News & Reviews- Make: BMW

When I was a kid of 13 years the original 6 Series arrived at our local auto show where my dad and I ogled over it like two school kids checking out the pretty new girl that was way out of our league. Ok, creepily weird to contemplate a 'tweenager and 46-year old white-hair sizing up the same young woman, but you get my analogy. After spending too much time on the BMW show stand we wandered over to Porsche's section to learn more about the 924 we'd been reading about in PM and other buff mags, which believe it or not was more within my dad's financial reach, and finally ended up getting serious with a then-new VW Scirocco, after driving (of course with me riding shotgun) the Ingolstadt-powered Zuffenhausen creation first. How we both would've loved to have had time in the 630CSi, but my dad's machine/welding/fab shop foreman salary wouldn't allow such extravagance. As it was, I learned to drive manual behind the wheel of that '76 VeeDub.

I've since driven both an old E24 635CSi Read Full Story

BMW didn't create the X6 to pad its bottom line. Like the Z4 roadster, 6 Series Coupe, Gran Coupe and Cabriolet, and new i8, not to mention all of its M-badged models, the X6 is a niche image building model that shines its halo across the rest of the brand's meat and potato vehicles, although to be fair to the Munich-base automaker its core models are more chateaubriand and truffled potato gratin than the usual commoner's stew.

The X6 has had few challengers since it came into fruition in 1997, the rival most often mocked being Acura's ZDX, a vehicle I happened to really like for its boldness and clean, uncluttered lines from the outside in. It was considered a slow seller, and while it slid down the sales chart as its four model years came to an end, its initial Canadian numbers weren't that much lower than X6 sales with 863 sold in 2010 compared to 1,017 X6s for BMW, whereas the unorthodox coupe-like German CUV only found 897 buyers last year. A redesigned X6 arrived during Read Full Story

In case you were wondering, it takes a considerable amount of time and effort to test, research, and finally write a review on a given vehicle. And that doesn't even take into consideration the team needed to schedule, book, pick up, shuttle around and drop off the test car, source a location and then shoot a gallery of photos, the additional team required to edit those photos, size and optimize them for the web, edit the review, and finally file it to various print publishers while posting it to the content management system for online distribution ahead of promoting it via various social media sites. So why on earth would anyone in my line of business cover the same car twice in a single model year? When that car is quite possibly the best sport sedan ever created.

Yes, it all comes down to personal gain. My gain, in this instance, was more time spent in yet another 2015 BMW M3. Sure this has cost me and my company time, effort and money, because it really wasn't necessary. Read Full Story

I certainly didn't expect this. I became a diehard M fan at first sight of the original M1 in my dad's Popular Mechanics magazine, which was long before my first stint at the wheel of a '94 Euro-spec E36 M3, followed up by a drive in a second-gen '95 M5 and many more recent M experiences since, but there's no way you could've told me a month ago that my new favourite M-badged BMW would be an SUV.

It's a clear sign that I'm aging and prioritizing what matters most under the luxury and refinement categories rather than all-out performance, but while this X5 M is endowed with what is by far the most enticing BMW interior I've experienced yet, let alone one of the best quality and most stylish SUV cabins ever created, the X5 M is also a mighty skilled performer when called to task. It looks pretty damn good too.

From its blacked out grille inserts to its bolder more aggressive lower fascia, stylish twinned five-spoke alloys on optional 285/35ZR21 front and 325/30ZR21 Michelin Read Full Story

Compared to the old 1 Series Coupe and Cabriolet, the 2 Series two-door hardtop that arrived on the scene last year and this drop-top, new for 2015, seem to have grown up. They've transcended from cute and somewhat pudgy shapes to sleeker more athletic profiles, each model's longer, narrower twin kidney grille and sharply angled headlamps looking downright menacing, my tester's upgraded M Sport lower front fascia more aggressive, curvaceous side panels more mature and shapelier angled taillights more upscale. The 2 Series twosome are altogether more alluring than their predecessors.

The 2 Series Cabriolet continues forward with a similar fabric soft top to the 1 Series, instead of the retractable hardtop used by the larger 4 Series Cab, which is probably good being that the 2's stubbier length would've made graceful C-pillars and rear glass in the latter challenging, while a complex folding mechanism and the various metal panels would have robbed the trunk of its current usability. Read Full Story