Tests & Reviews

A tale of 2 turbos…

Been an interesting month and a half, 430d was awaiting EGR recall parts, so Eastern BMW loaned me an LCI 435d for the first month of the wait. Very similar spec on both cars, but a surprisingly different driving experience.

So what difference does 1 extra turbo and 2 extra diffs/driveshafts make? Well, the engine and torque delivery really is quite remarkable, the internet folklore isn’t without justification. My god it likes to rev! Same core 6 cylinder lump but the 35d’s extra low down torque is very noticeable, it also revs way quicker and carries a very different engine note.

Never actually got round to sticking my vbox in to see what the acceleration figures were like to compare against my 30d. Equally, I can’t comment off the line, I’m not in to traffic light grand-prix and have never really believed in roasting the nuts off a car someone has been kind enough to loan you. From on the roll to legal speeds on motorways & dual carriageways however, the buttdyno confirms it’s definitely quicker, despite some internet theories of the 30d having nearly the same power to weight ratio.

Ride is not such a favourable review, however. The extra couple of diffs, well actually the transfer case, require additional ride height for ground clearance and that’s why I didn’t consider a 35d when shopping for my 4 series. From an aesthetics point of view as much as dynamics. You don’t have to push the car down a twisty road to feel the suspension is a bit more ponderous, the higher ride and more roll just don’t give the same feel even through fairly mundane corners. Also, on the motorway in cross winds, it’s amazing how much more it wanders with the additional airflow getting under the car.

An interesting comparison was pre-LCI vs LCI. Most interesting, to me, was the different feel of the gearbox. It’s the same ZF 8hp unit, but the LCI version seemed to engage “coast” mode far more readily. Now that I have my car back, I’ve noticed it operates very differently. In both the 435d and subsequent 420i I was loaned [more about that at some other point], at anything over 30mph in EcoPro, lifting would have the car go in to coast mode. The revs would drop to idle and the car was coasting with clutches presumably disengaged to enable this. When asking for some engine braking via the paddles, say slowing slightly for traffic on the motorway, the first pull on the paddle would actually bring the car back in to 8th gear, then you would start going down the box. On my 430d, the first downshift pull on the paddle, immediately pulls the box down a gear. I like this feature quite a lot and may well see if there’s a gearbox software flash update available for my car to put the LCI map on it.

Other notable differences and my feelings on them:

  • rear light clusters, LCI ones look great, another potential purchase…
  • indicator/wiper stalks, dislike, rather a lot actually. They have reverted to latching style indicator stalks and that feels like a backwards step, also think the pre-LCI buttons on the end felt nicer to touch. Wiper stalk, you now have to move up one latch for auto, vastly prefer just pushing the button on the end per the pre-LCI. Also is it not a bit pointless leaving the adjuster for intermittent speed on the stalk when auto over-rides it…?
  • iDrive, the more tablet style layout definitely has cool points, the info displayed is better, satnav route display is seriously cool. But at the same time, it’s added faff in some areas. Resetting the trip computer (when you haven’t left the car sitting long enough for autoreset to kick in) on my pre-LCI car is a push and a click. On the LCI you are click, scroll, click, push, push half back, click
  • Digital instrument cluster, wow, love it. Don’t entirely like the lack of rev counter on eco-pro mode but that’s about all I can say that’s negative. The amount of data on display without it being cluttered is excellent

Few things I missed about mine that were purely spec:

  • I know keyless entry is supposedly the devil and any kid with a scanner and game boy can steal your car, but my god it’s convenient!
  • Extended storage pack for seat back nets and luggage net in the boot, you don’t realise just how useful they are until you no longer have them

Car ceramics, Caramics, oh I get it.

Was meant to be fitting my summer wheels to the car this weekend but:

  • It was snowing
  • The roads are still being regularly salted
  • My cars going in for EGR check at the end of the week so could be gone anywhere from 1 day to 3 months and that’s a long time of someone else being in charge of not kerbing my wheels

So instead, I jumped in to Halfords and grabbed one of Auto Finesse’s Caramics kits to have a play with.

Piece of cake to use, pleased with the results. Now just need to wait ??? weeks to get them on the car and see how the coating stands up to real world use.

Video of how to apply if anyone is interested, mostly because I didn’t find out that was any real use on YouTube when I went looking

10 weeks, 5k miles

430d 5k miles

That’s me 10 weeks in to ownership and I should tick past 5,000 miles done since picking her up at some point tomorrow.

Thus far I’ve managed to only skud the splitter once!

Anyways, last weekend I was participating in the 3hr C1 Endurance race at Rockingham so a good chance for the car to stretch its legs and do some distance work.

I wound up taking my kit and another one of our drivers’ stuff down as well. I’m convinced the boot on this is smaller than my e46, will need to check the stats. Still, it all fitted in and there wasn’t any danger of it sliding about.

On a side note, when I’m just taking my instructing helmet to the circuit for a weekend shift, the cargo net is brilliant. No more stuffing jackets on top of my helmet on the back seat to stop it flying about!

Friday I was heading down after work, then got a last minute call to pick up some graphics for the racecar from over in Edinburgh, this changed the route plan so I ended up going all the way down the A1 [previously, would have been doing M74 – M6 – A66 – A1M].

A1 was the usual for a Friday afternoon, plenty of trucks and people bumbling along but I wasn’t particularly in a rush, but then I got near Newcastle and a truck was broken down on the dual carriageway just after the Metro Centre

– For those familiar with the area, from the junction on the A1 with the A19 right through to where it becomes the A1M was done at a maximum of 20mph, more often 5-10mph

– For those not familiar with the area, 14.6 miles took me an hour and 20 minutes

After that the road was largely clear all the way to Rockingham to meet the team. Sorted a few things out with them setting up the pop-up etc for the weekend then headed off to our hotel in Kettering. Few hours sleep, returned to the Rock, did our race and at half 5, headed home along the exact same route, as I was now dropping off one of our drivers in Edinburgh.

Journey stats:

– Outbound: 347 miles, average speed 51.6mph, consumption 52.8mpg

– Return: 349 miles, average speed 58.7mph, consumption 52.6mpg

I refuelled half way home on the return leg and the actual brim-brim mpg calculation showed 51.4mpg over the 588 miles, exactly what the trip computer said. [I use the vehicle stats on the iDrive for journey to journey fuel economy and average speed, reset the instrument trip computer at each fill up]

Thoughts:

Driving up the A1 at night was the first time I have used the adaptive headlights: WOW! I know some people like them, some people don’t, I thought they were absolutely brilliant. Its not the twistiest of roads but the beam aiming in to the corners was useful and it was amazing to watch the beam adapt to remove sections to avoid dazzling oncoming cars.

I really need to update my satnav. The recent A1M sections are just far enough away from what was the A1 to confuse the satnav and give you a constant chirp of “follow the road in the direction of the arrow” and “make a U-turn where possible.”

It’s a seriously competent cruiser this car. The armrests seem to line up better with my body shape than my e46’s ones. In fact, in the e46 I largely used the window ledge for my right arm and nothing for the left, on this, both armrests are perfect position to use both. The seats are nice and supportive, think I’d fit the back bolsters a touch better if I trimmed a few pounds right enough.

Still the highest economy 430d on Fuelly although there’s a new entrant with a 2017 car that’s nipping at my heals.

A little over a year ago, Eastern BMW allowed me a shot of testing the new G30 model designation 5 series prior to launch.

Here’s the review I wrote back then and some of the pictures. Actually rather scary how quickly 12 months can pass!

“So, headed along to Eastern BMW at Newbridge to take the new 5 series for a 24hr test drive. The car in question being a white 520d in SE spec, which I reckon is a pretty important model to them, given the number of outgoing models in exactly that spec (and colour) I all of a sudden started to spot on the way home.

First thing I noticed on arrival was the styling. For the last couple of decades, it has really looked like the designers designed the MSport then dulled everything down to just about good enough for the normal/ES/SE versions. Sorry if that’s your flavour, just my opinion. In the new 5 series however, that’s changed. The front bumper actually has a bit of menace and purpose with the appearance of a full width lower intake. I’m also a fan of the twin tailpipes and small strake on the front wing. As a side note, having driven a massive selection of pretty obnoxious cars on the road, it turns out the easiest way to gain attention is simply to add manufacturer camouflage!

So, jumping in, everything is pretty familiar. In terms of the dash and interior layout, it’s firmly evolution over revolution. Electric memory seats configured very quickly to my preferences, good bolster support on the seat back and under knee support. The memory steering moving out the way to allow easier ingress and egress was a nice touch for tighter parking spots as the front doors are pretty big.

Satnav and infotainment is definitely an improvement over the outgoing model, much nicer interface from my point of view. Quickly input the postcode to head home and sync’d my phone up and away we go. Running round doing some errands and dropping parcels off it gave me plenty of stuff to play with and entertain me. The DAB reception seems better on this model and making a few calls the integration was really good between phone and car, the sound insulation for making calls is excellent. At motorway speeds completely normal conversation volume is sufficient, if you’re raising your voice, it’s to make a point, not just to be heard.

Taking a late night run in to Glasgow to pick up the other half gave it a chance to stretch its legs on the way home. Coming out the 50mph limit it pulls back up to “cruising speed” nicely. The buttock dyno suggests somewhere just shy of 200hp and mated the excellent ZF 8 speed auto box, acceleration is genuinely seamless.

On Friday, my fiancé and I both had a day off, so decided to take it on a bit of a tour heading up through the Trossachs to Glencoe. With a good mix of A and B roads, dual carriageways and motorway on the planned route, something to test the handling a bit better than the selection of roundabouts I’d sampled with it thus far.

Now, MSport vs SE isn’t a marketing gimmick, there’s changes to the spring and damper ratios, tyre size and even geometry. On the softer sprung SE, you can feel the extra body roll if trying to push on through roundabouts or tighter twists in the road, even without particularly bulbous sidewalls.  That being said, over the range of roads I drove, it allowed me to make progress with confidence inspiring neutral handling, the softer suspension helping damp out the vibrations from the rough and scarred surfaces that pass for roads these days.

Taking things in context, it’s remarkably agile for the size of car. You can’t completely fight physics, longer wheelbase = greater polar moment = not as willing to change direction, there’s really nothing can be done about that. It’s a big old beast but the 100kg weight loss over the previous model is a great achievement and helps make it more nimble. It doesn’t understeer, doesn’t oversteer, it allows you to clip on at good pace, stress free. The steering weight is great for cruising, my personal preference would be for slightly more weight, but it had plenty of feedback and you could position the car accurately, even at national limit speeds on pretty twisty roads.

Since it was the 2.0 diesel I was testing, I would be remiss if I didn’t talk fuel economy. On the tour of the Trossachs, up to Glencoe and back to West Lothian via Glasgow, it returned 52.9mpg. Over the 322 miles I did in the car, I never saw under 50mpg for a journey and on the motorway run back to Eastern to drop the car back off it returned 62mpg with cruise control set around 70. Seriously impressive when you consider this car was fresh out the wrapper with only 12 miles on the clock when I collected it and engines don’t really loosen up for a few thousand miles.

Of course I realise, nobody reads/believes reviews that only talk about the good stuff, so what didn’t I like? Well, nothing bugged the life out of me but there were some niggles.

At a towering 5ft 9, and with a preference to sit nice and low in the car, the sunvisor in low sun conditions could do with being about half an inch to an inch longer.

The volume on the stereo when playing music from your phone via Bluetooth needs quite a high volume on your phone to get a decent base volume on the stereo. That didn’t make much sense given its not an aux input via cable.

I would definitely want to spec split fold rear seats. I didn’t need them during my time with the car but I know how useful they are on my 3 series.

With the car in EcoPro model, the gearbox is programmed to allow the car to coast to maximise fuel economy. When using cruise control in EcoPro mode, this has the effect that when going downhill, on a not quite steep enough gradient to maintain the speed you were going at, it will lose up to around 5mph and then when the road flattens out it hoofs it to gain the speed back. Alternatively, if going downhill on a steep gradient it will pick up speed over the cruise value, so if you’d set cruise at 55 in a average speed camera’d 50 limit, it could get interesting.

Comfort and Sport modes don’t have the same freewheeling gearbox feature, so they’re the better bet for absolute set speed cruising. Making progress over country roads with the ability to use engine braking via the paddles, and the more linear throttle mapping, would make those modes my choice for anything non-motorway/dual carriageway.

Overall, it did exactly what a 5 series, and indeed a BMW, is meant to. It can hustle along over twisty roads with great balance and feedback, it can kick off its heels and run and it can munch several hundred miles in one sitting with the passengers in total comfort and feeling fresh at the other end.”