OUR DRIFTBOX TIMING equipment is broken. Or at least I think it must be. If it’s right, this BMW M340i xDrive has just ripped down the quarter mile and obliterated its claimed 0-100km/h acceleration time. Four. Point. One? That’s three-tenths quicker than what BMW says it will do. That’s even quicker than a current BMW M3.
And it’s not even an M car. Well, not a real one anyway. It’s the latest job from BMW’s M Performance arm that aims to inject some hot-blooded engineering from the M division into regular cars. This gives us a stepping stone between each range on price and performance. And we're discovering that you're getting a lot of the latter.
So we line up again on Heathcote Raceway’s drag strip to try and repeat the magic. I run my left finger up the drive-mode pad, pressing Sport along the way to turning DSC off. I yank the fancy crystal gear lever sideways to engage its Sport shift program and pin the brake pedal hard.
Revs build and hold between 2500 and 3000rpm. I clear the brake and the M340i bursts forward like a cornered cheetah that’s spotted its escape. The first couple of upshifts come and go before that number appears again. Four point one. I keep my eyes locked on the horizon. The quarter-mile time repeats the previous run. It has clocked 12.3sec at 183.1km/h.
When we last tested a BMW 340i it accelerated to 100km/h from rest in 5.51sec and crossed the quarter mile in 13.57sec. That’s over a second slower than the xDrive on both counts. And that was after a morning spent trying to extract its best times.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der January 2020-Ausgabe von MOTOR Magazine Australia.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
Bereits Abonnent ? Anmelden
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der January 2020-Ausgabe von MOTOR Magazine Australia.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
Bereits Abonnent? Anmelden
Ged Bulmer
THE ACCOMPANYING YARN WAS A RIB TICKLER, BUT THE SUITS AT PORSCHE DIDN'T SEE IT THAT WAY
Dylan Campbell
WE WERE LIVING THE DREAM. WE ALL WANTED TO WORK FOR MOTOR AS TEENAGERS
HONDA NSX
Honda's alloy missile - a friendly firecracker
TESLA MODEL S
Looking back on the automobile's iPhone moment | TESLA AIMS TO ELEVATE THE ELECTRIC CAR FROM INTRIGUING CURIOUSITY TO A VIABLE MEANS OF EVERYDAY TRANSPORT
PORSCHE 959
Weissach rethinks the supercar
PCOTY LEGENDS - 1996-2022
HOW THE ANNUAL QUEST FOR AUSTRALIA'S BEST PERFORMANCE CARS HAS DELIVERED A ROLL CALL OF EXCELLENCE
THE UNDEFEATED
HONDA'S FK8 CIVIC TYPE R IS OUR LINEAL CHAMP, WINNING EVERY MOTOR COMPARISON AS WELL AS BOTH PERFORMANCE CAR OF THE YEAR AND BANG FOR YOUR BUCKS. WE PAY OUR RESPECTS WITH A FINAL DRIVE IN THE END-OF-THE-LINE LE SPECIAL
THESE ARE OUR PEOPLE
IN A CULTURE OVERFLOWING WITH POSERS AND TRY-HARDS, WE FIND A HAVEN FOR THOSE THAT LOVE DRIVING ABOVE ALL ELSE
OPEN WIDE, SAY R
VOLKSWAGEN'S GOLF R LANDS IN AUSTRALIA AND IT ALREADY HAS THE SWAGGER OF A GIANTKILLER ABOUT IT. WE LINE UP SOME ASYMMETRIC ALTERNATIVES TO SEE IF THE GOLF HAS THEIR RESPECTIVE TALENTS COVERED
SING FOR YOUR DINNER
As the motoring world undergoes seismic shifts in focus, Rob Dickinson's vision for Singer remains clear