I have owned my 2005 pre facelift 2.5 SE for a couple of years now and am entirely happy with it including performance. Yes I have wondered how much better the 2.5 si or 3 litre might have been but condition and low mileage was what sold it to me. Anyway wife and I were staying with friends in Gloucester recently and mate said to me that there was a brand new state of the art BMW showroom near Cheltenham so we went along to kick tyres.
Brilliant place with some restored BMW classics over three floors but it was the Z4s which attracted me. Know I am not knowledgeable on the newer Zeds but sales rep had some secondhand ones with very low mileage in the showroom. I think they were around the £18/19k region. I particularly liked the white Zed which was an 18i. It had an 'M' sport badge and driving position felt very comfortable. In short I was very taken with the car. I asked the sales rep what sort of performance the car had and I am sure he said 157 bhp.
So my first question is whether that could be true. My old Zed pushes out 190bhp which is way down the list so how could BMW market such an underpowered sports car. Also I have seen a few Zeds recently with 'M' stickers that are clearly not what they suggest. Its a pet hate of mine when people stick 'turbo' etc on cars which are clearly not so how could BMW take the 'M' badge in vain. Is it just styling they are referring to in which case 'M' badges shouldnt be used. Inside the showroom I saw a number of other models with 'M' badges but small single exhaust pipes suggesting they cannot be 'M' range. The 18i also had a single exhaust pipe.
Alternatively I am going completely nuts and have misunderstood the 18i M sport performance. Can anyone put me out of my misery!!
Brilliant place with some restored BMW classics over three floors but it was the Z4s which attracted me. Know I am not knowledgeable on the newer Zeds but sales rep had some secondhand ones with very low mileage in the showroom. I think they were around the £18/19k region. I particularly liked the white Zed which was an 18i. It had an 'M' sport badge and driving position felt very comfortable. In short I was very taken with the car. I asked the sales rep what sort of performance the car had and I am sure he said 157 bhp.
So my first question is whether that could be true. My old Zed pushes out 190bhp which is way down the list so how could BMW market such an underpowered sports car. Also I have seen a few Zeds recently with 'M' stickers that are clearly not what they suggest. Its a pet hate of mine when people stick 'turbo' etc on cars which are clearly not so how could BMW take the 'M' badge in vain. Is it just styling they are referring to in which case 'M' badges shouldnt be used. Inside the showroom I saw a number of other models with 'M' badges but small single exhaust pipes suggesting they cannot be 'M' range. The 18i also had a single exhaust pipe.
Alternatively I am going completely nuts and have misunderstood the 18i M sport performance. Can anyone put me out of my misery!!