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BMW M3

Test date 04 July 2007  Price as tested  £52,050

What is it?

If you’ve never heard of the BMW M3 then, frankly, you’ve clicked on the wrong website. If you have, you’ll know all about the car that’s done as much for BMW’s image over the past 20 years as all the rest of them put together (well, almost). And now there’s a brand-new version, the fourth all-new model since the original of 1986.

The big news in this instance is the engine. The first-ever M3 was left-hand drive and used a high-revving in-line four, the next two versions used increasingly powerful incarnations of BMW M-division’s straight six. This one’s got a 4.0-litre V8. Except this ain’t no ordinary V8.

Without going into too much technical detail (because you can and should read more about car and engine in the magazine on 11 July), this is an engine that has eight individual throttle bodies, revs to an astonishing 8400rpm and develops 414bhp at 8300rpm and 295lb ft at 3900rpm in the process.

Installed in a new M3 that weighs just 78kg more than the previous 339bhp model, the new engine provides BMW’s new icon with what you could describe as ample performance: 0-60mph in 4.8sec and 0-100mph in around 10sec dead.

When it goes on sale in August the new M3 will cost £50,625 and come with sat-nav, Bluetooth connection, part-leather cabin and a six-speed manual as standard. You’ll also get an evolutionary version of BMW’s M-diff as standard, as well as a version of the M6’s M-drive system whereby you can change the settings for the traction control, steering weight, damper stiffness and throttle response at the press of a button on the steering wheel. EDC dampers will be optional.

What’s it like?

On the one hand, it’s amazingly rapid but also surprisingly civilised for a car wearing an M3 badge. The ride is smooth-going-on-luxury with the M-drive set to normal, while the steering, brakes and throttle response are each curiously soft in response to begin with. This car, you think, is more like an old M5 on the road, and not at all how you’d expect a smaller, sharper, nimbler M3 to be.

Then you pres the M-button and - even with all the systems on their most aggressive settings - it’s still not quite what you’d expect from a new M3. It’s fast with a capital F, of course, but the rest of the car seems too refined for its own good on the road.

And the steering never scores more than six out of 10 no matter where or how you drive the car. Nor do the brakes, which suffered from fade on the road and went away badly on the track. Or the fuel consumption, which was regularly down in the mid-teens on roads on which the old car would have hit well over 20mpg.

Should I buy one?

You are not likely to be disappointed by the new M3 because in many ways it is a deeply impressive car, with a huge range of abilities and very few flaws. But if you were expecting a faster, yet more exciting version of the old car, you might want to wait until the CSL version appears which, on this evidence, will need to happen sooner rather than later to truly keep the legend alive. Even so, as an everyday super-coupe the M3 is some motorcar. So long as you can afford the fuel bills.

Steve Sutcliffe

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