Each day, I am inundated with tons of crap – news from car makers and debuts from “Uncle Timmy’s Supercharging Crew” that no one cares about (stop emailing me, I am not doing a story on your 1969 Camaro project). I was going to count this BMW Neue Klasse concept prototype sedan among the flotsam, but then I read something. A number. 13,269. That’s what BMW says the torque is. But can an electric M3 really pump out that much power?
If so, I dunno…I might be into it, you know what I mean?
This car is going to be different from what BMW currently does
The car you see here is based on BMW’s Neue Klasse concept, and it does something important by pulling this chassis away from what BMW currently does.
If you’ve seen an i4 M50, you’ll notice that it looks like…a 4 Series, yes. That’s because it is, and if you open the hood, you won’t find an engine, or a frunk. You’ll find a mess of electric equipment that resembles Rick Moranis wearing a tin foil hat in Ghost Busters. The platform is a compromise, meant to accept many different powertrain options.
This new concept does away with this – it’s electric-only, from the ground up. This isn’t groundbreaking – Tesla has been doing it for a decade. But if BMW wants to compete, it can’t keep pumping out sedans that weight 5,000 pounds and call them “Ultimate Driving Machines”. A dedicated platform will help keep the weight down.
Show me the Gs
BMW says that this concept car has the ability to pull 3 Gs. To put that in context, a Corvette Z06 can pull about 1.2 Gs on a skidpad, and an F1 car and pull up to 6 Gs when cornering. Though not quite the same, an F-14 Tomcat’s “safe” max limit was 6.5 Gs.
The takeaway? That’s a lot of pull from a little BMW sedan. And the amazing bit here is that the car was shod with simple Michelin Pilot Sport tires, like what I have on my current M3. Is BMW lying? I doubt it, but don’t expect that kind of grip in the production version.
While most electric cars have one or two motors, this Neue Klasse concept uses four, one at each corner. That will help keep the weight as low as possible, while also keeping it about as evenly balanced as a car can get. If the new M3 can pull even half that G force, then it’ll be as capable as the most expensive hypercars currently made.
The BMW Neue Klasse concept does produce 13,269 lb-ft of torque, but so does your car
It’s likely BMW is using the same trick that GM did when the Hummer EV was released. Some suspect that the 11,500 lb-ft number is calculated by multiplying the torque at the wheels by the Hummer’s gear ratio. The number at the motor is much less, around 1,200, and that’s the number commonly advertised.
A G80 M3 has 479 lb-ft of torque at the crank. If we take that number and multiply it by the M3’s first-gear ratio of 5.00, then take that number and multiply it by the final drive ratio of 3.15, you get 7,544. I’m going to tell that to everyone at the next car show and see how long it takes for me to get a set of glazed-over looks.
I don’t know what this Neue Klasse concept has for gear ratios, but we can safely assume it’ll put down double the amount of power as the current M3.
Waiting for weight
BMW says they will still make an ICE-powered version of the next 3 Series and M3, as well as the electric versions here. But before I leave you, I’d like to point out the current hybrid M5.
Car & Driver recently tested the new car, and it takes 2.8 seconds to get to sixty. The F90 did it in the same exact time, with over a hundred fewer ponies. I can’t remember any other time a new M car wasn’t faster than the car it replaced.
Could it be because the G90 weighs 5,300 pounds, which is what an X5 M weighs? See where I’m going with this?
Simply put, BMW can’t make the new electric M3 that heavy. The only way for them to get the attention of us, the enthusiast, is to make it so fast and fun that no one would consider the ICE version.
I’ll grab my G-suit.
