RE: BMW reveals 374hp M340i ahead of LA show
Discussion
I'll probably be looking at one of these to replace my 440i GC in a few years time.
Love the current car - it's no outright sports car but it's quick, sounds nice, handles well enough and does everything you'd want a sporty saloon to do whilst looking like a 420d and flying under the radar.
I can only see the 4WD and bit of extra power as a bonus. Not too sure about the design at the moment - I'd have to see one in the flesh.
Love the current car - it's no outright sports car but it's quick, sounds nice, handles well enough and does everything you'd want a sporty saloon to do whilst looking like a 420d and flying under the radar.
I can only see the 4WD and bit of extra power as a bonus. Not too sure about the design at the moment - I'd have to see one in the flesh.
A very real contender for my next car, if the maths are workable when the time comes.
Wonky door handles aside, I even like the styling. Not convinced on the new instruments, but that wouldn't stop me from buying one if the rest of the car was as good as I suspect it will be. And I can afford it, of course. Which is a big if.
My only initial reservation is the X-Drive. I wasn't very impressed with it in the F30 335d I drove. Felt like the nose wanted to run wide out of tight corners, and the turning circle was atrocious compared to a RWD 3er. Snow aside, I don't find my M140i to struggle to put its power down in daily use, and that's with a cheap open diff.
I suspect this is going to make a fabulous daily.
Wonky door handles aside, I even like the styling. Not convinced on the new instruments, but that wouldn't stop me from buying one if the rest of the car was as good as I suspect it will be. And I can afford it, of course. Which is a big if.
My only initial reservation is the X-Drive. I wasn't very impressed with it in the F30 335d I drove. Felt like the nose wanted to run wide out of tight corners, and the turning circle was atrocious compared to a RWD 3er. Snow aside, I don't find my M140i to struggle to put its power down in daily use, and that's with a cheap open diff.
I suspect this is going to make a fabulous daily.
Ares said:
ITP said:
This will no doubt be an excellent car, more than most people need to be honest.
However, they really won’t sell thousands of these 340’s at all. They will be a very niche car due to the price/lease cost.
Most, who aren’t too fussed about the engines these days, will just look at the cost and think I could have a nice 5 series m-sport for that money, why would I get a 3 series?
In that sense, BMW are to be applauded for still offering a 3 litre 6 cyl petrol in what is, to the majority of the BMW target buyer, a car that looks just like a much cheaper model, but is very expensive in comparison and not with the image/bragging rights of an M3. A sort of no mans land, however good it is. How many current 340’s did they sell percentage wise. Low single figures I would guess.
You think? You don't think BMW will sell thousands of 340s? BMW claim that 5% of the c150,000 3-series sold each year in Europe are 340i (and 335i prior to that), and around 30% of the 50,000/yr US sales are 340s. However, they really won’t sell thousands of these 340’s at all. They will be a very niche car due to the price/lease cost.
Most, who aren’t too fussed about the engines these days, will just look at the cost and think I could have a nice 5 series m-sport for that money, why would I get a 3 series?
In that sense, BMW are to be applauded for still offering a 3 litre 6 cyl petrol in what is, to the majority of the BMW target buyer, a car that looks just like a much cheaper model, but is very expensive in comparison and not with the image/bragging rights of an M3. A sort of no mans land, however good it is. How many current 340’s did they sell percentage wise. Low single figures I would guess.
I'm not sure at £45k it is expensive? I can't think what significantly betters it on price at that performance?? The Audi equivalent gives power away and is the same price. The Merc is more expensive.
Don’t get me wrong, l’m all for a large engined smallish BMW, I have had 4 over the years
With regard to the states, then yes, they will buy loads. They still like big engined cars over there, plus they are also the last bastion of the high powered manual car. They’ll probably ask for a manual one like they did the old v10 M5!
Price wise, again, I covered this earlier, on paper it will tick more boxes than most at 45-50k but, for me, it’s not a special enough car, something that can’t be measured. Apart from the engine, but that can still be had in a 30k 2 series.
Ares said:
theplayingmantis said:
Greg the Fish said:
To make it look like teeth so the inferior people will move their in vastly inferior vehicles will move out of the way for fear of being eaten by someone FAR more successful.
But not successful enough to get an M3...Don’t get the point of this. If you want power you can’t use in the road go whole hog and get M3 and track it, otherwise this just smacks of cant afford the monthlies for an M3,rightly or wrongly.
And if you can't use 374bhp, perhaps it's time to hand your licence in.
t maybe thats why i crashed my quad! couldn't handle the power! anyway, i maintain you cant use the full beans on the road the majority of time, legally, as you will know from your quad. Its still nice to have, even more so the unicorn factor.Your not going to track a repmobile, you might as well finance a quad for a probably only small amount more pm than you would on this and get a infinitely superior car, if not the badge cachet.
Again see no point to this.
But then i'm not going to get in an argument with you over it as i know i wont win and don't have the time as my commutes not that long.
So basically the NON M3 version of the 3 series is now a Lotus Carlton with 4wd and an 8spd box?
A car which in 1990 cost £48,000 which in today’s terms adjusted for inflation is £104,000.
Progress indeed. It shows how insane the power wars in cars have become. Bet it’s not as much actual fun as my tuned GT86 though.
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/in...
A car which in 1990 cost £48,000 which in today’s terms adjusted for inflation is £104,000.
Progress indeed. It shows how insane the power wars in cars have become. Bet it’s not as much actual fun as my tuned GT86 though.
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/in...
The performance is certainly impressive but I question who would buy one. The performance kind of leaves it in no-mans land. Surely it's too powerful and expensive to be a viable purchase/lease to run as a daily and if you really want a performance BMW, the proper M model is where to go. Strangely enough I can see the point in the M240i though but not in a 3 series, maybe it's the reputation as a rep-mobile. I had a loaner 320d recently and whilst it left me cold as a drivers car, it was a perfectly acceptable mile muncher and other brands could learn a thing or two from the satnav and tech.
Blink982 said:
The performance is certainly impressive but I question who would buy one. The performance kind of leaves it in no-mans land. Surely it's too powerful and expensive to be a viable purchase/lease to run as a daily and if you really want a performance BMW, the proper M model is where to go. Strangely enough I can see the point in the M240i though but not in a 3 series, maybe it's the reputation as a rep-mobile. I had a loaner 320d recently and whilst it left me cold as a drivers car, it was a perfectly acceptable mile muncher and other brands could learn a thing or two from the satnav and tech.
Makes you think that the next M3/4 might be a very very low 3 second affair or even into 2seconds
Honeywell said:
So basically the NON M3 version of the 3 series is now a Lotus Carlton with 4wd and an 8spd box?
A car which in 1990 cost £48,000 which in today’s terms adjusted for inflation is £104,000.
Progress indeed. It shows how insane the power wars in cars have become. Bet it’s not as much actual fun as my tuned GT86 though.
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/in...
That's the thing isn't it - is it really progress? It's a power war indeed, but with all that power comes more weight to help with safety, more expensive consumables to keep up with the thing, and whole suite of electronic gubbins to make it point the right way when it's inevitably mostly going to be driven by people who neither know nor care about cars. A car which in 1990 cost £48,000 which in today’s terms adjusted for inflation is £104,000.
Progress indeed. It shows how insane the power wars in cars have become. Bet it’s not as much actual fun as my tuned GT86 though.
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/in...
I'm actually quite excited by the cheap electric cars coming, because hopefully there will be a real desire to make the cars as light as possible...and to do that they'll have to limit performance, because a faster car has to be a stronger (and therefore heavier) car. So we might finally end up with practical cars which are under a ton, top out at 100mph but still do 0-60 in 5 seconds or so. The sooner we get away from this current trend the better in my book.
I have a current (last gen) 340i xdrive Touring with the M-Performance kit. It produces 360PS and 500NM and BMW quoted a 4.4s 0-100kmh time. For some time any 3 series above a 320 (or M3, but they didn't sell that well) here in Switzerland was xDrive. The M-Performance kit was a factory-fit option for the last year of it's sale here. 340s are pretty common here (about as many for sale at the moment as 320is and 330is combined)
If the new car is anything like mine it's fast but not particularly involving or fun. It does the sitting on motorway thing really well and is very responsive up to about 220 kmh where it seems to get a bit more sluggish up to 250kmh but it still pulls reasonably well up to the limiter (I have a number of German clients so get it out on the autobahn quite frequently).
I'm based in the Engadin valley so to get home have either the Fluela, Julier or Maloja passes to get over. Maybe it's because most drives involve one but I don't particularly look forward to going over them in it. I've also never taken it out just for a drive. The best thing you could say about it on the passes is that I rarely get stuck behind a caravan. On snow it understeers quite poorly in hairpins.
What it does best is sitting on the motorway, adaptive cruise and the adaptive headlights on, suspension in comfort. However I've always had a feeling that a 540 or E400 / E43 would have done this better.
If the new car is anything like mine it's fast but not particularly involving or fun. It does the sitting on motorway thing really well and is very responsive up to about 220 kmh where it seems to get a bit more sluggish up to 250kmh but it still pulls reasonably well up to the limiter (I have a number of German clients so get it out on the autobahn quite frequently).
I'm based in the Engadin valley so to get home have either the Fluela, Julier or Maloja passes to get over. Maybe it's because most drives involve one but I don't particularly look forward to going over them in it. I've also never taken it out just for a drive. The best thing you could say about it on the passes is that I rarely get stuck behind a caravan. On snow it understeers quite poorly in hairpins.
What it does best is sitting on the motorway, adaptive cruise and the adaptive headlights on, suspension in comfort. However I've always had a feeling that a 540 or E400 / E43 would have done this better.
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