BMW 320i News

A hectic 2007 proved to be lucrative for the car industry with a plethora of new cars launched and more than a million sales throughout the year. And there's no indication that it will be slowing down in 2008.AUDI The new A4, to rival the 3 Series and C-Class is expected here about April, while July will see the hot sports wagon, the RS6 Avant and the A3 Cabrio. Extra A5 variants will follow. BMWBMW has a busy year ahead, starting with the 320d and 335i touring this month. The 1 Series Coupe will go on sale around April, followed by the convertible in May-June. But its big one for the year will be the new X6 Sports Activity Coupe, arriving between July and September. It comes with three engine variants, all twin-turbo, an in-line six, a 3.0-litre diesel and a 300kW 4.4-litre V8. Pricing is expected to start at just under $100,000. And the X5 scores a new engine in February, with the first variable twin turbo diesel offered in the range. CHRYSLER/JEEPJanuary will be a busy month for Chrysler, with the Sebring Cabrio and Grand Voyager people mover both arriving in Australia. The Jeep Cherokee will also get a total makeover. CITROENBased on the C4 Picasso, but bigger and better equipped, Citroen will introduce the Berlingo van between July and September, with a mainly diesel range. This will make room in the line-up for the new Nemo small van mid-year. The C5 will also get a new V6 diesel engine.FERRARIDeliveries of the exquisite F430 Scuderia, priced at about $550,000, will start mid year. Only about 40 will come to Australia and New Zealand. FIAT The reincarnation of the 1960s Bambino will arrive in March, but Fiat has already sold the first four months' supply. The new Fiat 500 will have three engine choices, a 1.2-litre petrol, a 75kW 1.4-litre petrol engine or a 56kW 1.3-litre turbo diesel. Pricing is expected to start from $22,000. The new Ritmo will join the Fiat 500 in March with pricing from $30,000. FORD One of the biggest launches for the year will be the new Falcon. Ford will release details of the new model in February and it's expected to be followed by an unveiling at the Melbourne motor show in the same month, with the official launch around May.FPV FPV will start the year with a new model, the hot turbo Territory, known as the F6 X model. It's the first non-Falcon model from FPV, with 270kW and 550Nm. The FPV Falcon range will also arrive this year. HOLDEN/CADILLACWith Ford's big year planned, you can't expect Holden to keep quiet. But so far, Holden has only announced it is expecting the VE Sportwagon, due in the first half of the year. GM-Holden is also introducing Cadillac with the first model due late in 2008. HONDA Honda will start the year with the new Accord model, due to be launched in February. The small Jazz is also getting an update after the middle of the year. Details on the new generation will be released closer to the launch. The Accord Euro is also expected to arrive later this year. HYUNDAI No big launches just yet, although an upgraded Sonata is expected mid year. JAGUARJaguar's major release for the year will be the new XF in June, with pricing expected to start from $105,000. It will be available in a V6 diesel, as well as a V6 and V8 petrol. KIAPreviewed at the Sydney motor show last year, Kia will launch its new seven-seater Rondo crossover in February. It is expected to start from as low as the mid-$20,000 mark. LEXUSNew for Lexus will be the LX570 around April or May, followed by the IS-F towards the end of the year. Details still to come. MAZDAThe second-generation Mazda6 will go on sale at the end of February with pricing from less than $30,000. It will be powered by a 2.5-litre, four cylinder engine, with 125kW and 226Nm.MERCEDES-BENZThe first arrival for Mercedes-Benz is expected to be the C 63 AMG in mid March. It will be followed by the S 320CDI, priced at $189,874 and the C-Class wagon, which will carry a $3000 premium over the sedan, coming in just under $60,000. MINIAnother new version of a 1960s cult car is also headed our way, with the Mini Clubman launched in February. The modern successor of the Morris Mini Traveller, the Austin Mini Countryman and the Mini Clubman Estate won't get into showrooms until March or April. Pricing will start in the mid-$30,000 area. MITSUBISHIMitsubishi will release two turbocharged Lancers this year. The top-level Lancer Evo X GSR will be here in April and sell for about $58,000. The 2.0-litre four cylinder turbo engine pumps out 200kW and 422Nm. Joining it will be the detuned version in the Ralliart all-wheel drive, at about $40,000. NISSANNissan's first addition for the year will be the all-wheel-drive wagon, the Dualis. Starting at $28,990 and stretching to $35,990, it's powered by a 102kW, 2.0-litre engine. PEUGEOTThe big launch for Peugeot will be the 308 replacing the 307 range, which will start with the 308 hatch in February in both petrol and diesel guises. The touring will follow in June or July, with the 308cc model a prospect for late 2008 or early 2009. PROTONProton has announced the Persona, based on the Gen2 hatch platform, will make its debut at the Melbourne motor show in late February, going on sale in March. It will be priced around the mid-teens. The Gen2 will also get engine updates and minor styling changes. RENAULTThe all-new Laguna will go on sale mid-year with a 2.0-litre diesel engine. SAABJune sees the arrival of the Turbo X AWD. SSANGYONGThe South Korean company will go completely diesel in 2008, with no more petrol engines on offer in Australia. SMARTThe new Fortwo arrives in Australia in February. The one-model brand will get both the 52kW and 62kW models, in hatch and cabrio, being bigger than the current models. SUBARUThe star WRX STi comes in February with a 2.5-litre turbocharged engine, although pricing is still to come. The third generation Forester arrives in March. SUZUKIFebruary's proving to be a busy month, with Suzuki also launching its Grand Vitara diesel. TOYOTAAfter a big year in 2007, Toyota is expecting a quiet year, with only the TRD Hilux due to be launched in April-June. VOLKSWAGENVolkswagen will kick off the year with the SUV, the Touareg R50, to be released in April. It's powered by a 258kW V10 TDI engine. The Tiguan also arrives about October.  VOLVOThe recently launched XC70 arrives in showrooms this month, joined by the C30 diesel also in January. It's priced at $43,950. A base model C30 will also enter the line-up, at $34,450. A 3.0-litre six-cylinder engined V70 will arrive in March. 

January 1, stamp duty on cars in Queensland will leap from 2 per cent of the price to 3 per cent for four-cylinder cars, 3.5 per cent for six cylinders and 4 per cent for eight or more cylinders.Only hybrid vehicles, with petrol-electric power plants, will stay at 2 per cent.The higher tax will range from $100 more for the buyer of a $10,000 second-hand four-cylinder car up to thousands of dollars for big-engine, top-dollar cars.The increase will add $220 to the price of a $22,000 four-cylinder car like a Toyota Corolla, $600 to a $40,000 six-cylinder car like a Holden Commodore, and $800 to a V8 Commodore.Mercedes-Benz dealers say an E280 Elegance sedan, currently costing $107,344 on the road, will be $108,864 from January 1.On a $200,000 V8-powered car, the duty will increase from the present $4000 to $8000.It will end Queensland's reign as the low-tax state for car buyers, which has attracted many buyers from interstate, especially Western Australia.Dealerships are starting 'beat the taxman' sales to encourage customers to buy cars sooner rather than later.Most upmarket brands have arranged extra stock to meet the last-minute buying rush.Brisbane executive Andre Faiva had planned to get a new car next year, but took delivery of his $50,000-plus BMW 320i sedan last week. Mr Faiva, a property recruitment consultant living in Brisbane, says he saved about $2500 due to the lower duty and other deals.“I'd heard about the duty change, but sort of forgot about it until I went in to have a look at cars,” he said.“Then I started to talk more seriously. It was well worth bringing things forward to save that sort of money.”The State Government announced the change in May, estimating it would bring in an extra $200 million.The RACQ, the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries and the Motor Trades Association of Queensland have criticised the move.The FCAI, representing carmakers and importers, said; “This is a clear and patent grab for a bit of extra tax revenue by the Queensland Government.”Brisbane BMW dealer principal Martin Roller said; “The amount to be saved on stamp duty at the moment is definitely a buying motivation for a lot of people.“We've just had our strongest six-week period ever."“We're telling people that if they want to do something about getting a car, they probably want to do it now."“It's going to bring forward to December a lot of cars that otherwise would have been bought in January.” 

Previous Bathurst 1000 Winners 1963 Harry Firth/Bob Jane Ford Cortina GT 1964 Bob Jane/George Reynolds Ford Cortina GT 1965 Bo Seton/Midge Bosworth Ford Cortina GT500 1966 Rauno Aaltonen/Bob Holden Morris Mini Cooper S 1967 Harry Firth/Fred Gibson Ford Falcon XRGT 1968 Bruce McPhee/Barry Mulholland Holden Monaro GTS

In his 15 years at BMW, the Munich car maker's US-born head of design has overseen the creation of some of the industry's most admired and imitated, if controversial, cars.

So which carmaker is the world's cleanest? Not sure? Well, an independent survey released last week has found that BMW has most improved its average fuel efficiency and CO2 emission rate. Indeed, it's done so to an extent which will embarrass other carmakers.The study, began from 1990-2005 by Environmental Defense, a US-based non-profit environmental advocacy group, which shows BMW has improved fuel economy by 14 per cent and carbon emissions by 12.3 per cent.The next best reduction was Toyota's 3 per cent. The C02 performance of every other leading carmaker deteriorated.BMW has made much of the fact that the report covers a period when its US sales increased fourfold.The Americans, of course, buy more big X5 SUVs than the rest of the world combined. The report, Automakers' Corporate Carbon Burdens, studied the impact of 12 major carmakers' product strategies on fuel efficiency and overall automotive carbon emissions.BMW improved fuel economy on several key models, including the 3 Series, 5 Series, 7Series, Z4 M Coupe, M5 Sedan and X5 SUV. Of course, the group's Mini Cooper accounted for almost half of BMW's overall fuel economy improvements.BMW Australia spokesman Toni Andreevski says the group has made further substantial improvements to fuel consumption and emissions since the end of the survey period.“Already in 2007, one-third of new BMWs sold in Europe have a CO2 rating of no more than 140g per kilometre,” he says. “Basically it is a great result that shows that we can continue to optimise current engines. It also shows petrol and diesel engines that outperform existing hybrid technology at comparable costs.”With its latest diesel and lean-burn direct-injection petrol engines, (the latter is no good for Australia because of the high sulphur content of our petrol) BMW has taken its own hybrid direction. This week at the Frankfurt motor show, it showcased its new dual-mode hybrid that returns a claimed 20 per cent economy improvement on the highway and in town.BMW's other more vaunted green gambit is the Hydrogen 7, the first hydrogen-powered luxury sedan. Driven in Germany last year by carsguide, the Hydrogen 7 emits primarily vapour when running on a non-petrol engine.Toyota rated second best, reducing CO2 3 per cent overall, a result in part due to its introduction of the Prius hybrid, but mainly to improvements made to the best-selling Corolla.The report also rated the overall 'carbon burden' that carmakers placed on the environment, derived from factors including vehicle emissions and the number sold. GM came out on top, with a 6.5per cent reduction in overall carbon burden, though its carbon emissions rose by 3 per cent. Toyota, while low in CO2, grew its carbon burden by 125 per cent because of an increase in overall sales. Snapshot: Carbon savings BMW: reduced 12.3 per centToyota: reduced 3 per centVolkswagen: up 1.3 per centSubaru: up 1.6 per centGeneral Motors: up 3per centMitsubishi: up 4 per centHonda: up 4.4 per centFord: up 4.7 per centDaimlerChrysler: up 4.8 per centNissan: up 9.2 per centHyundai: up 17 per centKia: up 30 per cent Source: US Environmental Defense group 

No, vandals have not run amok in a BMW car park. This is a work of art and part of a unique collection.BMW has given cars to prominent artists as a blank canvas since the 1970s and four have just been in Sydney for a quick display at the Museum of Contemporary Art.The four cars from the BMW Art Car Collection were given the treatment by the legendary Andy Warhol, Australia's Ken Done, father of pop art Roy Lichtenstein and minimalism leader Frank Stella. And they are not just any cars. Done did his work on an M3 race car. Warhol was allowed to paint one of BMW's super-rare M1 race coupes and Stella got a 635 racer.Done is famous for his ubiquitous Australiana symbols that have been emblazoned on every possible tourist souvenir from the 1980s onwards.So it's fitting his 1989 work on a BMW M3 was inspired by the colours of our parrots and parrotfish.``Both are beautiful and move at incredible speed,'' Done says. ``I wanted to express the same thing.''The resulting riot of strongly patterned lush colour would certainly look at home cruising along the Great Barrier Reef.The late Lichtenstein's oversized comic strip-inspired style was loud and bold, but his 1977 transformation of a BMW 320i Group 5 racer is subdued by comparison.The design relies on an exaggerated dot technique, but Lichtenstein has used it to portray a subtle record of the road and landscape the car experiences.All four Art Cars look perfectly at home in a gallery but are racers and each has hit the track.Jim Richards drove the Done car to an Australian Touring Car Championship win in 1987, but that was when it was still painted in the black-and-gold battle colours of the Benson & Hedges race team. 

The Japanese car maker now owns a massive 21.9 per cent of the market, a rise of 0.6 per cent compared with the corresponding period last year.Australia's leading seller has surged to 91,984 sales to the end of May compared with 82,227 for the first five months of last year.Toyota is driving the industry to continued forecasts that more than a million vehicles will be sold for the first time in a calendar year in Australia.The Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries has nominated an annualised rate (SAAR) of 1.022 million vehicles for 2007.Chief contributors to Toyota's booming figures are the four-cylinder Camry while the 4 x 2 and 4 x 4 variants of the HiLux have recorded huge jumps along with the Yaris and the introduction of the V6 Aurion.Significantly, since improved supply, the petrol/electric Prius has more than doubled on 2006 figures with 1333 sold to the end of May compared with 625 for the same period last year.Toyota continues to punch above the performance of the total market.“Our aspirations are always to grow bigger than the market,” Toyota Australia chairman Emeritus John Conomos said at the launch recently of the 10th generation Corolla.“No one has ever achieved 25 per cent of the market in modern times before.“It's probably not achievable this year but it's a goal worth setting.”Holden remains in Toyota's shadow. It has increased sales from 60,792 to 61,863 year-on-year, but its market share is down from 15.7 to 14.8 per cent.Ford is a clear number three but has slipped almost 5000 sales year-on-year and has lost 2 per cent market share which now stands at 10.5 per cent.Mitsubishi continues to claw its way back and is moving up on Nissan in a fight for fifth spot.Those models selling well for Mitsubishi have been the Lancer, Outlander, Pajero and the Triton 4 x 4 although the model which the Adelaide maker has staked its future on, the 380, has declined from 5176 to 4641 in year-on-year figures.On the luxury front, BMW recorded its second successive monthly record with 1497 vehicles finding owners, taking its year-to-date tally to 6462.What has been a massive seller for BMW has been the new hardtop 3-series convertible and coupe with combined sales standing at 1170 compared with 313 this time last year.While sales of the X5 Sport Utility Vehicle remain robust and Z4 convertible and coupe sales have grown by a massive 49.4 per cent it is the two-door 3-series models which have allowed BMW to gain significant market momentum.BMW customer deliveries last month were 11.7 per cent higher than May 2006, adding an extra 157 units to last May's record figure.Volkswagen, the only European importer to make the top 10 list, has lifted its year-on-year volume share to 2.6 per cent from 1.9 per cent with sales topping 10,918 to the end of May.

But those big accidents, they'll always happen to someone else, not me. And as much as I hate to admit it, I think I had fallen into this mindset. That was before I attended an advanced driver training course this week.When learning how to drive, we are simply taught to get our licence, as my instructor at the BMW Young Driver Training course, Derek Walls, told us."With every other form of vehicle — motorbikes, heavy vehicles, light vans — you have to go further," he says."But basically, when it comes to a car licence, that's it. You get your licence and don't have to do anything else."And it's true. In most cases, you're not taught how to avoid an accident, how dangerous travelling too close to the car in front can really be or the importance of wide vision.I arrived at the course to find I was on the older side of young drivers. My six fellow motorists were on their P-plates.And while they were all keen on driving a brand new 3 Series BMW for the day and hitting the racetrack, it seemed they were all there because of the initiative of parents or relatives. Some had first-hand accident stories, others told of friends who were lucky to have escaped some sticky situations.But it became clear from the start that we all shared that optimism in our abilities. So it was off to the classroom for a reality check.After some theory, we were off to put it into practice. Braking, the correct steering technique and swerving to avoid an accident were first on the list. There were some tangled arms as we tried to adjust to new hand positioning, burnt rubber as we learned the benefit of ABS and how to control a car without this technology, and quite a few witches hats taken out along the way.And while it was heaps of fun and most of the exercises were done with smiles on our faces, as well as a few butterflies in our stomachs, we all absorbed a wealth of knowledge we had previously taken for granted.After lunch it was off for some more theory and practical exercises and then came time for what most of the boys had been waiting for, hitting the track. Our 110km/h felt considerably fast, but to finish the day off, we saw real speed in action. Our instructors took us for some hot laps in their BMW M3s.Some people may criticise these courses for encouraging unsafe driving behaviour. But as Walls says, advanced driver training courses show young people their limits and encourage them to work within them.His motto is simple: "Speed that thrills is speed that kills." If you're getting excited by your driving, you're outside your comfort zone.The treat of some hot laps at the end of the day demonstrated just how much technique and experience is required to carry off such speeds with precision. We were all pretty much agreed that we were yet to possess the experience required to execute such a task."Let them experience and they will go away and make their own decision, but you have to give them the correct tools to make accurate decisions," Walls says.While most courses require you to bring your own car, this one had us all drive the same BMWs. Walls warns that some courses may not be as qualified as you think, so people should do some research before booking one.Back on the road, I've noticed I'm putting all my new skills into practice. I'm now much more alert, I'm giving extra room between my car and the car in front and I'm practising and mastering my turning technique.Experiencing actions such as braking or swerving suddenly at 80km/h shows just how hard these tasks are, something you can't quite comprehend until you experience it.I know I'd rather this on the track than in real driving conditions. With the disastrous effects of over-confident young drivers continually in the news, a driver training course could just be the wake-up call they need.How to drive safelyVision If there's one thing we're not good at, it is looking far enough ahead. In most cases we just don't do this and fail to focus far enough ahead. Keep your head up and always be aware of what is going on around you. Look out to see what's coming next. Good observation really is the key.Braking Early is better. The bottom line is if you think you need to brake, then you do. Leave two to three seconds between yourself and the car ahead. A car travelling 100km/h takes 80m to stop with reaction time. Incredibly, that's nearly as long as a football field.Seating positionYou should be in a comfortable position, but your legs must not be straight or too cramped. You should be able to fit only four fingers above your head before reaching the roof. You should be comfortable and in control in all situations. Your leg can't become locked under braking.Peer pressureThere's always peer pressure, which is especially true for young blokes. Don't cave in to these demands. "Speed that thrills is speed that kills." If you're getting excited, then you're driving outside your comfort zone.