F30 despite them obviously being much newer (I should point out I know nothing about the two cars in question, it's just the impression I've got of the way European cars have progressed in the last 25 years). The Europeans, with the possible exception of the very top end of the market, seem to be competing to build down to a price rather than up to a quality level. Mercedes seem to have hit rock bottom and started heading upwards again in terms of build quality and VAG and BMW are still heading downwards (although they're not as bad as Mercedes got at their worst), from what I've seen.
ETA: I'm not blaming the European manufacturers for this, they're producing what their customers want for the prices their customers can pay. If the car buying public genuinely wanted high-quality engineering I'm sure the market would oblige but with cars being viewed more and more as consumables I don't think that's ever going to happen.
Edited by kambites on Friday 17th July 10:12
Saying that, a rep mobile might rack up over 100k miles in less than 3 years with little to no issues whatsoever. Not so long ago, 100k miles would be a death sentence to most cars!
Seriously people, please try to use your own brains rather than just take car reviews at face value!
Back in the day, when Autocar tested typical family cars, lets say an Austin Princess against a Ford Cortina Mk2, then there was a true "winner" of that test. Generally because one of the cars was so awful it actually fell apart and failed to even complete the test!
Fast forward to 2015 and there are no "bad" cars anymore. Any "class leader" or "favourite" is that simply because of subjective factors. Road testers can slag off a cars steering, as in this test, but i guarantee you, that for 99.9% of the motoring public either wouldn't notice any issue, or would have forgotten about it after a day or two!
So is the new 3 series steering better or worse than that of an XE? I'm going to suggest you'd need a test track and about £30k worth of data logging kit to be able to determine that objectively rather than subjectively. People will always have a preference of course and that is why modern cars at least have some difference still! I'd bet you that the 3er and the XE actually share the vast majority of there steering system components, with a 'lecy rack from ZF, and column components from TWR or Conti etc. Yes there will be tuning and kinematic differences, but we are talking about a few percent difference here and there.
It's also worth noting that all modern cars use the same components underneath, and are of course "built down to a price"! For example, BMW could replace the (cheap, fast to assemble, and rattle free) plastic door card clips, parts that 99.99999999% of owners never see or need to even notice, with some "over engineered" bolted fixings (which would cost 100 as much, take 100x longer to assemble, and almost certainly come loose and rattle at some point), but if they did that for all the "under engineered" parts, this car would cost >£60k!
As a result of component & platform sharing, design for manufacture and yes, cost-downs, we can now buy incredible cars, packed with amazing tech, that have performance and economy attributes that would have been simply impossible just 20 years ago, but in real terms they are cheaper than they have ever been.
If we look back to our "Family car test 1983" with the Princess and Cortina, have a look at the spec of those cars. I mean, you had to wind your own windows up and down, in fact, they used to boost "TWO door mirrors" on the standard equipment list FFS........
Back in the day, when Autocar tested typical family cars, lets say an Austin Princess against a Ford Cortina Mk2, then there was a true "winner" of that test. Generally because one of the cars was so awful it actually fell apart and failed to even complete the test!
Fast forward to 2015 and there are no "bad" cars anymore. Any "class leader" or "favourite" is that simply because of subjective factors. Road testers can slag off a cars steering, as in this test, but i guarantee you, that for 99.9% of the motoring public either wouldn't notice any issue, or would have forgotten about it after a day or two!
So is the new 3 series steering better or worse than that of an XE? I'm going to suggest you'd need a test track and about £30k worth of data logging kit to be able to determine that objectively rather than subjectively. People will always have a preference of course and that is why modern cars at least have some difference still! I'd bet you that the 3er and the XE actually share the vast majority of there steering system components, with a 'lecy rack from ZF, and column components from TWR or Conti etc. Yes there will be tuning and kinematic differences, but we are talking about a few percent difference here and there.
It's also worth noting that all modern cars use the same components underneath, and are of course "built down to a price"! For example, BMW could replace the (cheap, fast to assemble, and rattle free) plastic door card clips, parts that 99.99999999% of owners never see or need to even notice, with some "over engineered" bolted fixings (which would cost 100 as much, take 100x longer to assemble, and almost certainly come loose and rattle at some point), but if they did that for all the "under engineered" parts, this car would cost >£60k!
As a result of component & platform sharing, design for manufacture and yes, cost-downs, we can now buy incredible cars, packed with amazing tech, that have performance and economy attributes that would have been simply impossible just 20 years ago, but in real terms they are cheaper than they have ever been.
If we look back to our "Family car test 1983" with the Princess and Cortina, have a look at the spec of those cars. I mean, you had to wind your own windows up and down, in fact, they used to boost "TWO door mirrors" on the standard equipment list FFS........
Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 17th July 10:59
Dion20vt said:
£38k for a non M BMW??? Am I the only one thinking this will depreciate badly?
If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
And before the pedantic patrol start the argument old Vs new... it's hardly a greek relic is it!
That Volvo looks superb.If I had £38k to splash on a fast practical car, I'd go for one of these: http://selekt.volvocars.co.uk/en/used-cars/Volvo/V...
And before the pedantic patrol start the argument old Vs new... it's hardly a greek relic is it!
I've totally missed these. Are they any good to drive?
I always loved the idea of a fast Volvo.
A bit like the old mentally fast Legacy's - the badge is perfect camouflage for unwanted attention.
I bet Polestar owners are a self-selecting audience of excellent people. Much like Alpina. No bellends need apply.
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