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      03-20-2019, 09:43 PM   #94
Red Bread
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This is the fight I've had for the last decade. My M Coupe wasn't kid friendly, the E91 and F31 were too large, heavy and saddled with only the base engine and the F31 had awd and an automatic too. The sedans were boring and the coupes had rear windows that didn't open, rendering them useless for my dog. We didn't get the five door hatch. The convertibles had a stupid, heavy hardtop.

So I've had other brands. First a Mazda 3. Then a couple of GTIs. Fwd isn't the devil, it's actually more fun than a heavy, boring, one wheel drive 3er that the wife parked in the garage for a while.

There's a chance that BMW actually knows what it's doing here. As noted, they've actually done a nice job with Mini dynamics and applying that to a small sedan might actually work well. Anything is better than the F series cars, even a fwd "coupe."
I agree that FWD isn't the devil but it just cannot match a RWD car by its very nature. I'm sure BMW's entry will be more fun than the very boring A3 and A/CLA, but it's still disappointing.

And I agree the F-chassis cars sucked nuts.
There's a point of rwd diminishing returns though that is keyed to weight, wheelbase and traction available. I greatly prefer small, light, tossable cars with a manual. A fwd car that fits those parameters is often more fun than a rwd one that misses one, two or all of those. My high school CRX Si was always more fun than my parents 560SL/SEL/SEC and 500 SL's. Snoozefest, glorified taxis.

Of course a similarly sized rwd car will usually be more enjoyable than a similarly sized fwd or awd car, but when smallish rwd cars aren't available in a class, I'm willing to defect to pullers.
We are not talking about a quid pro quo here. BMW can still make a RWD, light, powerful, manual platform, AKA the 235i and in a sedan form and it would have sold a lot better than the couple-only 2-series.

Do you think the A3 and the CLA sell because they are AWD, lightweight, fun cars? Maybe yes, but primarily it's because they are sedans.

A 2-series sedan (1-Series) platform with a B58 and RWD platform will be killer.

At least we know we'll have an Xdrive version. That should be a fun car.
Nope, 2er is fatter than the already porky F30, and G20 saves a little weight on both. 1er was a porker too. Adding more doors isn't going to help. The real issue is that BMW needed a dedicated chassis for this type of car, not just a shortened 3er. Sharing with Mini allows more overall sales than creating a stand alone chassis for the 2er. Even though I fully admit that this would have been the wildly more appealing solution to enthusiasts, if not accountants.

VW MQB Evo cars have been coming in around 150 to 200 pounds lighter than MQB cars. So the Mk8 GTI will likely be 2900-2950 pounds and an A3 about 100 more than that. With the Golf R and S3 being maybe 100 over that. If BMW sticks to the 2er being about 100 pounds more than a 3er, than the M240i should be around 3,500 pounds again. So a 10% heavier car than the equivalent S3. The good news is that M seems to take the M2 seriously, so hopefully the next M2 is close to the next RS3 in weight.
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