I had one of the first 3 series coupe’s back in the early 1990’s – beautiful 2L straight six petrol. If you don’t need the estate get the 4 series coupe, its a lovely looking car.

Especially when there’s a “20” after the 4 and an M badge 😉

Mmm…

X6.

Obviously.

If you’re going to go w******, you may as well go full w******.

😉

Debadging = this car has a small engine and the driver is ashamed of it – whatever anyone says to the contrary, that’s what it means 🙂

Maybe if you are looking at Fiesta’s, but not in this sector. Apples and oranges. If you look at the range as a whole, it’s one of the smaller engines/outputs. If you vain enough to be buying the car as a ego-wagen it does spoil the image to those that care, regardless of how good the car is in relative terms.

We have a 120d and a 320i. The 320i does feel a bit sluggish, after the torque of the 120d, but when I remember to change up later, the car feels sprightly enough. The engines are similar in overall power, they just deliver it differently.

(Neither car feels underpowered despite only having a 2L engine)

Note that 320i defaults to ‘Comfort” mode, if you click mode to “Sport” it is no longer that sluggish. Diesels seem to be less affected by these settings as you’ll get plenty of torque in all 2 liter diesel engines.
There is setting for auto gear box too and even optional “Sport+” mode too 🙂
That said, my 3yo F31 is a bit noisy (tyre noise mostly) and there are couple of squeaks from the trim and sport seats are bit annoying to adjust without electrics (especially the height).

My brother has a 440i.

Its lovely, its not earth shatteringly quick, but fast enough and just very nicely put together and that straight six sounds amazing! Its also surprisingly frugal regularly getting high 30’s mpg and even over 40 when bimbling along on the motorway. He got a 520d courtesy car the other day and was surprised by how well in compared in terms of fuel economy

[/quote]Debadging = this car has a small engine and the driver is ashamed of it – whatever anyone says to the contrary, that’s what it means

His is debadged

Makes sense to debadge a larger engined model to stop other people being judgmental or driving like a-holes near your pride and joy.

Not for a 4 litre 300bhp car its not.

Not for a 4 litre 300bhp car its not.

Firstly, I was commenting on mikertroid’s 325 touring.

Secondly, when you are talking about using up a finite resource in a terribly damaging way, 28mpg is woeful and convincing yourself it isn’t is foolish and selfish. 🙂

The newer E91 is better built than the E46 by all accounts.

I’d agree with that having owned them both.

Personally, I’d stick with a 3 series of some sort because I’m not sold on how the 4 series looks.

My big issue is the lack of straight six engines in the new range – the engine in our 330 was brilliant.

The latest six pot diesels though are very good and seriously quick, if lacking in the noise department.

I meant that they still sound like a Massey Ferguson on start up / low revs. The growl under acceleration isn’t too bad though.

Debadging, this is the first car which I have debadged and I don’t think it fools anyone as it has single exhaust pipe and 16″ wheels. 😀
Reason for debadging was that being OCD I couldn’t cope with 320i and xdrive badge being so annoingly positioned on the trunk – they are not centered vertically or horisontally and letter styling is completely different. It is zero cost option from factory anyway so it is quite common not to have them.

The new 330 is a 2l 4 pot engine. If you are any the six pot you’ll need to spring for the 340.

Either way the auto box is very smooth.

Which one is best for carrying a bike ? or isn’t that a use case ?

Don’t need car to carry bikes have a van for that. Just want something that can be used everyday for short journeys and the occasional longer trip and is fun to drive and looks good.