2012 BMW 328i Reviews

...and BMW 328i Sport Line.Two old enemies fight a perennial civil war on the Australian frontIt's almost tediously inevitable yet the comparison between the BMW 3 Series and Mercedes C-Class has also never been more pertinent nor so closely fought. Hitherto the BMW has embodied the compact sports sedan, the rear-drive, perfectly balanced corner carver - the driver's default choice. The Benz signified aspiration, entry to the prestige touring club, a step to the E-Class.In terms of performance and perception, the entry levels of both were pretty parsimonious. A bit try-hard. Overpriced and underdone. You needed to drop closer to $100,000 than $60,000 to get a decently kitted 3 or C, or one with an engine to keep a Corolla honest.In terms of go for your dough and fruit for your finance package, these longstanding adversaries have never been better value. That you can say “value'' in this context without dislocating an eyebrow says much in itself. The 320i and C200 CGI are not only nothing to sneer at, they're almost too good for you to spend more money.Yet people will and do, climbing to the mid-range 328i and C250. These have the full-cream versions of the turbocharged fours that fling along their respective entry level cars. The Bimmer and the Benz have coalesced in more ways than similar engines and newly non-extortionate options list.What was once the undisputed choice for those who fancied themselves behind the wheel now enjoys not so nearly clear cut an advantage. In this regard BMW has kicked some own goals, four of which are found at each corner.Value remains a pertinent formula at this end of the prestige equation. As tested the C250 Avantgarde's list price climbs some nine grand north. None of the contributing options are are necessary, perhaps only metallic paint (a fairly outrageous $1600) is desirable.The 328i starts and finishes significantly lower, but the $1692 Adaptive M-Suspension is crucial and $1538 Sport Line package includes smart 18-inch alloys. Previously M kits have, in concert with run-flats, ruined many a 3 Series. This one is of the essence. Without it, the 3 Series is shockingly poor at dealing with bumps and corners simultaneously.The smart suspension imbues the Comfort and Sport settings of the Driving Experience Control with real meaning, making the latter the one to select at every opportunity. Am I alone in thinking it’s not good enough that a BMW should need artificial enhancement to deliver on the drive that badge promises? The C-Class needs and is equipped with no such frippery. There's the default Eco setting or the Sport mode. The seven-speed auto is slower than BMW's eight, but kicks down emphatically and informatively. The Tristar car is simply less adulterated, something that extends to its cornering attitude. Its slightly greater mass is felt, but not negatively, even next to the Bimmer's more alert turn-in and adroit stance.Run-flat tyres have become more pliant than the first-generation shockers but their presence is still felt, though more in the ears than the spine. In contrast, the Benz is as aurally ambient as it is absorbent of the road's irregularities.The C-Class's cabin insulation is A-plus as are its material quality, fit and finish. It's sombre in there but this cabin is as sure a sign of the marque you've bought into as the Tristar emblem in the grille of this Avantgarde edition sedan.Having a wonderful time driving a 328i Sport Line in Spain last year at the model's international launch, I still expressed mild misgivings about the pre-production car's cabin quality. Nine months later in this identically specified South Africa-built example, I've made up my mind - it's pretty damn ordinary. As I write this a $31K Ford Focus (German-made as it happens) is parked by the 328i in my garage. The former's cabin is demonstrably superior.The Sport Line is the most popular 3 Series trim package but none are worthy of the sum asked. The accents and plastics are strikingly tacky and cheap. The 3 Series' sole advantage is its driver's position, which wraps you in a cockpit as opposed to the more upright and alert C-Class pew.But in the latter car you're not gripping an unpleasantly scratchy wheel. All the Merc's materials are more tactile and - crucially in a country where staring at the speedo is held to be more important than watching the road - the Bimmer lacks the Benz's digital readout. Nor, incredibly irritatingly, did the 328i accept the Apple lead for the iPhone.Neither has rear seats in which to spend interstate trips, though you've a slim hope of seating a human in the middle of the Merc. The BMW's Himalayan transmission tunnel renders it a four-seater. Better use of space extends to the C-Class's boot, which accommodates a temporary use spare. As ever, the 3 Series has none, although there's room for one. In Europe this matters not. Cop a serious rubber malfunction in this part of the planet, though, and it'll matter a whole lot.The 3 Series is the one that encourages you to seek out bendy stretches of bitumen where - at least when equipped to the optimum - it more readily conveys that sheer driving pleasure cliche. Some moan about the eight-speed auto, but they're wrong.This is a brilliantly adept transmission that's impossible to catch out, so much so that you might as well chuck out the paddle shifters. It slurs though the middle gears without the obvious shifting sensation of a box endowed with fewer gears but - as the speed dial tells you - with deceptive rapidity. The 3 is by far the quicker car.Mercedes steering remains lighter in all circumstances. Equally it is a little more linear that BMW's although the electronic set up with Servotronic imparts distinct and worthwhile feedback. Again though, why not simply have one setting that works? It’s passed the point where tech is unnecessary. Now it’s merely irritating.When equipped with its full optional panoply, the 3 Series remains the recreational device of choice. But its advantage is marginal. The Merc is vastly more than adequate on most roads most of the time and of discernibly higher quality within. The C-Class is, simply, a better prestige car.

Once BMW's 3 Series was the car equated with almost but not quite affordable prestige. Now most who do reach this height in life buy a Mercedes-Benz.A year ago this month, unnoticed by all including Mercedes-Benz, its C-Class became the best-selling mid-size imported car. It hasn't happened every month since but it does occur as often as not - a German prestige car that starts just shy of $60,000 outsells some excellent Asian imports priced from half that sum by as much as two to one.Not so long ago, you'd have been locked up in a quiet place with soft walls for so much as suggesting  such a prospect. But so too would have been the prophet who foretold Holden's Commodore being beaten last month for the first time by  a European car (albeit the much  cheaper Volkswagen Golf).Entry executive sedans - the C-Class and its traditional BMW rival - were once the cars we wanted but couldn't attain. Now more of us are reaching that bit further beyond the top end of the medium class. Merc reckons   some of their new custom comes from those who previously bought top end Fords and Holdens. Not long ago, this too was inconceivable.The bad news for BMW is that at the moment, aspiration takes the form of a Tristar rather than a blue and white propeller badge - the C not the 3. With an outgoing entry level 320i that is pound for pound the poorest car too much money can buy, the new sixth generation F30 3 Series - launched this week in Barcelona - simply must not fail.BMW's people puckishly predict it will propel the 36-year-old model name back to number one in our part of the planet. If what they insist on calling "sheer driving pleasure" means a scintilla to prestige punters, it could do it by the width of its fat torque band.VALUEWe can talk more intelligently of this in February  when the first three of four  new 3 Series models is released hereabouts. Initially it's sedans only, wagons being possibly a year away.The diesel 320d starts the lineup followed by the 328i with the all-new M20 direct injection turbo petrol four, to replace much loved but now obsolete 325i, the range topped by the 335i turbo six. The entry 320i is about eight months off. This, we wager heavily, will be worth the wait.Prices will be up slightly on their current equivalents, but, we're credibly promised, with appreciably more fruit standard. There's three major equipment lines: Sport, Modern and Luxury, with M Sport to come shortly thereafter. Of these Modern is the "newest" with the most distinctive interior accents and trim. Essentially Sport means 18s, bright stitching, tauter suspension and glossy black bits. Luxury means more chrome.All models cop stop/start and Driving Experience Control, which enables you to switch  ride comfort and throttle response between relaxed and alert. Eco Pro, which runs leanest, is standard in this set-up. Only Sport Plus mode, which disdains the electronic safety net, is optional.But, as we say, hold your naturally aspirated breathe for the 320i, which deploys a milder version of the 328i's twin scroll turbo power plant. Based on two days with the new 5 Series variant that uses this same engine tune, the entry car  will not only be leagues of magnitude ahead of the outgoing sluggard, but the sweet spot of the range.TECHNOLOGYMany will lament the passing of free-breathing sixes in this now all-turbo and all eight-speed auto line-up. But then -- some pine for spats and fedora hats.Sorry, but the direct-injection twin-scroll turbocharged M20 four-cylinder is a stunner, a big torquing yet revin' to seven device with an output surpassing the fabled 3.0-litre six, all of which is made accessible by that brilliantly intuitive auto. Which is well, given manuals will not be offered except by special order. You can lament that too, but you'll be the only one.While standard kit is better than on the outgoing car, it wouldn't be a Bimmer if there wasn't a plethora of options. Of these, Variable Sports Steering - a genuinely useful ratio quickener, unlike Active Steering - is enjoyable but not essential. The full-colour head-up display  is, once used, hard to do without. We'd tick that box. Lane-departure-warning should be mandatory in this land where those sufficiently stupid to text while driving are permitted to hold licenses.DESIGNBetter. Much better, if a little too like the big brother 5 Series. Yet this isn't inapt given the 3 Series of today approaches the size of a Fiver of a decade ago.The 3's not been pretty per se since the E46 of 1998 vintage, but this one is a step in the right direction. With the trademark accents in place, it really couldn't be anything else.Within, the 3's moved miles ahead on the outgoing device. Austerity is out, enhanced opulence is in. BMW has emerged its cars aren't owned by androids so there's even space in the door bins. While those up front are esconsed in a cockpit, rear seat passengers breath easy, so long as there's two, not three. That said the finish in our pre-production Sport wasn't perfect.SAFETYVast claims are being made by the maker, such as this is safest car in the history of its class. Suffice to say that five crash stars will follow and the formidable battery of active and passive life saving measures is in place - not the least of which is superbly responsive yet forgiving dynamics.As ever, however, a Carsguide half star is lost to the absence of a spare tyre. Yep, ran flats  are all very well, but just try copping one out back of the black stump and see where that gets you. Nowhere in a hurry is where. In a car that screams to be driven far and wide this just doesn't play.DRIVINGYou could drive the 328i tomorrow, having never set a foot on a BMW pedal and you would feel instantly at home. Everything is weighted and positioned just as it should be.You could, like me, have driven every minor variant of every 3 Series of the past two generations and more besides, and feel immediately that the new 328i advances the game. It fits either of you like a chamois glove.This is the genius of the 3 Series. It flatters the absolute beginner and enables the enthusiast. Throttle, brakes, steering - all are just ... well, just so. We loved the old sixes, we love manuals but we wouldn't swap this drivetrain. Capably amiable in milder modes, a weapon when the wick is lit, it comes close to being all things to all people.With uber-direct steering - some 2.2 turns lock to lock - through front wheels unburdened by the task of driving, this remains a completely intuitive handler, incredibly adept when pushing hard through a mountain pass and hugely adjustable and forgiving of even ham-fisted corrections.All torque kicks in from just above 1000rpm and it revs cleanly to 7000. It is a device that's  thoroughly efficient grinding through the suburbs and wonderfully satisfying when the opportunity arises. In sport mode throttle response is enlivened and feel through the wheel tautens, yet comfort mode is more than adequate for 90 per of likely regular going. Ride on Catalonia's smooth rides was excellent even with optional skinny 19-inch rubber - you'd stick to 17s on our battered bitumen.Indeed you needn't gild this lily  with bling and extras. The 328's brilliance is in its driving  essence.VERDICTGod, it's good. If driving a prestige car means half as much to you as owning one, then you have to try this.RATINGBMW 328iPrice: $68,000 (estimate)Warranty: three years/100,000kmResale: 65 per centService interval: 15,000km/12 monthsEngine: 2.0-litre 4-cylinder turbo petrol; 180kW/350NmBody: four doors, five seatsDimensions: 4624mm (L) 1811 (w) 1429 (h) 2810 (wb)Weight: 1430kgTransmission: eight-speed automatic; RWDEconomy: 6.4L/100km; 147g C02/km"The one for drivers and badge collectors alike. But wait for the base car if you can."OTHERS TO CONSIDERAUDI A4 2.0TRating: 3.5 out of 5 starsPrice: $58,900Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cylinder turbo petrol four; 132kW/320NmTransmission: CVT auto; FWDThirst: 7.1L/100km; 154g C02/km“Quattro costs extra, so why not look at the cheaper base 1.8?”MERCEDES-BENZ C250Rating: 4.5 out of 5 starsPrice: $65,900Engine: 1.8-litre 4-cylinder turbo petrol four; 150kW/310NmTransmission: 7-speed auto; RWDThirst: 7.2L/100km; 167g km"Exceptional. The  one BMW has to beat”VOLVO S60 T5 GDTIRating: 3.5 out of 5 starsPrice: $51,950Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cylinder turbo petrol four; 177kW/320NmTransmission: 6-speed twin clutch auto; FWDThirst: 8.3L/100km; 193g C02/km“T5 has four cylinders, so does the T4, just a smaller capacity. Try that first”