It has taken decades for car makers to convince the American buyer that relatively smaller engined cars from Europe have more than enough performance.

They may not always come with a V8 but a six cylinder engine can be enough for most people. It took almost as much to talk them into turbochargers.

Is this enough to consider people will accept a mix between downsizing and turbocharging very soon? BMW certainly thinks so.

The Bavarian company will be sending its new 1.5 liter three cylinder engine over the Atlantic with some of their smaller cars.

Thanks to twin-turbocharging and a lot of engineering work, this engine will be ready to produce anywhere between 120 and 220 horsepower.

Neither of these figures will worry fellas driving muscle cars but in small BMWs it will certainly zip around quicker than most small cars while also being economical.

Decent selling points but how is this going to help out the way the Americans will be buying 1.5 liter engines? Well, according to BMW, it’s the simplicity.

If a car feels like it has decent grunt, buyers couldn’t care less if it’s a V12 or a one cylinder scooter. There is some logic in that, after all, not everybody knows what cares about what’s going on under the bonnet.

In order to further create some confusion, BMW claim that their half a six cylinder engine will actually behave like such an engine and make the same noise.

That might be some optimistic marketing stuff but we’re yet to see people lose interest in the i8 and it comes with this precise engine.

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Marcus M.

http://www.bmwcoop.com

The post BMW three cylinder engines are going to the United States appeared first on BMWCoop | BMW Blog, BMW News, BMW Reviews.

BMW is not content with having the global crown for sales in the luxury department, they want to win over the American market by moving them away from Lexus and in order to achieve this they are pushing their BMW Individual program.

Basically what they want stateside buyers to do is to buy a car with what they want on it in terms of trim levels instead of just buying what the dealer has to offer at a particular time. Since the next car they will be launching in the U.S. is the 2011 BMW X3 that will be the one that they plan on starting this car buying revolution with.

This form of sales helps BMW with their projections and inventory but it also helps you get the car you wanted and it is a system that is successfully applied in Europe where almost 50% of all BMW’s sold are custom ordered.

This isn’t as simple as it sounds since Americans enjoy the idea of hitting a dealer showroom and leaving with a car off that lot the same day so if BMW will want the higher profit margins and the reduction in inventory they’ll have to be innovative here.

So in order to make this a reality the new BMW X3’s production will be moved from Austria to the recently expanded Spartanburg plant in South Carolina. Building the crossovers here will allow BMW to drastically cut delivery times and BMW will also be more heavily promoting its factory delivery program and the driving classes it offers at the nearby Performance Driving School.

About Post Author

Marcus M.

http://www.bmwcoop.com

The post BMW wants more people to custom order the X3 appeared first on BMWCoop | BMW Blog, BMW News, BMW Reviews.

BMW haven’t managed to overtake Lexus as top seller in the United States over the past ten decade despite a great product lineup.

This year however, Lexus have suffered quite a bit due to the company recalls.

Despite these “good” news analysts still believe that Lexus will still come in first and BMW will still be trailing even closer behind. What is most likely to be the thing keeping BMW from taking the sales crown in the American states is the wind down of the old 5 series since, in preparation for the June launch of the new model the dealers have … almost run out of cars to sell.

BMW AG global sales chief Ian Robertson stated that the 5 Series amounts to around 25 percent of BMW sales in the states and this issue will be a slight problem but with the launch of the new one it should be covered and he expects sales to register a few digit points of growth which are most likely to keep overall sales at a level pace.

So BMW are doing quite well while Lexus will have to wait for the simple results of the recall issues with the Lexus GX that took a bit off the boost sales Lexus required.

About Post Author

Marcus M.

http://www.bmwcoop.com

The post BMW still second place for sales in the U.S. appeared first on BMWCoop | BMW Blog, BMW News, BMW Reviews.