Pic at the top of this article..any info?

[RDMcG]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/05/automobiles/coll...

Interesting meeting of microcars, I thought I had seen just about every BMW, but never ran across this one. Earliest kidney grille I ever saw. Any info?......

[Hugo a Gogo]

BMW started out making licensed Austin 7 clones, which that could be, I didn't think they had kidney grilles though

[guldolf]

Bmw started out with making aircraft engines during ww1. When the war was over Bmw decided to find something else to do due to the lack of demand for aircrafts and the fact that treaty of versailles banned military aircraft in germany. Therefore they bought out the Dixie marque which produced licensed Austin 7 look-a-likes. Dixies car didn't have kidneys like todays Bmw. Instead it had a grill similiar to what was found on the original Austin 7. When Bmw bought Dixie out they started out with simply glueing their logo on top of the old shape grill (they repeated this formula when they took over Glas in the 60's).

The car in article looks like a BMW 3/15 roadster and it's a far as I know the earliest example of the kidney grill. Later on they used it on the 7 too:

[10 Pence Short]

Urgh, look at that horrible Bangle design...

[Carfolio]

Looks like a Dixi DA-1 with body by Ihle to me. Although that was from 1928 not 1926, so I may be wrong.

[RDMcG]

Thanks for the info. I will try to find something that specifically identifies the car.