1
00:00:04,080 --> 00:00:06,320
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Car and Drivers Into Cars, a

2
00:00:06,400 --> 00:00:09,440
Speaker 1: podcast from iHeartMedia is Ruby Studio, brought to you by

3
00:00:09,480 --> 00:00:12,559
Speaker 1: eBay Motors. I'm Tony ki Roger, the editor in chief

4
00:00:12,600 --> 00:00:14,800
Speaker 1: of Car and Driver, and I'm joined by my co host,

5
00:00:15,080 --> 00:00:18,040
Speaker 1: former editor in chief and current Chief Brand and Content Officer,

6
00:00:18,160 --> 00:00:20,720
Speaker 1: Eddie Alterman, and together We're Into Cars.

7
00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:24,680
Speaker 2: Each episode of this podcast covers a new car we

8
00:00:24,720 --> 00:00:27,240
Speaker 2: think is worthy of your attention. The cars we select

9
00:00:27,240 --> 00:00:30,840
Speaker 2: for this podcast may feature a novel design, cutting edge engineering,

10
00:00:31,120 --> 00:00:34,360
Speaker 2: or offer something entirely new. We'll be covering the stories

11
00:00:34,360 --> 00:00:38,000
Speaker 2: behind the cars too, answering the whys and exploring the whats.

12
00:00:38,400 --> 00:00:40,920
Speaker 2: We'll drive the cars and let you listen in, and

13
00:00:40,920 --> 00:00:42,640
Speaker 2: then we'll sit down with the people who made the

14
00:00:42,680 --> 00:00:45,199
Speaker 2: cars to answer our questions about them. Come along for

15
00:00:45,240 --> 00:00:47,720
Speaker 2: the ride and you'll hear it all the good, the bad,

16
00:00:47,720 --> 00:00:50,800
Speaker 2: and the ugly in the way that only carent Driver delivers.

17
00:00:51,680 --> 00:00:55,360
Speaker 2: So today we've got two BMW's to drive and talk about.

18
00:00:55,480 --> 00:00:58,720
Speaker 2: Two BMW's, but they're the same car. It's the five series,

19
00:00:58,760 --> 00:01:01,320
Speaker 2: but the gas version and the EV version.

20
00:01:07,040 --> 00:01:09,679
Speaker 1: And it basically comes down to a customer's choice. Do

21
00:01:09,720 --> 00:01:13,560
Speaker 1: you want battery or gas tank charging station or gas station.

22
00:01:13,680 --> 00:01:15,240
Speaker 1: Do you want a turbot charge in line six or

23
00:01:15,280 --> 00:01:17,360
Speaker 1: an electric motor? I mean, it's an interesting choice, and

24
00:01:17,400 --> 00:01:18,840
Speaker 1: it's a choice that more and more people are going

25
00:01:18,880 --> 00:01:20,680
Speaker 1: to be facing over the next five ten years.

26
00:01:21,000 --> 00:01:25,119
Speaker 2: BMW has a really interesting approach here within the envelope

27
00:01:25,319 --> 00:01:29,120
Speaker 2: of the five series. You can get a mild hybrid

28
00:01:29,520 --> 00:01:33,640
Speaker 2: gas engine or a full EV. You can just pick

29
00:01:33,880 --> 00:01:35,800
Speaker 2: which technology you want.

30
00:01:35,880 --> 00:01:38,040
Speaker 1: Right, it comes down to what do you want, what

31
00:01:38,080 --> 00:01:40,720
Speaker 1: fits your needes. They have both options and you get

32
00:01:40,720 --> 00:01:43,760
Speaker 1: the exact same car essentially. And maybe it comes from

33
00:01:43,760 --> 00:01:46,039
Speaker 1: being a little gun shy after building something like the

34
00:01:46,080 --> 00:01:51,240
Speaker 1: BMWi three, which launched about a decade ago, carbon fiber structure.

35
00:01:51,320 --> 00:01:54,480
Speaker 1: It was a purpose built EV. It was super practical,

36
00:01:54,520 --> 00:01:57,360
Speaker 1: It had some quirkiness that people sort of expected of evs,

37
00:01:57,800 --> 00:02:00,360
Speaker 1: but it just didn't sell. So this this might be

38
00:02:00,360 --> 00:02:01,920
Speaker 1: a reaction against that. That must have been a pretty

39
00:02:01,960 --> 00:02:02,760
Speaker 1: expensive mistake.

40
00:02:03,280 --> 00:02:07,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, the I three was super exotic. The interior was incredible.

41
00:02:07,080 --> 00:02:12,440
Speaker 2: It had suicide doors, these tiny little sort of bicycle tires.

42
00:02:12,560 --> 00:02:15,079
Speaker 2: They built a concept car that was actually pretty affordable,

43
00:02:15,200 --> 00:02:17,400
Speaker 2: didn't have a ton of range, and it sort of

44
00:02:17,440 --> 00:02:18,800
Speaker 2: looked like a science experiment.

45
00:02:19,280 --> 00:02:20,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, did you ever look at the rear end of

46
00:02:20,840 --> 00:02:22,520
Speaker 1: that thing? It looked like it was swallowing a nine

47
00:02:22,520 --> 00:02:24,120
Speaker 1: to eleven. If you look at the rear bumper of

48
00:02:24,120 --> 00:02:25,679
Speaker 1: that car, it looks like it's just a nine to

49
00:02:25,720 --> 00:02:28,200
Speaker 1: eleven has driven into the I three and just you

50
00:02:28,200 --> 00:02:29,760
Speaker 1: can just see the bottom of its tail.

51
00:02:29,880 --> 00:02:31,760
Speaker 2: Like, I'll have to take a look. But they are

52
00:02:31,840 --> 00:02:33,640
Speaker 2: sort of gunshy, I would say.

53
00:02:33,720 --> 00:02:38,720
Speaker 1: And EV adoption, the timeline has kept changing. Having two powertrains,

54
00:02:38,760 --> 00:02:41,359
Speaker 1: an electric and a gas one on the same platform

55
00:02:41,400 --> 00:02:44,360
Speaker 1: allows them to have flexibility. So if the market is

56
00:02:44,360 --> 00:02:46,880
Speaker 1: turning away from eves, if the market's turning towards gas

57
00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:49,880
Speaker 1: or vice versa, they have some flexibility to move more

58
00:02:49,880 --> 00:02:52,919
Speaker 1: evs or more gas cars. And I think that makes

59
00:02:52,960 --> 00:02:54,200
Speaker 1: total sense. Yeah, that's right.

60
00:02:54,240 --> 00:02:57,440
Speaker 2: You can scale production of one model based on consumer

61
00:02:57,480 --> 00:03:00,760
Speaker 2: demand instead of shoving this stuff down people's throats, you know.

62
00:03:00,840 --> 00:03:03,480
Speaker 2: And I think that's been a lot of that EV backlash.

63
00:03:03,480 --> 00:03:05,680
Speaker 2: It's been due to people saying, you know what, I

64
00:03:05,720 --> 00:03:09,480
Speaker 2: still want an internal combustion car. The ultimate freedom is

65
00:03:09,600 --> 00:03:14,520
Speaker 2: choice and BMW allows people to have that freedom. And

66
00:03:15,160 --> 00:03:18,680
Speaker 2: the five series is really an icon of the sports

67
00:03:18,680 --> 00:03:23,000
Speaker 2: Sinanan World and the E thirty four version, the E

68
00:03:23,160 --> 00:03:25,480
Speaker 2: thirty nine version. These were sort of seen as the

69
00:03:25,520 --> 00:03:29,200
Speaker 2: pinnacle of the mid size sports sedan, and so I

70
00:03:29,240 --> 00:03:33,480
Speaker 2: think the question before us today is is the electric

71
00:03:34,080 --> 00:03:36,200
Speaker 2: a better sports sedan than the gas version.

72
00:03:36,760 --> 00:03:39,320
Speaker 1: So today we have the top of the five series ranges.

73
00:03:39,400 --> 00:03:41,280
Speaker 1: We have the top gas engine car, which is the

74
00:03:41,280 --> 00:03:43,760
Speaker 1: five forty I X drive, and then we've got the

75
00:03:43,800 --> 00:03:45,760
Speaker 1: I five M sixty. So we've got the top ones

76
00:03:45,840 --> 00:03:49,000
Speaker 1: until the M five shows up. The five forty in

77
00:03:49,040 --> 00:03:53,960
Speaker 1: traditional BMWA has terbocharged in line six, and I want

78
00:03:54,000 --> 00:03:56,200
Speaker 1: to see how that compares to the I five M sixty.

79
00:03:56,240 --> 00:03:57,760
Speaker 1: I mean, the I five M sixty has a lot

80
00:03:57,760 --> 00:04:00,840
Speaker 1: more power. It's got five hundred and ninety three horsepower.

81
00:04:00,920 --> 00:04:03,280
Speaker 1: It's also got a lot more weight. Yes, it is

82
00:04:03,320 --> 00:04:05,480
Speaker 1: a bit heavier, but it is. It's also more expensive.

83
00:04:05,600 --> 00:04:08,600
Speaker 1: It's close to twenty thousand dollars more expensive than the

84
00:04:09,320 --> 00:04:11,480
Speaker 1: more but it got a lot more power. You got

85
00:04:11,520 --> 00:04:13,040
Speaker 1: more than two hundred more horsepower.

86
00:04:13,280 --> 00:04:16,000
Speaker 2: And there's three levels to the I five. Right, there's

87
00:04:16,120 --> 00:04:18,520
Speaker 2: the rear drive you know, base car, which is three

88
00:04:18,640 --> 00:04:21,320
Speaker 2: hundred and thirty five horse power, which is plenty quick

89
00:04:21,880 --> 00:04:25,159
Speaker 2: the three hundred and eighty nine horse power Extrive forty version,

90
00:04:25,240 --> 00:04:27,320
Speaker 2: and then this top Dog, which, as you say, is

91
00:04:27,360 --> 00:04:30,280
Speaker 2: almost six hundred horse power, which is you know, adequate.

92
00:04:30,600 --> 00:04:34,160
Speaker 2: They really look very very similar. You'd be hard pressed

93
00:04:34,200 --> 00:04:36,159
Speaker 2: to see which is the EV and which is the

94
00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:39,440
Speaker 2: ice version. But let's go out into the parking lot

95
00:04:39,560 --> 00:04:41,839
Speaker 2: do a little walk around and see what those differences

96
00:04:41,880 --> 00:04:42,320
Speaker 2: really are.

97
00:04:46,920 --> 00:04:50,039
Speaker 1: We're standing in front of the I five Eddie and

98
00:04:50,120 --> 00:04:53,640
Speaker 1: the five forty. I can't see the badges. Which one's

99
00:04:53,680 --> 00:04:57,120
Speaker 1: the gas one, which one's the electric. It is extraordinarily

100
00:04:57,160 --> 00:04:59,080
Speaker 1: hard to tell. They're the same.

101
00:04:59,240 --> 00:05:02,400
Speaker 2: They're the same. I mean they both have the same

102
00:05:02,480 --> 00:05:06,279
Speaker 2: plastic grill. One has an M badge, so maybe that's

103
00:05:06,320 --> 00:05:09,200
Speaker 2: the gas one. But then I look at the BMW

104
00:05:09,279 --> 00:05:13,000
Speaker 2: rondel and it has a blue ring around.

105
00:05:13,040 --> 00:05:15,440
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's the Oh and it's got that on

106
00:05:15,480 --> 00:05:16,240
Speaker 1: the wheels too.

107
00:05:16,400 --> 00:05:19,360
Speaker 2: Okay, so that's but the wheels are exactly the same. Yes,

108
00:05:19,480 --> 00:05:22,000
Speaker 2: the height of the cars are exactly the same, the

109
00:05:22,160 --> 00:05:24,760
Speaker 2: size is exactly the same, The body is the same.

110
00:05:24,800 --> 00:05:26,080
Speaker 1: They've got the same body kit.

111
00:05:26,560 --> 00:05:29,880
Speaker 2: If you look at the five forty, it has that

112
00:05:30,000 --> 00:05:33,840
Speaker 2: sort of thick rocker section you go, oh, that's the evy. No,

113
00:05:34,040 --> 00:05:35,840
Speaker 2: it's the exactly the same.

114
00:05:35,960 --> 00:05:37,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, this one just doesn't have a battery in it

115
00:05:37,720 --> 00:05:40,359
Speaker 1: in that space. That's basically it. I mean, if you

116
00:05:40,360 --> 00:05:42,800
Speaker 1: look really close, the tires are different. It's the same

117
00:05:42,880 --> 00:05:45,160
Speaker 1: kind of tire, but the I five has a little

118
00:05:45,160 --> 00:05:47,600
Speaker 1: bit more tire. It's a wider tire. Yeah, and it's

119
00:05:47,600 --> 00:05:50,560
Speaker 1: got the new HL rating for tires, which is for

120
00:05:50,600 --> 00:05:52,839
Speaker 1: heavy load. Because this is a big boy at like

121
00:05:52,880 --> 00:05:54,960
Speaker 1: over fifty two hundred pounds. Oh my god. And so

122
00:05:55,000 --> 00:05:58,000
Speaker 1: what is the five. It's also a big boy. I

123
00:05:58,000 --> 00:06:00,720
Speaker 1: think it's around forty three hundred pounds. Let's walk around

124
00:06:00,760 --> 00:06:03,200
Speaker 1: the back. Okay, they don't even show off the exhaust pipe,

125
00:06:03,240 --> 00:06:06,000
Speaker 1: so you get this like pseudo diffuser on both cars,

126
00:06:06,480 --> 00:06:07,960
Speaker 1: but you can't even see the exhaust.

127
00:06:08,040 --> 00:06:13,039
Speaker 2: Oh difference, different license plates and one is red and

128
00:06:13,080 --> 00:06:16,200
Speaker 2: one is blue. But other than that, it's nothing. And

129
00:06:16,320 --> 00:06:18,479
Speaker 2: I do have to say these are some of the

130
00:06:18,520 --> 00:06:22,880
Speaker 2: least grotesque is coming out of the Doctor Font's laboratory.

131
00:06:22,960 --> 00:06:24,640
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, they've been edited for sure.

132
00:06:25,200 --> 00:06:29,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, looking at you, XM, these look like proper luxury cars,

133
00:06:29,560 --> 00:06:30,440
Speaker 2: high reard.

134
00:06:30,200 --> 00:06:33,039
Speaker 1: Deck, the proportions are right, it's got the long dash

135
00:06:33,120 --> 00:06:35,360
Speaker 1: to axle, which is the distance from the middle of

136
00:06:35,400 --> 00:06:37,680
Speaker 1: the front wheel to the windshield. That shows it's not

137
00:06:37,720 --> 00:06:40,920
Speaker 1: a front wheel drive car basically exactly. They're pretty.

138
00:06:41,520 --> 00:06:44,279
Speaker 2: They do have that kind of angularity and some of

139
00:06:44,320 --> 00:06:46,800
Speaker 2: the graphics that is so popular these days.

140
00:06:46,839 --> 00:06:49,960
Speaker 1: But yeah, it's not the brick that the I seven

141
00:06:50,000 --> 00:06:51,839
Speaker 1: and the seventh series are. It looks more like a

142
00:06:51,839 --> 00:06:54,839
Speaker 1: five series has always looked. Here's another Easter egg. Oh

143
00:06:55,680 --> 00:06:58,240
Speaker 1: on the B pillars A five middle post of the cars.

144
00:06:58,279 --> 00:07:00,919
Speaker 1: A little five. That's cool in case you forget what

145
00:07:00,960 --> 00:07:01,560
Speaker 1: you're driving.

146
00:07:01,880 --> 00:07:05,719
Speaker 2: How do we feel about the electric wearing the M badge?

147
00:07:06,360 --> 00:07:08,080
Speaker 1: Well, I mean it has almost six hundred horse bar,

148
00:07:08,160 --> 00:07:10,520
Speaker 1: so I feel okay with it. Okay, I can make

149
00:07:10,600 --> 00:07:11,160
Speaker 1: I can make.

150
00:07:11,040 --> 00:07:14,560
Speaker 2: Peace with it. Well that's the xterior. Let's talk about

151
00:07:14,560 --> 00:07:14,960
Speaker 2: the interior.

152
00:07:15,240 --> 00:07:27,320
Speaker 1: Let's up inside. Would you hear that? It's got startup music.

153
00:07:27,680 --> 00:07:30,480
Speaker 1: We're looking at carbon fiber trim. It's got this huge

154
00:07:30,520 --> 00:07:33,920
Speaker 1: center screen, which is a touch screen. I like this touch.

155
00:07:33,960 --> 00:07:37,000
Speaker 1: When you turn the hazard lights on, illuminates.

156
00:07:36,360 --> 00:07:39,280
Speaker 2: The the whole hype lights.

157
00:07:39,320 --> 00:07:41,200
Speaker 1: The whole hYP lights up, so you can't just leave

158
00:07:41,200 --> 00:07:44,480
Speaker 1: your hazard lights on. It's got the M sports seats,

159
00:07:44,520 --> 00:07:46,880
Speaker 1: which are really comfortable. It's got the M steering wheel

160
00:07:46,920 --> 00:07:49,160
Speaker 1: with a little red piece of leather in the middle,

161
00:07:49,160 --> 00:07:50,720
Speaker 1: so you know what the top is, which is kind

162
00:07:50,720 --> 00:07:51,320
Speaker 1: of hilarious.

163
00:07:51,800 --> 00:07:54,680
Speaker 2: Decently upright windshield for cars these days.

164
00:07:54,520 --> 00:07:57,400
Speaker 1: That's very true. Yeah, and this one's got a big.

165
00:07:57,240 --> 00:08:00,680
Speaker 2: Hud head up display, which, yeah, exactly always turn off.

166
00:08:00,720 --> 00:08:02,240
Speaker 1: I hate those. Oh you don't like those. I'm a

167
00:08:02,280 --> 00:08:02,680
Speaker 1: big fan.

168
00:08:02,800 --> 00:08:05,520
Speaker 2: I find it so distracting. I'm not a toimecap pilot.

169
00:08:05,760 --> 00:08:08,920
Speaker 2: I'm not Maverick. I don't need it. I'm not even Goose.

170
00:08:11,120 --> 00:08:13,440
Speaker 1: It has the latest version of I Drive. BMW still

171
00:08:13,480 --> 00:08:15,560
Speaker 1: has eye drive. I think it's like I Drive thirty

172
00:08:15,640 --> 00:08:19,360
Speaker 1: seven point two. But yeah, so you still get the

173
00:08:19,400 --> 00:08:21,080
Speaker 1: big knob, you still get the big control now. But

174
00:08:21,120 --> 00:08:23,960
Speaker 1: you know, mercifully, BMW puts a touchscreen into this thing too.

175
00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:25,960
Speaker 2: And I like the width of this car. You know,

176
00:08:26,240 --> 00:08:30,480
Speaker 2: it's so a little less closely coupled than the I four.

177
00:08:31,200 --> 00:08:33,560
Speaker 2: It feels a little bit more luxurious. There's tons of

178
00:08:34,080 --> 00:08:37,160
Speaker 2: leg and knee room. Yeah, it's super comfy. This would

179
00:08:37,200 --> 00:08:40,480
Speaker 2: be an amazing cross country cruiser if it wasn't an EV.

180
00:08:40,840 --> 00:08:43,080
Speaker 1: Although it can fast charge pretty quickly, not as quick

181
00:08:43,120 --> 00:08:44,920
Speaker 1: as some of the fastest cars. It is a DC

182
00:08:45,040 --> 00:08:46,800
Speaker 1: fast charger which can do up to two hundred and

183
00:08:46,800 --> 00:08:50,560
Speaker 1: five kilowatts. It's a four hundred volt system, which isn't

184
00:08:50,720 --> 00:08:52,319
Speaker 1: you know the eight hundred volt system of a pors

185
00:08:52,400 --> 00:08:54,920
Speaker 1: Of ty Can or some of the Hyundai cars, So

186
00:08:55,000 --> 00:08:57,440
Speaker 1: it can't fast charge quite as fast as those.

187
00:08:57,760 --> 00:08:59,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's really the state of the r right now,

188
00:09:00,160 --> 00:09:02,800
Speaker 2: the eight hundred. And it's funny that, you know, portion

189
00:09:03,000 --> 00:09:06,840
Speaker 2: Audi have it and so does Hyundaikia Genesis, right, yeah,

190
00:09:08,720 --> 00:09:11,480
Speaker 2: I know. Well it's incredibly quiet at idle.

191
00:09:11,679 --> 00:09:14,480
Speaker 1: Yes it has. It has a really nice idol. But

192
00:09:14,520 --> 00:09:18,000
Speaker 1: you know, the in our testing, the five forty is

193
00:09:18,040 --> 00:09:20,920
Speaker 1: only like two or three decibels louder than this at idle.

194
00:09:21,240 --> 00:09:24,199
Speaker 1: So they've really masked the machinery.

195
00:09:24,760 --> 00:09:26,920
Speaker 2: You know, it's going to be interesting to dry these

196
00:09:26,920 --> 00:09:30,680
Speaker 2: things because motor is right in the middle of the

197
00:09:30,800 --> 00:09:35,920
Speaker 2: name yep, and for the longest time that meant engine YEP.

198
00:09:36,080 --> 00:09:38,240
Speaker 2: Now it means actual motor.

199
00:09:38,080 --> 00:09:40,480
Speaker 1: And it meant in in line six for the longest time,

200
00:09:40,559 --> 00:09:42,800
Speaker 1: which at least they still have it. They still make it.

201
00:09:42,840 --> 00:09:44,720
Speaker 1: I mean, you can get a four cylinder turbot with

202
00:09:44,760 --> 00:09:46,880
Speaker 1: the five thirty I, and then you can get the

203
00:09:46,880 --> 00:09:49,160
Speaker 1: five forty I, which has you know, the traditional inline

204
00:09:49,200 --> 00:09:53,520
Speaker 1: six at PMW has been making for els. God bless them.

205
00:09:53,559 --> 00:09:56,440
Speaker 1: I caught half of the twelve it is. It basically is.

206
00:09:56,480 --> 00:09:59,440
Speaker 1: It's so smooth, it's so quiet, it's so refined, but

207
00:09:59,520 --> 00:10:01,520
Speaker 1: you still get sound. You don't get the sound in

208
00:10:01,559 --> 00:10:04,400
Speaker 1: the electric Yeah you don't. Let's go step in the

209
00:10:04,520 --> 00:10:06,520
Speaker 1: five forty and see if we can pick out any differences.

210
00:10:06,600 --> 00:10:18,760
Speaker 1: Sounds good. So here we are in the five forty I.

211
00:10:19,720 --> 00:10:21,559
Speaker 1: What do you not first? Yeah, it doesn't have the

212
00:10:21,600 --> 00:10:24,280
Speaker 1: carbon fiber trim, but otherwise it's identical. It doesn't have

213
00:10:24,320 --> 00:10:26,960
Speaker 1: a little red stripe on the steering wheel either, so

214
00:10:27,160 --> 00:10:30,520
Speaker 1: that's I'm not buying this one. Start it up. Let's

215
00:10:30,520 --> 00:10:34,800
Speaker 1: see what it sounds like. Okay, okay, it's very quiet.

216
00:10:34,880 --> 00:10:36,360
Speaker 1: It's got a nice little hum to it.

217
00:10:36,800 --> 00:10:40,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, but everything is exactly as it is in the

218
00:10:40,600 --> 00:10:41,400
Speaker 2: electric version.

219
00:10:41,520 --> 00:10:44,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's exactly the same. It's it's really kind of freaky.

220
00:10:44,520 --> 00:10:47,040
Speaker 1: Oh you get it's a cometer. Oh right, it's acometer

221
00:10:47,080 --> 00:10:50,040
Speaker 1: instead of a power percentage gauge. How do you feel

222
00:10:50,040 --> 00:10:53,200
Speaker 1: about those gauges? Remember the old BMW gauges. They used

223
00:10:53,240 --> 00:10:57,959
Speaker 1: to take such pride in having large, clear, round analog gauges,

224
00:10:58,000 --> 00:11:00,640
Speaker 1: and now this is what the companies doing. No, it's

225
00:11:00,679 --> 00:11:01,080
Speaker 1: been a.

226
00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:06,640
Speaker 2: Long descent from the days of video and Jaeger gauges,

227
00:11:06,760 --> 00:11:09,640
Speaker 2: or as they say in the Watch World, ja ja.

228
00:11:11,160 --> 00:11:14,720
Speaker 1: That's what they watchers say. This looks like you remember

229
00:11:14,720 --> 00:11:18,720
Speaker 1: that that video game Tempest. These are the Tempest where

230
00:11:18,760 --> 00:11:22,680
Speaker 1: you're it's Tempest. And the designers must have played Tempest

231
00:11:22,679 --> 00:11:24,520
Speaker 1: at an early age and decided that this is what

232
00:11:24,559 --> 00:11:26,600
Speaker 1: they want in their gauges. And it's not. They're not

233
00:11:26,640 --> 00:11:28,480
Speaker 1: as clear, they don't work as well.

234
00:11:28,480 --> 00:11:31,400
Speaker 2: Look, this is an Apple Watch versus a Rolex argument,

235
00:11:31,760 --> 00:11:34,360
Speaker 2: right right right once you rather have the analog thing,

236
00:11:35,040 --> 00:11:38,000
Speaker 2: you know, especially in an analog seeming car or a

237
00:11:38,000 --> 00:11:40,720
Speaker 2: car that is old school internal combustion.

238
00:11:41,520 --> 00:11:44,360
Speaker 1: I want real gauges. All right, let's try.

239
00:11:44,920 --> 00:11:48,520
Speaker 2: I think what BMW is trying to do here is

240
00:11:48,600 --> 00:11:52,840
Speaker 2: normalize the EV version as just another powertrain choice.

241
00:11:53,040 --> 00:11:55,600
Speaker 1: Oh interesting, Yeah, it's kind of like it's no different

242
00:11:55,600 --> 00:11:57,720
Speaker 1: than when they offered a diesel in a gas There's

243
00:11:57,800 --> 00:12:00,680
Speaker 1: really no difference exterior or into or your wise. You

244
00:12:00,760 --> 00:12:03,120
Speaker 1: just have a different decometer, and that's basically the difference here.

245
00:12:03,280 --> 00:12:05,000
Speaker 2: You want the four, you want the six, or you

246
00:12:05,040 --> 00:12:09,000
Speaker 2: want the uh you know the battery?

247
00:12:12,600 --> 00:12:15,199
Speaker 1: Oh that engines so smooth in the inline six is

248
00:12:15,240 --> 00:12:17,240
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter if you're at one thousand rpm or

249
00:12:17,280 --> 00:12:20,280
Speaker 1: six thousand rpm. It's just a slightly louder thing, but

250
00:12:20,320 --> 00:12:22,480
Speaker 1: you feel no vibration coming through the car. It's just

251
00:12:22,880 --> 00:12:25,120
Speaker 1: isn't an amazing It's so wonderful.

252
00:12:25,640 --> 00:12:31,080
Speaker 2: I love that they've stuck with it, and I think

253
00:12:31,760 --> 00:12:36,400
Speaker 2: our mission today try to figure out which is the

254
00:12:36,400 --> 00:12:38,400
Speaker 2: best sports stand between.

255
00:12:38,080 --> 00:12:40,320
Speaker 1: Two Yeah, which one has more E thirty nine ers

256
00:12:40,960 --> 00:12:43,840
Speaker 1: full late nineties early two thousands five series, which I

257
00:12:43,840 --> 00:12:45,760
Speaker 1: think is the high water mark. I do to think

258
00:12:45,760 --> 00:12:47,160
Speaker 1: it's the high water mark. I do too.

259
00:12:47,200 --> 00:12:50,599
Speaker 2: That car is great, But you know that car weighed.

260
00:12:52,120 --> 00:12:57,280
Speaker 1: Six thirty seven. I mean we thought it was heavy

261
00:12:57,280 --> 00:12:59,160
Speaker 1: at the time. I know it was heavy because it

262
00:12:59,200 --> 00:13:00,439
Speaker 1: was heavier than it's pressor.

263
00:13:01,679 --> 00:13:04,280
Speaker 2: But as when the engines so went everything else in

264
00:13:04,320 --> 00:13:07,920
Speaker 2: that car. It was just so incredibly smooth and progressive

265
00:13:08,440 --> 00:13:11,360
Speaker 2: and predictable, and you knew where you were at all times.

266
00:13:12,240 --> 00:13:15,800
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, BMW's pumping in some engine sound that's coming

267
00:13:15,800 --> 00:13:18,840
Speaker 1: out of there speakers. Yeah sounds good. Though it does

268
00:13:18,880 --> 00:13:20,360
Speaker 1: sound good, it sounds real.

269
00:13:22,440 --> 00:13:26,439
Speaker 2: So much of the car's personality is in the engine.

270
00:13:26,480 --> 00:13:28,880
Speaker 2: It's the heart of the car, you know.

271
00:13:28,960 --> 00:13:31,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, you just lose it. You just lose it and

272
00:13:31,120 --> 00:13:34,600
Speaker 1: you gain acceleration. They're fun. I mean, electrics are super fun.

273
00:13:35,040 --> 00:13:37,800
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean the personality of a BMW was

274
00:13:38,040 --> 00:13:40,000
Speaker 1: a lot of it was built out of the inline

275
00:13:40,040 --> 00:13:42,640
Speaker 1: six and how flu it was and how different it

276
00:13:42,800 --> 00:13:46,200
Speaker 1: was from every competitor V sixes and even from competitor

277
00:13:46,240 --> 00:13:47,480
Speaker 1: inline sixes. Yeah.

278
00:13:47,480 --> 00:13:50,559
Speaker 2: And my beef with evs when you drive a bunch

279
00:13:50,600 --> 00:13:53,440
Speaker 2: of them back to back is they all start to

280
00:13:53,480 --> 00:13:55,199
Speaker 2: feel the same. I don't care if it's like a

281
00:13:55,280 --> 00:14:00,320
Speaker 2: Lucid Sapphire or an Ionic five from Hyundai. They all

282
00:14:00,400 --> 00:14:03,120
Speaker 2: have the same power delivery and they all really have

283
00:14:03,280 --> 00:14:04,240
Speaker 2: that same character.

284
00:14:05,520 --> 00:14:08,280
Speaker 1: They try to fake it with the fake noises which

285
00:14:08,320 --> 00:14:10,280
Speaker 1: sort of sound like, you know, anywhere from like the

286
00:14:10,360 --> 00:14:15,319
Speaker 1: Jetson's car to an angry robot, but it just doesn't

287
00:14:15,320 --> 00:14:17,240
Speaker 1: do it for me, and it doesn't really. Since there's

288
00:14:17,280 --> 00:14:20,520
Speaker 1: only one gear, you're not going through the gears, there's

289
00:14:20,560 --> 00:14:23,920
Speaker 1: no change in the experience you've taken such an important

290
00:14:23,920 --> 00:14:27,800
Speaker 1: part of driving a car out of it an important

291
00:14:27,800 --> 00:14:29,520
Speaker 1: part of a brand's personality too.

292
00:14:29,640 --> 00:14:33,440
Speaker 2: Yes, So what's the differentiator at that point between evs.

293
00:14:34,440 --> 00:14:40,120
Speaker 2: It's brand whatever that means, it's styling its interior. I

294
00:14:40,200 --> 00:14:43,520
Speaker 2: will say, However, there are some edge cases to this, Okay,

295
00:14:43,640 --> 00:14:48,880
Speaker 2: like the Porsche Ti Kon. Somehow that thing still feels

296
00:14:48,880 --> 00:14:49,600
Speaker 2: like a Porsche.

297
00:14:49,640 --> 00:14:51,400
Speaker 1: It does, and for me, you sit in it and

298
00:14:51,440 --> 00:14:55,360
Speaker 1: it feels you're sitting so low. They really played that up.

299
00:14:55,400 --> 00:14:57,480
Speaker 1: You can see the front fenders. They really did it

300
00:14:57,600 --> 00:14:59,800
Speaker 1: right so that you feel, even though you're in a sedan,

301
00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:02,040
Speaker 1: it feels like you're in a sports car. Yeah, let's

302
00:15:02,040 --> 00:15:09,160
Speaker 1: do a quick launch. Okay, Oh, it's pretty hard. My

303
00:15:09,320 --> 00:15:13,320
Speaker 1: lobships watch is super hard. Oh my god.

304
00:15:13,800 --> 00:15:16,200
Speaker 2: Nauseating, great, nauseating.

305
00:15:16,520 --> 00:15:17,720
Speaker 1: That's fantastic.

306
00:15:18,600 --> 00:15:22,040
Speaker 2: You know, humans weren't engineered to go to accelerate that quickly.

307
00:15:24,440 --> 00:15:27,280
Speaker 1: It's like, if you travel faster than a horse, will

308
00:15:27,360 --> 00:15:33,480
Speaker 1: you die? Maybe? Yeah. Now we're on the highway. I

309
00:15:33,520 --> 00:15:35,800
Speaker 1: mean it's really quiet as uh, you know, as you

310
00:15:35,880 --> 00:15:37,360
Speaker 1: expect from a mid sized BMW.

311
00:15:37,480 --> 00:15:39,560
Speaker 2: At the five series Tony, there is a v sun

312
00:15:39,640 --> 00:15:43,760
Speaker 2: Rogue ahead of us with a neurbur ring track sticker

313
00:15:43,840 --> 00:15:44,600
Speaker 2: on the back of it.

314
00:15:44,600 --> 00:15:52,400
Speaker 1: Will you catch up to him? Check this out? Oh,

315
00:15:53,560 --> 00:15:57,080
Speaker 1: it's so good. It's so wonderful. And there's no change

316
00:15:57,120 --> 00:15:59,360
Speaker 1: in like, you don't feel any bad vibes coming through

317
00:15:59,400 --> 00:16:02,360
Speaker 1: the car at all. It's just magic. It's just a wonderful,

318
00:16:02,400 --> 00:16:13,280
Speaker 1: wonderful magic in Line six still has a ton of

319
00:16:13,320 --> 00:16:16,040
Speaker 1: grip on the skid pad. It was about the same

320
00:16:16,160 --> 00:16:20,960
Speaker 1: as the as the I five. And it's so balance.

321
00:16:21,040 --> 00:16:24,040
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not understeering, it's not oversteering. You know.

322
00:16:24,200 --> 00:16:28,160
Speaker 1: The all four tires are working equally hard, it feels like,

323
00:16:28,920 --> 00:16:31,080
Speaker 1: and this one doesn't have the fifty to fifty balance

324
00:16:31,080 --> 00:16:33,200
Speaker 1: that BMW's used to be famous for. It's a little

325
00:16:33,200 --> 00:16:36,600
Speaker 1: bit nose heavy, but you kind of stepped away from that. However,

326
00:16:36,720 --> 00:16:41,680
Speaker 1: the electric is fifty to fifty weight distribution, and.

327
00:16:41,720 --> 00:16:46,120
Speaker 2: You can still control the cornery attitude of these cars

328
00:16:46,400 --> 00:16:47,240
Speaker 2: with the throttle.

329
00:16:47,440 --> 00:16:50,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, the steering is pretty asleep. You're not getting a

330
00:16:50,280 --> 00:16:53,080
Speaker 1: ton of feel through the steering, and even in this

331
00:16:53,240 --> 00:16:56,960
Speaker 1: sport mode, it's really really sort of overly light and

332
00:16:58,480 --> 00:17:01,200
Speaker 1: that's a shame. Okay, want to hear my theory about

333
00:17:01,480 --> 00:17:04,280
Speaker 1: BMW's I do.

334
00:17:05,000 --> 00:17:07,720
Speaker 2: They're always moving on to the next thing. They're always

335
00:17:07,760 --> 00:17:13,040
Speaker 2: putting their deepest talent in the next technology. You know,

336
00:17:13,119 --> 00:17:18,359
Speaker 2: when Europe was making great sports cars, they focused on

337
00:17:18,440 --> 00:17:22,440
Speaker 2: sports sedans. When everybody caught up and started making great

338
00:17:22,440 --> 00:17:27,199
Speaker 2: sports edans, they had shifted to making great SUVs, and

339
00:17:27,240 --> 00:17:30,960
Speaker 2: the sports dans suffered a little bit, and they weren't

340
00:17:31,040 --> 00:17:32,600
Speaker 2: quite as good as they had been.

341
00:17:33,480 --> 00:17:35,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, because X five was sort of like the first

342
00:17:35,720 --> 00:17:38,960
Speaker 1: great driving suv see right.

343
00:17:39,160 --> 00:17:43,080
Speaker 2: Okay, and they made great SUVs and even the X one,

344
00:17:43,160 --> 00:17:46,280
Speaker 2: the front drive one, the rear drive one was incredible,

345
00:17:46,280 --> 00:17:48,840
Speaker 2: but even the front drive one was good, much better

346
00:17:48,880 --> 00:17:50,800
Speaker 2: than the Mercedes equivalent.

347
00:17:51,520 --> 00:17:53,960
Speaker 1: You think they put all the talent into what's next?

348
00:17:54,119 --> 00:17:55,240
Speaker 1: I do? I think.

349
00:17:55,480 --> 00:17:57,359
Speaker 2: You know, they've moved a lot of people from what

350
00:17:57,400 --> 00:18:00,320
Speaker 2: I understand, off the M cars and in to the

351
00:18:00,359 --> 00:18:04,640
Speaker 2: I cars, and they're really like front loading a lot

352
00:18:04,640 --> 00:18:06,320
Speaker 2: of their talent into what's next.

353
00:18:06,480 --> 00:18:09,760
Speaker 1: That's how I four feels. I four feels like the

354
00:18:09,800 --> 00:18:12,560
Speaker 1: best people at BMW, the people who had all the

355
00:18:12,560 --> 00:18:15,040
Speaker 1: institutional knowledge of how to make a car handle, how

356
00:18:15,080 --> 00:18:17,520
Speaker 1: to make a car steer, or put on that car,

357
00:18:17,720 --> 00:18:20,280
Speaker 1: and then they brought back some of that magic. It's

358
00:18:20,280 --> 00:18:25,320
Speaker 1: really really great. Oh so good, I mean so smooth.

359
00:18:26,000 --> 00:18:28,360
Speaker 1: If somebody said there's a V twelve under the hood,

360
00:18:28,400 --> 00:18:31,720
Speaker 1: you'd be like, oh, yeah, totally, exactly, totally, it's so smooth.

361
00:18:32,400 --> 00:18:35,439
Speaker 2: And all the piped in engine noise in the world,

362
00:18:35,600 --> 00:18:39,240
Speaker 2: which there is some can't really replace that, or the

363
00:18:39,320 --> 00:18:41,240
Speaker 2: feel under the ball of your foot.

364
00:18:42,200 --> 00:18:44,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, and just being able to downshift a few gears

365
00:18:44,520 --> 00:18:47,600
Speaker 1: and just bring the engine alive because it is sort

366
00:18:47,640 --> 00:18:49,679
Speaker 1: of a living thing. I totally agree.

367
00:18:49,840 --> 00:18:53,200
Speaker 2: Like, you know, this is the closest that man has

368
00:18:53,240 --> 00:18:57,960
Speaker 2: come to creating an animal. The internal combustion motor car

369
00:18:59,560 --> 00:19:02,480
Speaker 2: and the engine is the heart of it. The thing

370
00:19:02,560 --> 00:19:07,240
Speaker 2: is growling. You have to kind of innate connection to

371
00:19:07,320 --> 00:19:10,639
Speaker 2: it because of the sounds it's making. But there is

372
00:19:10,680 --> 00:19:13,960
Speaker 2: an opacity to an ev you know, there is that

373
00:19:14,040 --> 00:19:17,719
Speaker 2: like what's really going on here? You know there is

374
00:19:17,760 --> 00:19:21,800
Speaker 2: a motor. There's a motor that's moving, but it feels remote.

375
00:19:22,200 --> 00:19:25,080
Speaker 1: It does, it's not the same. Let's see if.

376
00:19:25,080 --> 00:19:29,840
Speaker 2: You know BMW in the I five can give us

377
00:19:29,880 --> 00:19:30,639
Speaker 2: some of that feel.

378
00:19:30,840 --> 00:19:33,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's take this five point forty back and go

379
00:19:33,560 --> 00:19:43,119
Speaker 1: step into the I five and see what happens. Okay,

380
00:19:44,119 --> 00:19:45,960
Speaker 1: now we're inside the I five M sixty.

381
00:19:46,040 --> 00:19:48,040
Speaker 2: Let's start it up and see what it sounds like.

382
00:19:50,000 --> 00:19:56,640
Speaker 2: Who foreboding? Does Industrial Light and Magic get a royalty

383
00:19:56,720 --> 00:19:59,560
Speaker 2: for I was going to use a really dated reference.

384
00:20:00,080 --> 00:20:03,679
Speaker 2: It's close encounters. I think I beat you with that. No, No,

385
00:20:03,760 --> 00:20:05,959
Speaker 2: close Encounters is like eighty three or something.

386
00:20:06,200 --> 00:20:09,679
Speaker 1: I think it's like seventy eight. Oh, okay, all right,

387
00:20:09,760 --> 00:20:13,359
Speaker 1: let's get go on. Put it in drive. Sounds good,

388
00:20:14,440 --> 00:20:16,000
Speaker 1: Oh it's silent. I know.

389
00:20:16,680 --> 00:20:20,120
Speaker 2: BMW spends a lot of time and energy on the

390
00:20:20,160 --> 00:20:23,960
Speaker 2: sounds that its cars make, from the turn signals to

391
00:20:24,440 --> 00:20:27,840
Speaker 2: the door chimes to all that stuff. And I'm sure

392
00:20:27,840 --> 00:20:29,920
Speaker 2: they got some tricks up their sleeve when it comes

393
00:20:29,920 --> 00:20:31,959
Speaker 2: to ev sounds.

394
00:20:32,160 --> 00:20:36,000
Speaker 1: But we'll see. Well, it has this iconic sounds which

395
00:20:36,040 --> 00:20:38,080
Speaker 1: the other car also has. You can sort of turn

396
00:20:38,160 --> 00:20:40,440
Speaker 1: that on and off to see how or to make

397
00:20:40,520 --> 00:20:43,040
Speaker 1: it louder or quieter. What you want to do?

398
00:20:43,040 --> 00:20:48,000
Speaker 2: Does it sound like a batmobile? So car Driver, whenever

399
00:20:48,040 --> 00:20:51,680
Speaker 2: it tests a car, it produces a track sheet. And

400
00:20:51,880 --> 00:20:55,000
Speaker 2: I'm looking at the one from the I five sixty

401
00:20:55,320 --> 00:20:59,080
Speaker 2: X drive right now, and I'm looking at curbweight. Okay,

402
00:20:59,520 --> 00:21:04,920
Speaker 2: it's five two hundred and twenty five pounds, almost perfectly

403
00:21:05,320 --> 00:21:06,600
Speaker 2: distributed front rear.

404
00:21:06,720 --> 00:21:09,040
Speaker 1: Yep. But you can do that with the electric car,

405
00:21:09,240 --> 00:21:12,680
Speaker 1: and I used to be such an important part of BMW's.

406
00:21:12,119 --> 00:21:16,760
Speaker 2: That was a huge part of their brand, but you know,

407
00:21:16,920 --> 00:21:20,240
Speaker 2: a lot of it was marketing. Oh oh man, that's

408
00:21:20,280 --> 00:21:27,639
Speaker 2: brutal acceleration. Okay, So crazier acceleration from this car, just

409
00:21:27,680 --> 00:21:32,240
Speaker 2: in that little little run from a much heavier car. Okay,

410
00:21:32,280 --> 00:21:35,400
Speaker 2: the five point forty I'm looking at the trackshet that

411
00:21:35,520 --> 00:21:40,200
Speaker 2: weighed forty three hundred and sixty five, not a lightweight,

412
00:21:40,960 --> 00:21:44,479
Speaker 2: fifty four point two percent of its masses on the front,

413
00:21:45,080 --> 00:21:48,679
Speaker 2: forty five point eight percent on the rear. So this

414
00:21:48,760 --> 00:21:51,720
Speaker 2: is a much heavier car, but it's also much much quicker.

415
00:21:52,040 --> 00:21:53,760
Speaker 1: But I bet the center of gravity of this car

416
00:21:53,880 --> 00:21:56,159
Speaker 1: is lower because you've got the battery pack in the floor,

417
00:21:56,200 --> 00:22:00,000
Speaker 1: so you've got that mass all in the floor. Yeah,

418
00:22:00,080 --> 00:22:02,440
Speaker 1: So it'll be interesting to see how it handles compared

419
00:22:02,440 --> 00:22:05,480
Speaker 1: to the other one. The extra weight in a good

420
00:22:05,520 --> 00:22:08,960
Speaker 1: place isn't necessarily a bad thing. They put a little

421
00:22:08,960 --> 00:22:13,119
Speaker 1: more tire underneath to compensate for the extra weight, but

422
00:22:13,240 --> 00:22:17,320
Speaker 1: both are about point nine g. I do miss the

423
00:22:17,359 --> 00:22:21,080
Speaker 1: little vibrations of the engine. I miss the intake noise.

424
00:22:21,680 --> 00:22:27,160
Speaker 2: This feels very clinical and anti dine in comparison. The

425
00:22:27,200 --> 00:22:30,200
Speaker 2: noise is such a huge part of that car, the

426
00:22:30,320 --> 00:22:34,280
Speaker 2: five forty, I mean, such a great sound it it

427
00:22:34,400 --> 00:22:35,119
Speaker 2: engine makes.

428
00:22:35,480 --> 00:22:37,439
Speaker 1: And then having I mean this is a one gear.

429
00:22:37,640 --> 00:22:40,800
Speaker 1: I have one gear here. I'm always in the right gear. Yeah,

430
00:22:40,840 --> 00:22:43,920
Speaker 1: and I've got a ton of torque. It's got amazing

431
00:22:43,960 --> 00:22:46,920
Speaker 1: accelerator response. Notice I'm not saying throttle response.

432
00:22:48,040 --> 00:22:51,040
Speaker 2: Let's do an acceleration run and see how it stacks

433
00:22:51,119 --> 00:22:52,040
Speaker 2: up to the five forty.

434
00:22:52,520 --> 00:22:54,879
Speaker 1: You guys ready instantaneous torque.

435
00:22:55,600 --> 00:22:59,040
Speaker 2: Oh that's a lot of mass moving real quick.

436
00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:05,479
Speaker 1: Oh man, yeah, sixty and three three I think it was.

437
00:23:05,680 --> 00:23:08,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, Okay, let's look at the numbers. Sixty in three

438
00:23:08,520 --> 00:23:13,080
Speaker 2: three versus the five forties sixty in four seconds.

439
00:23:12,760 --> 00:23:15,960
Speaker 1: Which is still remarkably quick. The quarter mile they really

440
00:23:16,000 --> 00:23:18,320
Speaker 1: start to separate. That's where you really see the difference

441
00:23:18,320 --> 00:23:21,040
Speaker 1: in horsepower in the quarter This one did eleven and

442
00:23:21,080 --> 00:23:23,880
Speaker 1: a half at one twenty four and the other one

443
00:23:23,920 --> 00:23:26,480
Speaker 1: I think it was twelve and a half at one eleven. So, yeah,

444
00:23:26,560 --> 00:23:28,560
Speaker 1: that's right. Gap. It just keeps growing. The gap just

445
00:23:28,640 --> 00:23:31,000
Speaker 1: keeps growing as you accelerate harder and harder. It's crazy.

446
00:23:31,080 --> 00:23:33,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, at one hundred and fifty or one hundred and forty,

447
00:23:34,359 --> 00:23:36,720
Speaker 2: the gas car is at twenty two point one seconds.

448
00:23:36,880 --> 00:23:42,600
Speaker 1: How quick is this one fifteen point four? It's crazy.

449
00:23:43,240 --> 00:23:45,920
Speaker 1: You feel the torque, you feel the power, but it's

450
00:23:45,960 --> 00:23:48,639
Speaker 1: just one linear blast. You don't get the change in

451
00:23:48,680 --> 00:23:51,520
Speaker 1: the engine revolutions. You don't get the gear shifts. And

452
00:23:52,080 --> 00:23:54,280
Speaker 1: there's drama in that. I mean there's drama in this

453
00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:57,120
Speaker 1: because you're pressed so hard into the seat, but there's

454
00:23:57,200 --> 00:23:59,360
Speaker 1: drama in those gear shifts. There's real character.

455
00:23:59,600 --> 00:24:02,479
Speaker 2: Yeah, it does it a certain way that you have

456
00:24:02,560 --> 00:24:06,400
Speaker 2: to appreciate. You know, it's a lot harder to make

457
00:24:06,520 --> 00:24:09,359
Speaker 2: a gear change that smooth. It's a lot harder to

458
00:24:09,440 --> 00:24:13,960
Speaker 2: make all those reciprocating parts move in concert that way.

459
00:24:14,400 --> 00:24:16,640
Speaker 2: And I think you innately just appreciate that.

460
00:24:16,880 --> 00:24:21,000
Speaker 1: So for me, when a machine works hard is when

461
00:24:21,040 --> 00:24:25,000
Speaker 1: I find it most rewarding. Electric cars don't ever feel

462
00:24:25,000 --> 00:24:28,119
Speaker 1: like they're working that hard. They just do it, and

463
00:24:28,160 --> 00:24:31,000
Speaker 1: they do it like sort of blindly, like a with

464
00:24:31,040 --> 00:24:34,440
Speaker 1: a flat face. It just gets it done, and it's

465
00:24:34,440 --> 00:24:38,199
Speaker 1: brutal and it's quick, but a GASCAR really feels like

466
00:24:38,240 --> 00:24:39,600
Speaker 1: it's working to do it.

467
00:24:39,600 --> 00:24:43,080
Speaker 2: It's uncanny Valley, it really is. You know, this thing

468
00:24:43,600 --> 00:24:46,320
Speaker 2: is robotic. Now, let's see if you can change the

469
00:24:46,359 --> 00:24:49,959
Speaker 2: cornery attitude in this car the way you could with

470
00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:54,320
Speaker 2: the five forty.

471
00:24:55,000 --> 00:24:57,200
Speaker 1: I mean it feels similar. I feel like it feels

472
00:24:57,240 --> 00:25:02,640
Speaker 1: a little bit heavier. The steering actually feels a little

473
00:25:02,720 --> 00:25:06,600
Speaker 1: nicer than the gas car. Yeah, definitely, mean what the

474
00:25:06,600 --> 00:25:09,720
Speaker 1: tires are doing. You can feel what the tires are doing. Yeah,

475
00:25:09,760 --> 00:25:15,600
Speaker 1: a little bit. The steering feels nicer, there's more feedback,

476
00:25:15,840 --> 00:25:19,320
Speaker 1: there's more waiting. It just feels like a bit more

477
00:25:19,320 --> 00:25:21,520
Speaker 1: connected in a way that the other steering didn't. It

478
00:25:21,560 --> 00:25:23,679
Speaker 1: also speaks to your theory that maybe they've got the

479
00:25:23,720 --> 00:25:26,280
Speaker 1: best people on the electric car.

480
00:25:26,920 --> 00:25:30,479
Speaker 2: What about breaking, did you get a sense of you know,

481
00:25:31,200 --> 00:25:36,080
Speaker 2: break field modulation. You know, because this has a both

482
00:25:36,119 --> 00:25:38,600
Speaker 2: regenerative and friction braking system.

483
00:25:38,240 --> 00:25:41,160
Speaker 1: It's blended beautifully. A break pedal feels just as good

484
00:25:41,160 --> 00:25:42,359
Speaker 1: as it does in the five forty, And the five

485
00:25:42,480 --> 00:25:45,479
Speaker 1: forty has a really nice break pedal, super predictable, really linear,

486
00:25:45,840 --> 00:25:48,960
Speaker 1: it's not doing anything weird and grabbing as the handoff

487
00:25:49,040 --> 00:25:52,000
Speaker 1: from the regenerative breaks to the friction breaks happens. I

488
00:25:52,040 --> 00:25:54,560
Speaker 1: can't really discern a difference. I mean, it feels really great,

489
00:25:54,960 --> 00:25:57,439
Speaker 1: well tuned. Huh. Yeah, we've used five percent of the

490
00:25:57,440 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 1: battery just in the time that we've left the office.

491
00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:03,000
Speaker 1: That's crazy. A couple of short acceleration blasts and that's

492
00:26:03,000 --> 00:26:05,960
Speaker 1: what happens. But yeah, I mean the immediacy of the

493
00:26:06,000 --> 00:26:09,320
Speaker 1: response of an electric car is intoxicating. I do have

494
00:26:09,359 --> 00:26:12,880
Speaker 1: to say, like in passing in our five to sixty tests,

495
00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:14,760
Speaker 1: basically what we try to do in the five to

496
00:26:14,800 --> 00:26:17,520
Speaker 1: sixty test is recreate what happens on the street. In

497
00:26:17,560 --> 00:26:19,480
Speaker 1: the street, you're not setting your car up for launch control,

498
00:26:19,480 --> 00:26:22,800
Speaker 1: you're not doing all that nonsense. You're just matting the throttle.

499
00:26:22,880 --> 00:26:25,600
Speaker 1: So we roll at five miles an hour, stomp on

500
00:26:25,640 --> 00:26:29,480
Speaker 1: the accelerator, and the difference between the gas car and

501
00:26:29,520 --> 00:26:32,680
Speaker 1: the electric car is remarkable. The gas car does it

502
00:26:32,760 --> 00:26:36,000
Speaker 1: in five seconds, so it adds a second to its

503
00:26:36,040 --> 00:26:38,919
Speaker 1: zero to sixty. In the electric car, I think you

504
00:26:39,000 --> 00:26:41,720
Speaker 1: only add three tenses, yes, three, six, yeah, So I

505
00:26:41,760 --> 00:26:45,040
Speaker 1: mean this thing you can line up to anyone at

506
00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:47,840
Speaker 1: a dragstrip. You don't have to do very much to

507
00:26:47,880 --> 00:26:49,560
Speaker 1: prepare the car. You really don't have to do very

508
00:26:49,600 --> 00:26:52,359
Speaker 1: much more than just stomping on the accelerator and flooring

509
00:26:52,359 --> 00:26:54,120
Speaker 1: it and making sure that you hold your foot down.

510
00:26:54,440 --> 00:26:55,719
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just that simple.

511
00:26:55,760 --> 00:26:59,960
Speaker 2: I can say anecdotally that EV drivers, EV sedan drivers

512
00:27:00,720 --> 00:27:04,240
Speaker 2: drive like complete maniacs. They're going for all the whole shots.

513
00:27:04,520 --> 00:27:07,400
Speaker 2: I mean they're put in the accord and ultimate guys

514
00:27:07,440 --> 00:27:07,879
Speaker 2: to shame.

515
00:27:08,080 --> 00:27:09,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, well you can do it. I mean you just

516
00:27:09,720 --> 00:27:12,200
Speaker 1: you just squeeze the you squeeze the accelerator. You're always

517
00:27:12,240 --> 00:27:15,200
Speaker 1: in the right gear. You have this all this immediate torque,

518
00:27:15,720 --> 00:27:19,520
Speaker 1: and the car just delivers the acceleration. Let's try it now.

519
00:27:19,560 --> 00:27:22,119
Speaker 1: Let's let's try it if we shut the iconic sounds

520
00:27:22,160 --> 00:27:26,160
Speaker 1: off and accelerate. Okay, oh yeah, that's even more robotic.

521
00:27:26,240 --> 00:27:29,800
Speaker 1: It's just it doesn't even make any noise. It's soulless,

522
00:27:31,880 --> 00:27:35,680
Speaker 1: but it's quick. I mean it snaps your head back. Yeah,

523
00:27:35,720 --> 00:27:39,960
Speaker 1: it does, go back to iconic sounds. I'm not hating

524
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:44,040
Speaker 1: it that much. In this car, the iconic sounds. This

525
00:27:44,160 --> 00:27:47,480
Speaker 1: actually sounds like an internal combustion engine. They've really faked it.

526
00:27:47,920 --> 00:27:51,000
Speaker 2: I think it sounds more like, you know, a kind

527
00:27:51,000 --> 00:27:54,000
Speaker 2: of ev sounds signature, which I appreciate, like it.

528
00:27:54,000 --> 00:27:55,320
Speaker 1: Should sound like what it is.

529
00:27:55,920 --> 00:28:01,080
Speaker 2: There's a little grit at the bottom end. But I'm sorry,

530
00:28:01,480 --> 00:28:05,120
Speaker 2: sitting in the passenger seat, I like the experience of

531
00:28:05,440 --> 00:28:06,160
Speaker 2: the five forty.

532
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:10,479
Speaker 1: Bet you were more involved too. I mean, anytime you're shifting,

533
00:28:10,520 --> 00:28:14,080
Speaker 1: even if it's through the paddles of an automatic, you're

534
00:28:14,119 --> 00:28:15,520
Speaker 1: still taking control of the car.

535
00:28:16,320 --> 00:28:21,920
Speaker 2: And that's ultimately what a sports dance about. Feedback sensitivity.

536
00:28:22,680 --> 00:28:25,760
Speaker 1: Joy. Although I gotta say I'll take the steering of

537
00:28:25,800 --> 00:28:28,480
Speaker 1: this one every day of the week. It's really sweet. Fair.

538
00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:32,280
Speaker 2: They gotta do something to keep you involved.

539
00:28:32,760 --> 00:28:35,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, what do these things cost? Oh? Yeah, that's a

540
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:38,840
Speaker 1: good question. I think this one starts around in the

541
00:28:38,920 --> 00:28:42,920
Speaker 1: high eighties for the electric and there aren't too many options.

542
00:28:43,480 --> 00:28:47,160
Speaker 1: And the five forty is I think it's in the

543
00:28:47,160 --> 00:28:49,720
Speaker 1: sixty six thousand dollars range base price, but this one

544
00:28:49,800 --> 00:28:52,400
Speaker 1: has at least ten thousand dollars worth of options on

545
00:28:52,480 --> 00:28:55,280
Speaker 1: it to make it basically the same spec as the

546
00:28:55,360 --> 00:29:00,280
Speaker 1: I'm sixty. Okay, what do you like better? Like the

547
00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:02,880
Speaker 1: five forty. I think I'd buy the five forty. How

548
00:29:02,880 --> 00:29:05,280
Speaker 1: about you? Eddie? You always want to buy one.

549
00:29:05,360 --> 00:29:07,560
Speaker 2: I always want one to buy one. It's a five

550
00:29:07,720 --> 00:29:10,280
Speaker 2: forty for me, Doug. I just love that straight six.

551
00:29:10,600 --> 00:29:12,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't really care that this is quicker. Four

552
00:29:12,480 --> 00:29:14,760
Speaker 1: seconds of sixty is quick enough, and even in the

553
00:29:14,840 --> 00:29:17,680
Speaker 1: rolling start the real world number five seconds is still

554
00:29:17,680 --> 00:29:20,520
Speaker 1: plenty quick, still quick, and it's a really enjoyable five

555
00:29:20,560 --> 00:29:23,000
Speaker 1: seconds because the car is straining, you're going through the gears,

556
00:29:23,040 --> 00:29:26,120
Speaker 1: you're hearing it. It's special and it works for me.

557
00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:32,000
Speaker 1: That's the one i'd buy. Yeah, I agree, Well, that

558
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:35,360
Speaker 1: was fun. I know which car we would choose. But

559
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:38,360
Speaker 1: who are these cars? Four? I mean, they're very different cars.

560
00:29:38,360 --> 00:29:40,320
Speaker 1: Who's each one? Four? Yeah?

561
00:29:40,360 --> 00:29:43,800
Speaker 2: And I think the EV world is sort of separated

562
00:29:43,880 --> 00:29:46,760
Speaker 2: into the halfs and have knots, right, those people who

563
00:29:46,800 --> 00:29:49,800
Speaker 2: have a garage or or regular place to charge it

564
00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:53,719
Speaker 2: in those who don't. For car like this, a performance

565
00:29:53,760 --> 00:29:57,000
Speaker 2: EV that's draining the battery at a pretty alarming rate,

566
00:29:57,720 --> 00:30:00,320
Speaker 2: you need a place to plug in, if not every night,

567
00:30:00,400 --> 00:30:01,280
Speaker 2: than every other night.

568
00:30:01,440 --> 00:30:03,040
Speaker 1: It totally has to work for you, and that's such

569
00:30:03,040 --> 00:30:05,680
Speaker 1: a big element of it. And it also depends on

570
00:30:06,000 --> 00:30:08,800
Speaker 1: the tire size and the wheel size. The nineteens get

571
00:30:08,960 --> 00:30:11,200
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty six miles of range in the

572
00:30:11,440 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 1: EPA testing. If you go to twenty inches you get

573
00:30:14,520 --> 00:30:16,479
Speaker 1: the best range of two hundred and seventy eight miles.

574
00:30:16,760 --> 00:30:18,600
Speaker 1: But if you do what we did and have the

575
00:30:18,600 --> 00:30:21,400
Speaker 1: twenty one inch wheels with the summer tires, your range

576
00:30:21,440 --> 00:30:23,600
Speaker 1: goes all the way down to two hundred and forty miles. Yeah.

577
00:30:23,640 --> 00:30:27,040
Speaker 2: It's not just the size, it's also the compound, right, Yeah, totally.

578
00:30:27,320 --> 00:30:29,880
Speaker 2: To answer the question of who would buy the EV

579
00:30:30,200 --> 00:30:35,040
Speaker 2: over the Straight six, it's someone who welcomes our robot

580
00:30:35,080 --> 00:30:39,880
Speaker 2: overlords because that thing is dead eyed. It's insanely quick,

581
00:30:40,600 --> 00:30:43,800
Speaker 2: it's impressive as hell, but it's soulless.

582
00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, the soul's gone.

583
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:49,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, and BMWs should be about souls definitely.

584
00:30:51,200 --> 00:30:53,640
Speaker 1: When we return, we're speaking with product planner John Kelly,

585
00:30:53,640 --> 00:30:56,640
Speaker 1: who works in BMW's US Product and Strategy department.

586
00:30:56,800 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 2: Stay Tuned, Welcome back to Car and Drivers into Cars.

587
00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:13,160
Speaker 2: Product planner John Kelly works in BMW's US Product and

588
00:31:13,200 --> 00:31:16,719
Speaker 2: Strategy department, and he's responsible for both the electric and

589
00:31:16,760 --> 00:31:20,360
Speaker 2: gas versions of the BMW five series. Welcome to in

590
00:31:20,360 --> 00:31:23,120
Speaker 2: the cars, John, We've driven both of these cars back

591
00:31:23,160 --> 00:31:25,480
Speaker 2: to back and we have some thoughts and questions.

592
00:31:25,960 --> 00:31:28,400
Speaker 1: Can you talk about the strategy of building an electric

593
00:31:28,440 --> 00:31:32,560
Speaker 1: and GASCAR off the same platform. The cluster platform allows

594
00:31:32,640 --> 00:31:34,240
Speaker 1: you to do that. What are some of the benefits

595
00:31:34,240 --> 00:31:35,720
Speaker 1: and what are some of the compromises.

596
00:31:36,360 --> 00:31:38,760
Speaker 3: Yes, So, as you mentioned, the current architecture that the

597
00:31:38,760 --> 00:31:40,840
Speaker 3: five series is built on is referred to as our

598
00:31:40,880 --> 00:31:45,080
Speaker 3: cluster architecture. It's actually a very very flexible architecture. It

599
00:31:45,120 --> 00:31:47,960
Speaker 3: allows us to build many different drive trains on the

600
00:31:48,000 --> 00:31:51,840
Speaker 3: same chassis. So in the US we have the combustion

601
00:31:51,920 --> 00:31:55,920
Speaker 3: engine cars, and it's not just combustion engine PEV or

602
00:31:56,000 --> 00:31:58,400
Speaker 3: full BEV, but even within those there's a lot of

603
00:31:58,400 --> 00:32:00,880
Speaker 3: complexity and a lot of variation, and this is really

604
00:32:00,920 --> 00:32:02,760
Speaker 3: important to us for us to be able to offer

605
00:32:02,760 --> 00:32:05,920
Speaker 3: the customers exactly what they want. And in this case,

606
00:32:05,960 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 3: we have one architecture where we have combustion engines. In

607
00:32:09,560 --> 00:32:11,720
Speaker 3: the US, we have a four cylinder and a traditional

608
00:32:11,760 --> 00:32:15,080
Speaker 3: BMWN nine six, which is really fantastic. We have the

609
00:32:15,120 --> 00:32:18,040
Speaker 3: plug in hybrid, so this is a six cylinder plug

610
00:32:18,040 --> 00:32:20,960
Speaker 3: in hybrid that comes out this summer. This car makes

611
00:32:21,000 --> 00:32:23,440
Speaker 3: over four hundred and eighty horse power. But then we

612
00:32:23,480 --> 00:32:25,600
Speaker 3: also have the fully electric variant, and even there we

613
00:32:25,640 --> 00:32:28,720
Speaker 3: have we actually have three different models, but two of

614
00:32:28,760 --> 00:32:30,560
Speaker 3: them are quite similar. So we have the forties in

615
00:32:30,960 --> 00:32:33,560
Speaker 3: re real drive with one E machine. We have the

616
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:36,160
Speaker 3: X drive forty two E machines, one front, one rear,

617
00:32:36,440 --> 00:32:39,360
Speaker 3: and then we have our performance variant with nearly six

618
00:32:39,480 --> 00:32:41,760
Speaker 3: hundred horsepower. That's the one I drive every day and

619
00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:42,640
Speaker 3: the car is awesome.

620
00:32:42,920 --> 00:32:45,640
Speaker 2: That's what we drove too. So how do you achieve

621
00:32:45,680 --> 00:32:49,760
Speaker 2: that platform flexibility? I mean, short wave of answer asking

622
00:32:49,760 --> 00:32:52,000
Speaker 2: that question is where do all the batteries go?

623
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:55,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's pretty straightforward, and actually it's something that

624
00:32:55,840 --> 00:32:57,840
Speaker 3: I hope you recognize when you were driving the car

625
00:32:58,280 --> 00:33:00,960
Speaker 3: is the batteries are below the floor, so they're between

626
00:33:00,960 --> 00:33:04,240
Speaker 3: the wheelbase, between the track below the floor. Despite the

627
00:33:04,280 --> 00:33:06,720
Speaker 3: battery being quite heavy, it gives you a nice low

628
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:09,280
Speaker 3: center of gravity and the carstial handles like you would

629
00:33:09,280 --> 00:33:11,959
Speaker 3: expect to a mid size BMW sports sedan to handle.

630
00:33:12,480 --> 00:33:14,320
Speaker 3: But you mentioned what does it take to be able

631
00:33:14,360 --> 00:33:17,000
Speaker 3: to do this in one platform and the answer is

632
00:33:17,080 --> 00:33:19,600
Speaker 3: it's not that simple. It's not as easy as just

633
00:33:19,920 --> 00:33:22,840
Speaker 3: let's say, taking out the combustion engine. It's really quite

634
00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:25,360
Speaker 3: complex because you need to start with a platform that's

635
00:33:25,400 --> 00:33:29,320
Speaker 3: flexible enough to allow you to do this without significant downsides.

636
00:33:29,720 --> 00:33:31,440
Speaker 3: So if you were to just, let's say, take out

637
00:33:31,440 --> 00:33:34,240
Speaker 3: the combustion engine, you're going to have major inefficiencies in

638
00:33:34,320 --> 00:33:37,080
Speaker 3: terms of packaging and weight and so forth. But by

639
00:33:37,160 --> 00:33:40,640
Speaker 3: using our cluster architecture, which is very flexible, it allows

640
00:33:40,680 --> 00:33:43,680
Speaker 3: us to package these components in a very intelligent way,

641
00:33:44,160 --> 00:33:46,680
Speaker 3: such as having the battery below the floor. We have

642
00:33:46,720 --> 00:33:49,000
Speaker 3: what we call a heat unit, so it's a highly

643
00:33:49,040 --> 00:33:52,680
Speaker 3: integrated drive train unit, so has your electric motor, transmission

644
00:33:52,760 --> 00:33:56,320
Speaker 3: and power electronics all in one housing. And fitting that

645
00:33:56,440 --> 00:33:58,760
Speaker 3: in the front where you can fit a rather long

646
00:33:58,840 --> 00:34:01,960
Speaker 3: inline six engine not terribly difficult. But in the rear

647
00:34:01,960 --> 00:34:04,200
Speaker 3: it is where in the rear typically you have a

648
00:34:04,200 --> 00:34:07,920
Speaker 3: differential and not much else. So by using an architecture

649
00:34:08,040 --> 00:34:11,440
Speaker 3: that is adaptable and can fit these components quite easily,

650
00:34:11,840 --> 00:34:14,120
Speaker 3: you end up being able to fit them without many

651
00:34:14,160 --> 00:34:15,680
Speaker 3: downsides in terms of packaging.

652
00:34:16,400 --> 00:34:19,480
Speaker 1: I have a question about the BMWi three and sort

653
00:34:19,480 --> 00:34:22,279
Speaker 1: of how that relates to the cluster architecture in the

654
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:25,560
Speaker 1: current five series. The I three was a pretty radical

655
00:34:25,880 --> 00:34:29,680
Speaker 1: ev carbon fiber structure. It was pretty exotic vehicle and

656
00:34:29,680 --> 00:34:32,520
Speaker 1: now it seems like you've shifted over to a conventional sedan.

657
00:34:32,640 --> 00:34:35,399
Speaker 1: Is that sort of a reaction to how the I

658
00:34:35,480 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 1: three did in the marketplace or was it an expense thing?

659
00:34:38,080 --> 00:34:40,600
Speaker 1: How does the I three fit into the strategy today?

660
00:34:41,120 --> 00:34:43,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a really good question, and to be honest,

661
00:34:43,200 --> 00:34:45,759
Speaker 3: that's one that I love talking about because I've been

662
00:34:45,800 --> 00:34:48,279
Speaker 3: with the company for twenty years, and prior to the

663
00:34:48,280 --> 00:34:51,640
Speaker 3: ten years i'm in product management, I was in product engineering.

664
00:34:52,000 --> 00:34:53,840
Speaker 3: I had the pleasure of, while I was in product

665
00:34:53,880 --> 00:34:56,319
Speaker 3: engineering of working on the I three and I eight

666
00:34:56,400 --> 00:34:58,719
Speaker 3: and launching those products, so I know them in a

667
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:02,440
Speaker 3: very detailed technical way, and the cars were very much

668
00:35:02,440 --> 00:35:05,040
Speaker 3: ahead of their times in many ways. That carbon fiber

669
00:35:05,080 --> 00:35:09,080
Speaker 3: passenger cell was spectacular, lightweight, very strong, and so forth.

670
00:35:09,480 --> 00:35:12,640
Speaker 3: A little challenging to produce, of course, but that was

671
00:35:13,320 --> 00:35:16,640
Speaker 3: I would say, a very unique example basically a two

672
00:35:16,680 --> 00:35:19,880
Speaker 3: door hatch which has a relatively small or limited market

673
00:35:19,880 --> 00:35:23,800
Speaker 3: in the US, and it used technology that was perfect

674
00:35:23,880 --> 00:35:26,480
Speaker 3: for a low volume kind of niche product like the

675
00:35:26,560 --> 00:35:29,440
Speaker 3: I three was, but it doesn't scale as well to

676
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:32,279
Speaker 3: big volume products like what we have today with I four,

677
00:35:32,320 --> 00:35:33,200
Speaker 3: I five, I seven.

678
00:35:33,719 --> 00:35:35,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I three was really an exotic car.

679
00:35:36,120 --> 00:35:39,799
Speaker 3: It was, and you look at the construction, the fact

680
00:35:39,960 --> 00:35:43,320
Speaker 3: that had the range extender, it had a heat pump,

681
00:35:43,400 --> 00:35:46,600
Speaker 3: which at the time was not very common in electro vehicles.

682
00:35:46,880 --> 00:35:49,399
Speaker 3: So it really had a lot of fantastic technology which

683
00:35:49,400 --> 00:35:51,319
Speaker 3: we learned a lot from and we learned a lot

684
00:35:51,360 --> 00:35:53,560
Speaker 3: about how customers use the cars and what they expect,

685
00:35:53,560 --> 00:35:56,480
Speaker 3: and all that transfers into the future products that we're planning.

686
00:35:56,880 --> 00:35:59,000
Speaker 3: But of course it didn't make sense to continue with

687
00:35:59,040 --> 00:36:01,680
Speaker 3: that particular car when we want to scale up into

688
00:36:01,719 --> 00:36:05,640
Speaker 3: larger volume vehicles and we have such a great tradition

689
00:36:05,840 --> 00:36:08,960
Speaker 3: and fan base when it comes to our sports sedans

690
00:36:09,320 --> 00:36:12,600
Speaker 3: that that's the perfect opportunity to expand the BEV offerings

691
00:36:12,600 --> 00:36:15,719
Speaker 3: is with sports sedans, they have much more potential, and

692
00:36:15,800 --> 00:36:17,720
Speaker 3: so to do that in a way that looks similar

693
00:36:17,800 --> 00:36:21,120
Speaker 3: to the combustion engines was a great opportunity, but still

694
00:36:21,239 --> 00:36:23,800
Speaker 3: utilizing some of those learnings from the I three.

695
00:36:24,320 --> 00:36:26,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it strikes us as really a smart strategy.

696
00:36:27,239 --> 00:36:30,800
Speaker 2: So you can throttle volume on the ice cars versus

697
00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:34,680
Speaker 2: the evs with the same model line, the same sort

698
00:36:34,680 --> 00:36:38,719
Speaker 2: of marketing behind it. Effectively, the EV becomes another powertrain

699
00:36:38,760 --> 00:36:42,000
Speaker 2: option for the five series, and so what has the

700
00:36:42,040 --> 00:36:43,439
Speaker 2: model mix been so far.

701
00:36:44,320 --> 00:36:48,239
Speaker 3: It's fairly evenly split between ICE and BEV. I think

702
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:50,200
Speaker 3: the ICE actually is a little bit higher, but not

703
00:36:50,320 --> 00:36:52,880
Speaker 3: too much, which is also, I have to say, a

704
00:36:53,000 --> 00:36:55,719
Speaker 3: pretty big testament to how good the car is and

705
00:36:55,760 --> 00:36:58,799
Speaker 3: how well it's being received, because if you look at

706
00:36:58,800 --> 00:37:02,880
Speaker 3: our overall growth with electric vehicles last quarter, we were

707
00:37:02,960 --> 00:37:05,560
Speaker 3: up sixty two percent from the same quart of the

708
00:37:05,640 --> 00:37:07,680
Speaker 3: year before, so there's a lot of growth there. But

709
00:37:07,800 --> 00:37:11,160
Speaker 3: even still, that was a twelve percent overall BEV mix

710
00:37:11,280 --> 00:37:13,880
Speaker 3: in the portfolio twelve percent we're in the five series.

711
00:37:13,920 --> 00:37:16,120
Speaker 3: It's far far higher than that, So it just shows

712
00:37:16,239 --> 00:37:18,239
Speaker 3: I mean, granted, we don't have electric vehicles in every

713
00:37:18,239 --> 00:37:20,680
Speaker 3: segment just yet, but it just shows that there is

714
00:37:20,760 --> 00:37:23,280
Speaker 3: a lot of demand there if you have the right product.

715
00:37:23,640 --> 00:37:27,319
Speaker 2: One of our favorite three Slash four series cars is

716
00:37:27,360 --> 00:37:30,080
Speaker 2: the I four and that has a lot of the

717
00:37:30,200 --> 00:37:34,799
Speaker 2: BMW hallmarks in that package. It just feels like a BMW.

718
00:37:35,200 --> 00:37:41,040
Speaker 2: And BMW's known for that driving soul, that driving you know, engagement,

719
00:37:41,320 --> 00:37:44,720
Speaker 2: and a huge part of that has been its internal

720
00:37:44,719 --> 00:37:49,719
Speaker 2: combustion engines, specifically straight sixes. So how do you get

721
00:37:49,760 --> 00:37:52,719
Speaker 2: that soul. I think you've done it with the I four.

722
00:37:52,800 --> 00:37:56,240
Speaker 2: How do you get that soul into a big car

723
00:37:56,800 --> 00:37:57,880
Speaker 2: like the five series.

724
00:37:58,600 --> 00:38:01,359
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, a number of good points, and the first one,

725
00:38:01,360 --> 00:38:03,919
Speaker 3: as you mentioned, the inline six, it's iconic. It's got

726
00:38:03,960 --> 00:38:08,000
Speaker 3: sol interesting to note the current five series generation, the

727
00:38:08,120 --> 00:38:12,200
Speaker 3: five traditional six cylinder, is only for the US. When

728
00:38:12,239 --> 00:38:14,799
Speaker 3: we talked about what we're planning and why we plan it,

729
00:38:15,200 --> 00:38:17,200
Speaker 3: we look at what do we need in the market,

730
00:38:17,200 --> 00:38:19,640
Speaker 3: and of course a five forty I with a traditional

731
00:38:19,719 --> 00:38:23,960
Speaker 3: inline six traditional sports today and proportions traditional sports today

732
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:27,200
Speaker 3: and BMW lateral dynamics and so forth is super super important,

733
00:38:27,719 --> 00:38:30,040
Speaker 3: and this was something we fought very hard for to

734
00:38:30,160 --> 00:38:32,760
Speaker 3: ensure we got it in the US. There's no question

735
00:38:32,800 --> 00:38:36,400
Speaker 3: from my side, fantastic car, the acoustics that come along

736
00:38:36,400 --> 00:38:39,839
Speaker 3: with an inline six, the smooth running characteristics of an

737
00:38:39,880 --> 00:38:42,600
Speaker 3: inline six, I mean, they're undoubted. When it comes to

738
00:38:42,680 --> 00:38:46,000
Speaker 3: combustion engines, with an electric, of course, things are different,

739
00:38:46,480 --> 00:38:50,719
Speaker 3: and our engineers have worked incredibly hard on developing the

740
00:38:50,920 --> 00:38:53,239
Speaker 3: electric drive train as well as the chassis and the

741
00:38:53,320 --> 00:38:55,520
Speaker 3: dynamics and the steering and the brakes and so forth

742
00:38:55,760 --> 00:38:58,840
Speaker 3: to ensure that you still have the best overall package.

743
00:38:59,040 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 3: It doesn't sound like an and as it shouldn't, but

744
00:39:02,280 --> 00:39:04,520
Speaker 3: the engineers have done a great job of giving it

745
00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:07,880
Speaker 3: its own character and its own sound, and so it

746
00:39:07,920 --> 00:39:10,719
Speaker 3: does have what we call iconic sounds. And this you

747
00:39:10,719 --> 00:39:12,680
Speaker 3: can switch on or off depending on what you prefer,

748
00:39:13,040 --> 00:39:16,160
Speaker 3: and it does give you some acoustics that, let's say,

749
00:39:16,160 --> 00:39:19,480
Speaker 3: are aligned with the power demand and the power output

750
00:39:19,480 --> 00:39:21,680
Speaker 3: of the vehicle. I've been driving an I five M

751
00:39:21,760 --> 00:39:25,160
Speaker 3: sixty every single day for the last six months or so,

752
00:39:25,800 --> 00:39:27,759
Speaker 3: and one of the things that I realized when I'm

753
00:39:27,840 --> 00:39:30,120
Speaker 3: driving this is I'm a gearhead. I always have been

754
00:39:30,200 --> 00:39:32,080
Speaker 3: since I was a little kid. I've owned many M

755
00:39:32,120 --> 00:39:33,920
Speaker 3: cars and I still have you know, ones on the

756
00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:38,120
Speaker 3: side and so forth. And despite that, I absolutely love

757
00:39:38,239 --> 00:39:41,320
Speaker 3: driving the I five M sixty. And what you mentioned

758
00:39:41,320 --> 00:39:44,080
Speaker 3: about the soul and that character, one thing I noticed

759
00:39:44,200 --> 00:39:47,800
Speaker 3: was that the other attributes tend to take over a

760
00:39:47,840 --> 00:39:48,279
Speaker 3: little bit.

761
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:49,680
Speaker 1: And I actually drive.

762
00:39:49,520 --> 00:39:52,200
Speaker 3: The car despite somebody that likes, you know, loud exhausts

763
00:39:52,200 --> 00:39:55,279
Speaker 3: and so forth, I actually drive the car in silent mode,

764
00:39:55,360 --> 00:39:58,600
Speaker 3: and I actually spend more time honing in and paying

765
00:39:58,600 --> 00:40:03,440
Speaker 3: attention to the characteristics and the steering characteristics and maybe

766
00:40:03,440 --> 00:40:05,560
Speaker 3: exploiting them a little more than I have in the

767
00:40:05,560 --> 00:40:08,239
Speaker 3: past as well. So I think it's not that it's

768
00:40:08,680 --> 00:40:11,440
Speaker 3: a downside. I would just say it's different, right, The

769
00:40:11,480 --> 00:40:14,480
Speaker 3: soul is different, the characteristics are different, but you still

770
00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:16,600
Speaker 3: have all of those dynamic characteristics.

771
00:40:17,239 --> 00:40:17,640
Speaker 1: Well.

772
00:40:17,640 --> 00:40:20,440
Speaker 2: With that in mind, and because of the performance of

773
00:40:20,480 --> 00:40:22,839
Speaker 2: the I five, especially the M sixty that we drove

774
00:40:23,040 --> 00:40:26,720
Speaker 2: is so staggering, where does that leave the M five.

775
00:40:28,600 --> 00:40:32,759
Speaker 3: So I am super excited about the M five. I

776
00:40:32,760 --> 00:40:35,719
Speaker 3: hope my smile says it all. I can't wait for

777
00:40:35,800 --> 00:40:38,440
Speaker 3: this car. Unfortunately I can't get into all the details.

778
00:40:38,440 --> 00:40:41,080
Speaker 3: It's a little bit too early, but overall it leaves

779
00:40:41,120 --> 00:40:44,040
Speaker 3: plenty of room because here we have we have a

780
00:40:44,160 --> 00:40:47,200
Speaker 3: V eight. It's a plug in hybrid. The power is

781
00:40:47,239 --> 00:40:49,680
Speaker 3: far beyond what we've seen on the previous M five.

782
00:40:50,200 --> 00:40:54,680
Speaker 3: Performance is absolutely fantastic. And with an electric vehicle versus

783
00:40:54,760 --> 00:40:57,040
Speaker 3: a combustion engine or plug in hybrid, it's not just

784
00:40:57,080 --> 00:41:00,600
Speaker 3: about power output. It's about the overall package, the overall

785
00:41:00,640 --> 00:41:04,160
Speaker 3: feeling and the emotion that it gives you. And as

786
00:41:04,239 --> 00:41:06,440
Speaker 3: much as I love my I five sixty, it's not

787
00:41:06,480 --> 00:41:09,160
Speaker 3: an M five. It's different. It's an M performance vehicle,

788
00:41:09,400 --> 00:41:12,000
Speaker 3: not a full high performance vehicle like DM five is.

789
00:41:12,640 --> 00:41:15,680
Speaker 3: So it's something that we're really excited about and it

790
00:41:15,840 --> 00:41:17,600
Speaker 3: really is a fantastic package.

791
00:41:18,200 --> 00:41:20,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can't wait for that as a former E

792
00:41:20,760 --> 00:41:23,360
Speaker 1: thirty nine five forty six speed owner. And that's the

793
00:41:23,400 --> 00:41:25,960
Speaker 1: car for people who don't know the internal product codes.

794
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:28,040
Speaker 1: That was built the five series built from nineteen ninety

795
00:41:28,040 --> 00:41:31,759
Speaker 1: seven to two thousand and three. I'm curious if you've

796
00:41:31,800 --> 00:41:34,239
Speaker 1: been influenced on some of those classic BMWs, if you've

797
00:41:34,280 --> 00:41:37,040
Speaker 1: driven those classic five series and M fives.

798
00:41:37,760 --> 00:41:40,400
Speaker 3: So it's funny you mentioned that I love talking about

799
00:41:40,640 --> 00:41:43,480
Speaker 3: older BMW's and my experiences, and like I said, I'm

800
00:41:43,520 --> 00:41:46,000
Speaker 3: a gearhead. Even from the time I was a little kid,

801
00:41:46,080 --> 00:41:49,000
Speaker 3: I would always ask for automotive publications for Christmas, not

802
00:41:49,120 --> 00:41:51,719
Speaker 3: a new baseball bat or whatever, and read them cover

803
00:41:51,800 --> 00:41:53,200
Speaker 3: to cover. That was just that was my thing, and

804
00:41:53,239 --> 00:41:55,920
Speaker 3: that's what led me through engineering and into the auto industry,

805
00:41:56,680 --> 00:41:59,600
Speaker 3: and throughout all of that. I've always loved driving some

806
00:41:59,640 --> 00:42:01,680
Speaker 3: of the old cars and being inspired by them in

807
00:42:01,719 --> 00:42:04,239
Speaker 3: many senses. It's funny you mentioned the E thirty nine

808
00:42:04,320 --> 00:42:06,799
Speaker 3: because I actually just sold my E thirty nine M

809
00:42:06,880 --> 00:42:09,360
Speaker 3: five and this car was fantastic.

810
00:42:09,480 --> 00:42:10,040
Speaker 1: I loved it.

811
00:42:10,440 --> 00:42:13,880
Speaker 3: And one thing we see is that every generation the

812
00:42:13,920 --> 00:42:17,279
Speaker 3: cars change, and not just about being better or worse,

813
00:42:17,320 --> 00:42:19,920
Speaker 3: it's that they're different. So the E thirty nine you

814
00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:22,920
Speaker 3: had the V eight naturally aspirated. Then you had E

815
00:42:23,080 --> 00:42:26,160
Speaker 3: sixty V ten a V ten with it. You could

816
00:42:26,160 --> 00:42:27,960
Speaker 3: have it with a manual transmission and it revs to

817
00:42:27,960 --> 00:42:30,160
Speaker 3: over eight thousand rpm and the sounds it makes at

818
00:42:30,160 --> 00:42:33,480
Speaker 3: those speeds is absolutely spectacular. And then we went to

819
00:42:33,560 --> 00:42:35,520
Speaker 3: a twin turbo V eight and so on and so on.

820
00:42:35,600 --> 00:42:38,560
Speaker 3: So things have evolved quite a lot. And having been

821
00:42:38,800 --> 00:42:40,640
Speaker 3: in the company for a while and in the industry

822
00:42:40,640 --> 00:42:42,680
Speaker 3: for a while, you learn a lot from these in

823
00:42:42,760 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 3: terms of what makes people, what gets them excited, what

824
00:42:46,080 --> 00:42:49,040
Speaker 3: makes them want to buy these cars, and things evolve. Right,

825
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:52,040
Speaker 3: So the days of having the naturally aspirated V ten,

826
00:42:52,760 --> 00:42:55,080
Speaker 3: that's behind us. But we have many other great things

827
00:42:55,120 --> 00:42:57,200
Speaker 3: coming forward, such as now with the new M five

828
00:42:57,280 --> 00:43:00,520
Speaker 3: with a V eight twin turbo with electricis cation to

829
00:43:00,600 --> 00:43:03,680
Speaker 3: support it and just enhance the overall experience. So the

830
00:43:03,719 --> 00:43:06,120
Speaker 3: short answer is yes. Absolutely. Being a fan of the

831
00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:08,920
Speaker 3: older cars, we always use them as inspiration as.

832
00:43:08,760 --> 00:43:11,520
Speaker 1: We move forward, what was your first car?

833
00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:14,959
Speaker 3: My first BMW was an E thirty before I worked

834
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:17,480
Speaker 3: for BMW. This car was really a lot of fun.

835
00:43:17,600 --> 00:43:20,279
Speaker 3: I ended up turning it into an autocross car and

836
00:43:20,280 --> 00:43:22,200
Speaker 3: then took it to the track and so forth. So

837
00:43:22,239 --> 00:43:25,080
Speaker 3: that was my first BMW. My first ever car was

838
00:43:25,080 --> 00:43:26,920
Speaker 3: a Volkswagen Karado VR six.

839
00:43:27,120 --> 00:43:32,399
Speaker 1: Oh my god, yeah, this car.

840
00:43:32,719 --> 00:43:35,799
Speaker 3: This car was cool. I really enjoyed the car, but

841
00:43:36,160 --> 00:43:38,360
Speaker 3: as much as I enjoyed it being a front wheel

842
00:43:38,400 --> 00:43:41,400
Speaker 3: drive car, once I started driving real, real drive cars,

843
00:43:41,480 --> 00:43:44,799
Speaker 3: I really started to not just appreciate them, but just

844
00:43:45,000 --> 00:43:47,680
Speaker 3: enjoy driving re real drive cars more. And that's when

845
00:43:47,719 --> 00:43:50,600
Speaker 3: I started driving BMW's. But yeah, Karado VR six, it

846
00:43:50,640 --> 00:43:51,160
Speaker 3: was a cool car.

847
00:43:51,520 --> 00:43:53,360
Speaker 1: Not the nerd out a little, but the M twenty

848
00:43:53,560 --> 00:43:55,680
Speaker 1: in line six, the two point five liter is so

849
00:43:55,920 --> 00:43:59,279
Speaker 1: characteristically similar to that BR six engine. It's amazing, and

850
00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:01,640
Speaker 1: even the power everything is so similar to them. So

851
00:44:01,680 --> 00:44:04,120
Speaker 1: it seems like a natural that you then went into

852
00:44:04,160 --> 00:44:06,200
Speaker 1: a three twenty five. Yeah.

853
00:44:06,200 --> 00:44:08,320
Speaker 3: Actually they did make around the same amount of power.

854
00:44:08,760 --> 00:44:10,960
Speaker 3: They sounded different, but they both sounded excellent.

855
00:44:11,000 --> 00:44:12,360
Speaker 1: They're super smooth, yeah.

856
00:44:12,320 --> 00:44:14,240
Speaker 3: Super smooth, fun to drive.

857
00:44:14,480 --> 00:44:15,640
Speaker 1: That's such a cool first car.

858
00:44:15,800 --> 00:44:17,399
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was really cool. It's one of those cars,

859
00:44:17,400 --> 00:44:19,080
Speaker 3: you know. I think people say this very often about

860
00:44:19,080 --> 00:44:20,880
Speaker 3: their first car, like you never should have sold it,

861
00:44:20,960 --> 00:44:22,600
Speaker 3: just even if you don't drive it anymore, just put

862
00:44:22,600 --> 00:44:24,840
Speaker 3: it away somewhere. And I feel that way about my

863
00:44:24,840 --> 00:44:27,640
Speaker 3: first BMW as well. I probably shouldn't have sold it,

864
00:44:27,719 --> 00:44:28,120
Speaker 3: but I did.

865
00:44:29,000 --> 00:44:29,160
Speaker 1: Well.

866
00:44:29,200 --> 00:44:31,279
Speaker 2: This is great, John. Thank you so much for your

867
00:44:31,320 --> 00:44:36,359
Speaker 2: insight and your passion. And keep cranking them out man, Yeah,

868
00:44:36,440 --> 00:44:42,920
Speaker 2: thank you. That interview was brought to you by eBay Motors.

869
00:44:43,160 --> 00:44:45,160
Speaker 2: Visit ebaymotors dot com for more.

870
00:44:47,880 --> 00:44:50,160
Speaker 1: Car friends. Today, we examined and drove two cars that

871
00:44:50,160 --> 00:44:53,640
Speaker 1: are very similar but also incredibly different. We asked ourselves

872
00:44:53,640 --> 00:44:57,360
Speaker 1: the question electric or gas. Although the I five is

873
00:44:57,400 --> 00:44:59,640
Speaker 1: quicker and more efficient, the sound of an engine straining

874
00:44:59,640 --> 00:45:03,040
Speaker 1: and the serial nature of combustion still captivates and delights us.

875
00:45:03,400 --> 00:45:05,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess I'm old school. I'll take the five

876
00:45:05,840 --> 00:45:09,160
Speaker 2: forty every day. And that's what we came here to

877
00:45:09,200 --> 00:45:11,799
Speaker 2: find out. Which is the better sports seed in The

878
00:45:11,880 --> 00:45:14,440
Speaker 2: five point forty is just more rewarding. It gives you

879
00:45:14,480 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 2: more feedback, It's more visceral.

880
00:45:16,680 --> 00:45:19,240
Speaker 1: For more on the BMW five forty, I X Drive

881
00:45:19,480 --> 00:45:22,760
Speaker 1: and I five M sixty. Visit carent driver dot com

882
00:45:22,800 --> 00:45:24,400
Speaker 1: and be sure to pick up the latest issue of

883
00:45:24,440 --> 00:45:25,680
Speaker 1: carent Driver magazine.

884
00:45:25,880 --> 00:45:27,759
Speaker 2: Tune in next week where we take you on an

885
00:45:27,760 --> 00:45:31,560
Speaker 2: insider's tour of Cadillac House in Warren, Michigan. We'll sit

886
00:45:31,600 --> 00:45:34,200
Speaker 2: down with the team behind the all new Cadillacs Celestic

887
00:45:34,320 --> 00:45:36,719
Speaker 2: to learn more about its design and engineering.

888
00:45:37,800 --> 00:45:40,560
Speaker 1: And then the center tunnel. We turned the pouches that

889
00:45:40,560 --> 00:45:43,359
Speaker 1: are about half the width of the car. We turn

890
00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:46,120
Speaker 1: them ninety degrees and there's two stacks of twelve down

891
00:45:46,160 --> 00:45:48,319
Speaker 1: the meddown the mount under the center console. Here like

892
00:45:48,360 --> 00:45:52,799
Speaker 1: a Fiera gas tank. I can't think of a more

893
00:45:52,840 --> 00:45:56,520
Speaker 1: elegant reference, but yes, I like a Hiera guess. Thank guest.

894
00:45:59,520 --> 00:46:01,880
Speaker 2: Thank you for joining us on Car and Drivers into Cars.

895
00:46:02,360 --> 00:46:04,320
Speaker 2: If you enjoyed the show, join us every week for

896
00:46:04,440 --> 00:46:07,400
Speaker 2: new episodes, and don't forget to rate and review wherever

897
00:46:07,440 --> 00:46:08,640
Speaker 2: you listen to podcasts.

898
00:46:09,360 --> 00:46:12,279
Speaker 1: Car Drivers into Cars is produced by Ruby Studio from

899
00:46:12,280 --> 00:46:15,160
Speaker 1: iHeartMedia in partnership with Car and Driver and hosted by

900
00:46:15,160 --> 00:46:18,480
Speaker 1: me Tony Kiroga and Eddie Alterman. And visit Carndriver dot

901
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:20,520
Speaker 1: com for the latest car reviews and news.

902
00:46:20,760 --> 00:46:24,000
Speaker 2: Our executive producer is Matt Romano. Our EP of Post

903
00:46:24,000 --> 00:46:28,480
Speaker 2: production is Matt Stillo, along with supervising producer Sierra Kaiser.

904
00:46:28,840 --> 00:46:31,840
Speaker 1: This show was edited by Sierra Spreen special thanks to

905
00:46:31,840 --> 00:46:35,440
Speaker 1: our location sound recordist Matthew Sisco. Thanks for listening. We'll

906
00:46:35,440 --> 00:46:36,160
Speaker 1: see you next time.