New BMW 320i Sport - real life experience

[oldmanbm]

We are looking at a new BMW 320i Sport to replace our Volvo XC90 (family has flown). My heart says yes but my head says 320D or ED. Has anyone got the latest 320i? What are your impressions and how is it economy wise? Thanks in anticipation.

[ninjag]

Is it to buy or lease? Usually I'd say if leasing then a diesel but if buying then perhaps a petrol as there's usually less to go wrong. On saying that two of the guys at work had 320d ED BMW's for five years and had no issues.

[Fox-]

ninjag said:

Is it to buy or lease? Usually I'd say if leasing then a diesel but if buying then perhaps a petrol as there's usually less to go wrong. On saying that two of the guys at work had 320d ED BMW's for five years and had no issues.

There is no less to go wrong - the 320i is a turbocharged direct injection petrol engine.

As an engine it's fine - it's reasonably frugal, but it's biggest problem is the existence of the 328i which is much quicker and has identical fuel economy.

[Smuler]

I've no experience of the 320i, but have recently driven 2 320d's one M Sport, One Luxury and they both felt faster than the 320ED model I drove. Figures show 190bhp v 163bhp; may not seem much, but I felt it. So if not going with petrol, then I wouldn't go ED unless you do big miles to generate a big saving.

[iluvkefalonia]

I have owned two F30 320i, one luxury and one M sport, my daughter has a 320d sport so so I have driven both. The petrol is definitely smoother and feels more refined but the diesel will obviously give better fuel economy. I would say performance is very similar and perfectly adequate (having said that I have just changed to a 340i!) so I would base the decision on annual mileage, less than 10k a year I would definitely go for petrol.

[oldmanbm]

Thanks for this. Our Volvo is six years old and has just over 40,000 miles on the clock. We will keep the BMW a similar length and will be buying outright. We saw an Infiniti Q30 on the motorway today and thought it looked the part!

[Maracus]

Fox- said:

There is no less to go wrong - the 320i is a turbocharged direct injection petrol engine.

As an engine it's fine - it's reasonably frugal, but it's biggest problem is the existence of the 328i which is much quicker and has identical fuel economy.

Agree with the.

We've had our 328i auto for over 2 years, it's now 3 1/2 years old. After driving the 320i and 328i back to back, it's like the 320i had the handbrake on. Probably the same between the 328i and 340i

As Fox says, the economy is almost identical, so you'll be looking at low to mid 40s on a motorway run and mid 30s overall.

A six cylinder sound would be nice though. Maybe a 440i as its replacement.

[Pioneer]

We have a 320i Sport Tourer, coming up for 6 mths old. The last few 3 series we've had have all been diesels but missus does lots of short trips nowadays and we very rarely use it on longer drives. As you would expect feels more responsive around town than the diesel equivalent. No real performance at all but enough to overtake and get out of trouble when you need to. Did try the diesel equivalents before ordering this and decided the petrol suited us better this time around. I added the sport auto box with paddles for when I drive it, although they're actually a waste of time on the 2.0!

Edited by Pioneer on Friday 28th October 09:22