A little bit of trivia -- that hood is the largest piece of stamped steel on any car in America.

 

Three things to consider;

There is "Lightweight"
There is "Powerfull"
There is "Complies with all USA regulations"
There is "Affordable"

You can have any three of the four.

 

My prediction:

The 2000 pound weight goal is a fantasy that will never be achieved, and it will never come to the US with a four cyl. engine. Every BMW 4 sold in the US has been a disaster.

My guess is at least 2,600 pounds in US trim, with the 2.5 and 3.0 sixes, if it arrives here at all.

 

I also seriously doubt the 2000 - 2200 lb. weight. BMW's are historically on the heavy, and to their credit, solid side. Also remember that the S2000 target weight was 2500 lb. I feel a car of this type will be much closer to the 3000 than 2000 lb. mark. If Honda cannot meet a weight/budget target forget about BMW doing it.

 

* I don't know if all BMW 4 cylinder cars are disasters!! LOL. But note that the company generally sells 4 cylinder low content cars in some markets, leaving the inline 6s for the high profit / high performance niches. They prefer to sell the pricey versions!! They need to have enough of a performance benefit for the high profit I6 motored car for folks to buy them. Honda mostly is known for high tech fours..their high volume 6 poppers are not standouts tlike the fours. Here's another example. You can buy a number of VWs with the 1.8T or a 6. The 6 cyl versions are faster stock. Add a chip and filter and the 1.8 T is faster. VW needs to keep the 1.8T sufficiently slower to encourage folks to pay many thousands extra for the big motor. Same idea. Porsche needs to keep the Boxter a hair slower than the 911. BMW doesn't seem to like very peaky motors, preferring instead to produce wide range engines. This is easily done with tech and cubes. There is no size limit for street car motors in most parts of the world. So if they do make a small revvey four for the Z5, I doubt they will put it into a high volume heavy car cuz then it would feel dead low in the revs. The Z5 is a niche vehicle to replace the M coupe type of machine.

* I think that BMW, Honda, and Ferrari make the best engines these days. Sheesh the fastest engine in F1 last year was BMWs up-to-900-HP-for-qualifying 3 liter rig. Honda was one of the lower powered engines in the series, very surprisingly. For 02 BMW is trying to race (not qually) at over 900 HP. We'll see if they can do it. If noone steps up to their level, they plan to back off the revs for the sake of higher reliability. The high level engineering taking place has spill over into street cars. The F1 engine men were involved in some aspects of the new M3 motor for example. Racing improves the breed.

* BTW another rumour is that a version of their all conquering 3 liter F1 V10 may wind up in an M car. Perhaps the next M5. Street legal specs include a 15,000 RPM rev limit and 5-600 HP. That's right, 15,000 RPMs. Not cheap though!!

* The weight goal is not 2000 pounds, it's 1000 KG which is about 200 pounds heavier. With the planned aluminum, composites and plastic panels, they just might come close cuz they are starting with light weight as a design goal. It's also a hard top. That saves lots of weight right there. The S2000 could be lighter (and even stiffer) by 100-200 pounds if it had a metal roof. The 350 HP I6 version is likely to be much heavier than the light 4 cyl version.

* On the weight thing you can get a current Z3 under the weight of an s2k. Just use the alloy blocked 3.0 version which is about as fast as the stook and add a lighter hood. That car is a retro cruiser and never intended to be a hard core light sports car. That is what folks wanted in the 90s.

Stan

 

One of these days someone is gonna get their act together and produce carbon fiber bodies cheaply. Overall, carbon fiber costs a lot because the molds are soo expensive. You have to make a mold per part pretty much you want out of carbon fiber. But, once the molds are made the material costs are not really that high...compareable to aluminum. Of course you would have to redesign modern factories to support carbon fiber cars, but it is only a matter of time. I don't see BMW doing it...they are too small. The first high volume carbon fiber cars will probably come from VW, GM, FORD, Dailmer Chrysler...someone very big who can take the R&D and start up costs.

 

Hmm, I had a different impression of the source of the cost for carbon fiber. I've heard the material itself described as expensive, never heard anything about the molds. (How can they be expensive? What are they made of?) But what really drives up the cost, as far as I can tell, is the manufacturing process. All that time spent spent cooking in a high pressure oven doesn't lend itself to a mass-production model very well at all. To churn out several hundred such bodies a day, you'd need hundreds of ovens. I'd imagine the cost would be entirely prohibitive. I don't think there's any way around that, either. I saw a show on TDC about this group set up by the UK government who's purpose is to visit small businesses and assist them in streamlining their processes. They helped a cabinet maker and a few others, but when it came time to help the company making hunting bows out of carbon fiber, they couldn't come up with anything better than the typical hand-made method.

 

Just to clarify, I meant marketing and sales disasters, not technology disasters. The recent 318 coupe and some of the earlier 3-series 4-cylinders come to mind.

 

>>Just to clarify, I meant marketing and sales disasters, not technology disasters. The recent 318 coupe and some of the earlier 3-series 4-cylinders come to mind.<<

Quick, how many pricey four cylinders does Acura sell? Possibly none? (The RSX is in the easily affordable price range) BMW does not want to do all-out four cylinders for many of it's cars. Why bother? The market simply does not want them above some price level in a given nitch. You'll never see a four cylinder boxter for example. For pure sports cars that price can be higher though. The priciest four cyl sports car of which I am aware was the old Lotus turbo which was roundly criticised for retaining a four at that price level. You can't achieve the level of smoothness and driveability and wide power band that they achieve from those I6s, from a four cylinder motor. A V12 would be smoother. Honda can't do it either. Imagine an S2K motor trying to haul around an accord or TL. It would be a total slug around town, can't deal with an automatic and would be too buzzy and loud. So again, for many BMW models a four provides an entry level lower price version or helps close the deal on a six after a test drive. The buyer does not want to shell out the big bucks unless his right foot is happy and his refinement needs are met. The market wants refinement and they will get it from whoever sells it. Having said that, BMW has an interesting new four cylinder incorporating the new valvetronic. Valvetronic is likely to be copied by others. They ditch the throttle body (although I think they have a door that can be slammed shot as a backup.) completely. Noone has ever done this before. Then they use an extra rocker to change the fulcrum point of the rocker or follower that actuates the cam. So they continuously and directly change valve timing and lift on the fly. Not just low cam below 6000 / high cam above 6000. The valves barely crack open at ide and then open as much as needed the rest of the time. You wind up with a wide range engine with great economy, emissions, throttle response and so forth. No sudden jump in power like vtec, just more go more of the time. At this point it's good for average to sporty motors but not for screamers as friction factors kick in at high revs > 7000 RPMs.. I think the s2k would be easier to drive hard more of the time by more people if the pre-vtec softness was filled in with some torque..but that would be initially less exciting to drive. Would help in the rain too. I have heard of a number of slick road spins where hitting vtec immediately preceded the drama. Sudden changes in the power band are harder for the driver to control.

Following up on F1 comments, Honda has just thrown down the gauntlet for '02 after some disapponting race results the last few years: >>>Honda's Toru Ogawa says the all-new RA002E engine will give BAR all the power it needs to challenge for honours next season. "It's a brand new design, lighter and more powerful with a lower centre of gravity," he said. "We now have a clear long-term commitment to the team and we are aiming to give them the best engine in F1."<<<

Part of the incentive for Honda's kicking it up a notch is that arch rival Toyota has entered the fray. Toyota comes into F1 next year as the first Japanese entry since 1968. (Honda mostly just makes motors for other teams at this point -there hasn't been a Honda team per se in decades) They really want the H power teams to hand it to the T power teams ASAP. Then they want to beat everyone else. This could get interesting!!!

Stan

 

It will be interesting. I've read that the Honda-Toyota rivalry is even more intense than the BMW-MB rivalry.

I thought the problem BAR Honda was having the last couple of years was not engine power but chassis flex in the corners.