Topic: Day-by-Day Review: 2013 BMW 320i xDrive; Day 1

[rrocket]

^^Depends.  The 3 Series has more possible option combinations than any other car.  IIRC it's 1.2 million.

[mmret]

Well stated, that's what I found.

We were Benz Bros but no longer. I am there only in spirit.

[KD]

I was thinking about the whole power thing again. I know most of us subscribe to the "more is always better" school of thought but for many people enough is good enough.  I seem to recall driving a 177hp 1986 300E circa 1990 and thinking it had all kinds of power. When we got the 217hp 93 300E I thought it was a rocket! 

A 1984 Mazda RX-7 was hands down the funnest car i have ever driven especially in the winter during a light snowstorm!  Not sure what hp rating was, but i assume 120bhp tops!  A little more power would have been nice, but not at the expense of handling as it was simply a joy to drive and felt like an extension of myself! It was the kind of car that made even the shortest drive an event and that to me is the essence of what makes a car truly good! 

The biggest letdown was a 1972(?) Corvette with a souped up 454 V8 putting out over 500hp and loads of torque! It drove and handled like a tank, was almost impossible to see out of and had the worst clutch ever! I have driven tractors with more compliant clutches! I was 19 and this was my dream car at that time.  It turned out to be a miserable and scary experience

[KD]

Wow! If I knew how much vitriol and controversy i could generate simply by owning a bmw i would have bought one years ago!  What a hoot!  Maybe that is part of the allure.

It is quite uncanny though how many bmws i see being driven aimlessly and slow and usually by a foriegn university student who probably shouldn't be driving.  I actually saw one on its roof a couple of years ago on the side of a busy city street in the middle of a perfectly sunny day with its stunned looking approx 18yr old driver standing beside it barking into his cell phone.  Do people like that actually think something with the moniker of "the ultimate driving machine" will make them better drivers!?

Try driving around Millidgeville if you want to be amazed by foreign student driver's whose daddy has bought them a ( fill in Lexus, BMW, MB etc) that they don't have a clue how to drive.

Yup...right on the money...that's where i saw the car on roof....university avenue to be exact.

Bunch of beaters compared to what the rich daddies buy the foreign students in BC.  Example....   

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/dailybrew/fast-furious-busted-mounties-impound-13-street-racing-210611991.html

.

Yeah, now that's getting crazy isn't it?  Trouble is they can wreak as much havoc in a $500 beater!  Bad parenting is obvioulsy not defined by tax brackets!

[sailor723]

Getting back to the review.......

From the Day 3 entry............

"Some suggest that perhaps BMW underrates their turbocharged engines and that despite the advertised rating of 180 hp, the 320i may have nearly that much horsepower to the wheels while most cars advertised at 180 hp would have maybe 145 at the wheels. I could believe that as my tester does not feel slow in the least. And when you engage Sport mode it feels pretty darn quick!"


I'd wondered about that with BMW's in general. I know our 6 cyl 328 often feels like it's more than 230HP and the Sport mode changes the AT completely.

[mixmanmash]

I've been thinking about the often stated complaint about FGC makers charging lavishly for options and packages. So for fun I did an experiment – I compared (by percentage) the base price vs. loaded on my car and a Ford Focus. For consistency I used a common engine for both cars and started with the base model and then added every available option. Then I calculated how much the selling price increased as a percentage. I used the build and price feature at the Canadian websites.

Mercedes Benz E350 – Base: $66,8000, Fully optioned: $83,650 for an increase over base price of 25%

Ford Focus sedan – $15,129, Fully optioned: $31,960 for an increase over base price of 111%

Then for fun, I compared the cheapest possible E Class with the most expensive possible E Class with every available option:

Base Mercedes Benz E250 Bluetec $57,800 to Fully loaded E550 (no E63 on the website presently): $90,050 for an increase over base price of 56%

So, I've concluded that Ford is gouging customers with outrageous packages and stand-alone options and that Mercedes Benz takes a comparatively reasoned approach to pricing and packaging its options.

I don't think that's a fair comparison.  Try a Cadillac CTS instead.

[mixmanmash]

Not sure the argument that a BMW should have every feature standard is valid.   BMW offers everything KIA does and more.    And they install all those features in a much better car. Build your own 3 series with everything you think it should have standard and look at the price.  That would be the base price if options were standard.  If that's what you want they will be happy to sell you one that way.  What about the people who just want the quality and feel of a BMW but don't care about frills and gadgets.  I like the idea that BMW has a car for them too.

You have a point there. At least BMW will still let you order a car pretty much the way you want it (although not to the extent they used to) as opposed to the Asian car makers that bundle everything into packages.

I don't know.  I think Mercedes Benz is pretty bad for bundling options in to packages and then requiring you to get a certain package if you want a specific other package.  Porsche is pretty bad too.

I agree with the Benz part, they have many $5, 6, 9 thousand dollar option packages. Porsche is a good, lots of stand alone options, unfortunately the cost of each of those options is eye wateringly bad.

Yeah, I agree with the Benz thing as well. They seem to have an unerring ability to identify the 3 or 4 options I want most and put each one in a different option package. 

Going to have to disagree there. I just went through the E-Class configurator and could not find a single option that required any stacking.

(This is for E350 4M)

You can literally order a car with just the $3k Exclusive Package (fancy leather + headliner) and a Massage Seat (which is a standalone option!) and pass on everything else.

They also offer passive blindspot + lane keeping for $800 which is good IMO, less annoying version of the nannies.

The "advanced nannies" package replaces the $800 one, doesn't stack on top of it.

The premium package gives you all the requisite gizmos (smartkey, Harman Kardon, power trunk closer thing, 360 degree camera etc.) for $4k, while Nav is standard.

The LED lighting package is $1300 and gives you presumably excellent LED headlamps. Used to be a $1000-1200 BiXenon AFS package.

Panoramic roof is a standalone $300 option (!)

Metallic paint is free except the Red $500 and "Diamond White" $900

Almost any combo of paint/interior is available.

You want the AMG wheels? $500 standalone.

I think every combo of interior trim/interior color is also available. They do charge $250 for the one "special" interior trim thing, but its also standalone choice.

Way better than BMW. Maybe the C-Class is different but if memory serves Mercedes option setup is much better and more flexible than BMW.

Well stated, that's what I found.

That's one example only.  Try other models in MBs line up and you'll find some packages or options are required to get others.

I get having packages, it lowers their various particular configurations / inventory versus the D3, but don't get the stacking.  And it almost seems that the 2 or 3 items that are desirable are spread over 2 or 3 packages.

[carcrazed]

Not sure the argument that a BMW should have every feature standard is valid.   BMW offers everything KIA does and more.    And they install all those features in a much better car. Build your own 3 series with everything you think it should have standard and look at the price.  That would be the base price if options were standard.  If that's what you want they will be happy to sell you one that way.  What about the people who just want the quality and feel of a BMW but don't care about frills and gadgets.  I like the idea that BMW has a car for them too.

You have a point there. At least BMW will still let you order a car pretty much the way you want it (although not to the extent they used to) as opposed to the Asian car makers that bundle everything into packages.

I don't know.  I think Mercedes Benz is pretty bad for bundling options in to packages and then requiring you to get a certain package if you want a specific other package.  Porsche is pretty bad too.

I agree with the Benz part, they have many $5, 6, 9 thousand dollar option packages. Porsche is a good, lots of stand alone options, unfortunately the cost of each of those options is eye wateringly bad.

Yeah, I agree with the Benz thing as well. They seem to have an unerring ability to identify the 3 or 4 options I want most and put each one in a different option package. 

Going to have to disagree there. I just went through the E-Class configurator and could not find a single option that required any stacking.

(This is for E350 4M)

You can literally order a car with just the $3k Exclusive Package (fancy leather + headliner) and a Massage Seat (which is a standalone option!) and pass on everything else.

They also offer passive blindspot + lane keeping for $800 which is good IMO, less annoying version of the nannies.

The "advanced nannies" package replaces the $800 one, doesn't stack on top of it.

The premium package gives you all the requisite gizmos (smartkey, Harman Kardon, power trunk closer thing, 360 degree camera etc.) for $4k, while Nav is standard.

The LED lighting package is $1300 and gives you presumably excellent LED headlamps. Used to be a $1000-1200 BiXenon AFS package.

Panoramic roof is a standalone $300 option (!)

Metallic paint is free except the Red $500 and "Diamond White" $900

Almost any combo of paint/interior is available.

You want the AMG wheels? $500 standalone.

I think every combo of interior trim/interior color is also available. They do charge $250 for the one "special" interior trim thing, but its also standalone choice.

Way better than BMW. Maybe the C-Class is different but if memory serves Mercedes option setup is much better and more flexible than BMW.

Well stated, that's what I found.

That's one example only.  Try other models in MBs line up and you'll find some packages or options are required to get others.

I get having packages, it lowers their various particular configurations / inventory versus the D3, but don't get the stacking.  And it almost seems that the 2 or 3 items that are desirable are spread over 2 or 3 packages.

By stacking the option packages, it cuts down the inventory variations even less.  The spreading out of desired items over different packages is all about enticing people to get those expensive stacked packages. 

At the end of the day, it's all about $$$.


I agree about German cars having more hp at the wheel than other manufacturers even though I have limited experience in them.

Do all 320s come with the option to choose eco/sport mode?

[KD]

Judging by the amount of comments generated, the one thing for sure about this vehicle (and bmws in particular) is that it probably wouldn't the best vehicle to arrive incognito!  Love it, or hate it people have a strong opinion.  Anonymity is not an option while driving this vehicle me thinks!   

What i am getting from the review is that it is a comfortable, good looking well rounded machine that drives extremely well with reasonable performance and economy.  It sounds like a lot of thought went into the design of this vehicle to make the synergy between human and machine just right.  In fact I can't wait to test drive it to see what all the fuss is about!

[huota]

Re: options pricing, I found this quite revealing:

Amazing ANE stat: Porsche made 1.3 billion euros on 78k sales Jan-June. VW brand 1.5 bn on 2.4 million sales, Audi's 2.6 bn euros 692,000k

[Noto]

I've tried to let this car settle with me for a few days...and I test drove it last night.

All was fine - I didn't particularly hate the sound of the engine either (though didn't inspire any excitement either, unlike my Subie's turbo).  I did notice the turbo lag, which I found irritating for a daily driver.  Still, when the salesperson talked numbers with me, I just got up and said "nice car, but about $5k too pricey..."

Now I fully understand and appreciate why Infiniti went to the Q50 designation - the G25 didn't sell as well as they had hoped, they admit was partially because of the perceived "cheapness" of the car by name alone.  The 320 sticks with me as entry level, cheap, and makes the car feel overpriced.

If the 320i were the 325i, then the 328 became the 330i and the 335 stayed as is, I'd be more ok with it.  Still, having the BMW badge just isn't worth the $ to me.

[nlm]

I was thinking about the whole power thing again. I know most of us subscribe to the "more is always better" school of thought but for many people enough is good enough.  I seem to recall driving a 177hp 1986 300E circa 1990 and thinking it had all kinds of power. When we got the 217hp 93 300E I thought it was a rocket! 

Rather, I think most of us subscribe to the "power is relative" school of thought: how much can I get for the same/similar money.

Remember the early 90s when 325/328s and Maximas with 190hp did 0-60 in 6.6 sec (of course they were lighter)? The article posts similar times with similar output.

Speaking about the article can a photo of those trick cup-holders showing their alternate use be posted?

[wing]

This shows the alternate use, the tray in front of the shifter.

[nlm]

This shows the alternate use, the tray in front of the shifter.

Thanks for that. It doesn't appear to be what I thought from the description:
" the two cup holders that convert to a mobile phone–type tray with an insert", in that I thought there was an insert for the phone so that I angled up and faced you. But I see now the insert is the tray into the cup holders? Where do you put the tray if use the cup holders?

[wing]

Tray goes into the glovebox.  That's where I found it lol

I'm sure the next journalist is going to write "Kind of odd this vehicle doesn't come with cup holders"

[HeliDriver]

I've tried to let this car settle with me for a few days...and I test drove it last night.

All was fine - I didn't particularly hate the sound of the engine either (though didn't inspire any excitement either, unlike my Subie's turbo).  I did notice the turbo lag, which I found irritating for a daily driver.  Still, when the salesperson talked numbers with me, I just got up and said "nice car, but about $5k too pricey..."

Now I fully understand and appreciate why Infiniti went to the Q50 designation - the G25 didn't sell as well as they had hoped, they admit was partially because of the perceived "cheapness" of the car by name alone.  The 320 sticks with me as entry level, cheap, and makes the car feel overpriced.

If the 320i were the 325i, then the 328 became the 330i and the 335 stayed as is, I'd be more ok with it.  Still, having the BMW badge just isn't worth the $ to me.

LOL, that's classic! So the car itself is okay, but you'd like it better if the badge on the back said 325 instead of 320.

Reminds me of a friend of mine whose parents bought a 318i back in the eighties. They wanted to impress the neighbours, so had the 318i badge taken off the back and a 325i put on instead.

[PJ]

I've tried to let this car settle with me for a few days...and I test drove it last night.

All was fine - I didn't particularly hate the sound of the engine either (though didn't inspire any excitement either, unlike my Subie's turbo).  I did notice the turbo lag, which I found irritating for a daily driver.  Still, when the salesperson talked numbers with me, I just got up and said "nice car, but about $5k too pricey..."

Now I fully understand and appreciate why Infiniti went to the Q50 designation - the G25 didn't sell as well as they had hoped, they admit was partially because of the perceived "cheapness" of the car by name alone.  The 320 sticks with me as entry level, cheap, and makes the car feel overpriced.

If the 320i were the 325i, then the 328 became the 330i and the 335 stayed as is, I'd be more ok with it.  Still, having the BMW badge just isn't worth the $ to me.

LOL, that's classic! So the car itself is okay, but you'd like it better if the badge on the back said 325 instead of 320.

Reminds me of a friend of mine whose parents bought a 318i back in the eighties. They wanted to impress the neighbours, so had the 318i badge taken off the back and a 325i put on instead.

It's not just BMW owners.  I know someone who put a set of GT badges on a 3.8 Mustang and he really believed it impressed people.

[wing]

Yeah I'm sure the dealer will put a 325 badge on free of charge to make the sale.

In Europe I noticed most cars had no badge at all!

[mmret]

I've tried to let this car settle with me for a few days...and I test drove it last night.

All was fine - I didn't particularly hate the sound of the engine either (though didn't inspire any excitement either, unlike my Subie's turbo).  I did notice the turbo lag, which I found irritating for a daily driver.  Still, when the salesperson talked numbers with me, I just got up and said "nice car, but about $5k too pricey..."

Now I fully understand and appreciate why Infiniti went to the Q50 designation - the G25 didn't sell as well as they had hoped, they admit was partially because of the perceived "cheapness" of the car by name alone.  The 320 sticks with me as entry level, cheap, and makes the car feel overpriced.

If the 320i were the 325i, then the 328 became the 330i and the 335 stayed as is, I'd be more ok with it.  Still, having the BMW badge just isn't worth the $ to me.

LOL, that's classic! So the car itself is okay, but you'd like it better if the badge on the back said 325 instead of 320.

Reminds me of a friend of mine whose parents bought a 318i back in the eighties. They wanted to impress the neighbours, so had the 318i badge taken off the back and a 325i put on instead.

Saw an "E550" today on 16" wheels...

[Ex-airbalancer]

Yeah I'm sure the dealer will put a 325 badge on free of charge to make the sale.

In Europe I noticed most cars had no badge at all!

After a couple of years you need to replace the BMW rounded , because it will fade