AMS: Lightweight E90 M3 to Also Wear "GTS" Badge, with 440 HP

[antzcrashing]

Originally Posted by aus

Stop drinking the BMW Cool Aid. Porsche has MANY models that are totally niche cars with engines that need certifying and they can make a profit on them. Porsche is too small to lose money on anything they make.

Stop drinking the Porsche cool Aid as are many on this forum. If you like Porsche so much, why not go to their site and provide your praise. Or do they complain about their messiah company too?

[Bennettbrauer]

Originally Posted by antzcrashing

Stop drinking the Porsche cool Aid as are many on this forum. If you like Porsche so much, why not go to their site and provide your praise. Or do they complain about their messiah company too?

Um, lots of people on this forum are car guys, not BMW guys. There's no reason to blindly follow a single brand, anyone who does that is a mindless ideologue that has been suckered by marketing. I love BMWs, and have owned several but I also am a fan of Porsche, Lotus, and a half dozen car models that are a blast to drive. I would love to own an R8 or a 458 or a McLaren F1, and would clearly take a variety of brands over an M3 at a given price point. It would be stupid not to. Free your mind, there are a lot of great cars out there that don't have an ///M attached to them.

[Erhan]

Originally Posted by Bennettbrauer

Um, lots of people on this forum are car guys, not BMW guys. There's no reason to blindly follow a single brand, anyone who does that is a mindless ideologue that has been suckered by marketing. I love BMWs, and have owned several but I also am a fan of Porsche, Lotus, and a half dozen car models that are a blast to drive. I would love to own an R8 or a 458 or a McLaren F1, and would clearly take a variety of brands over an M3 at a given price point. It would be stupid not to. Free your mind, there are a lot of great cars out there that don't have an ///M attached to them.

[ADV.1 Matt]

At the OP... I like it! But i'd like it more if they offered it in the GTS Orange.

[aus]

Originally Posted by antzcrashing

Stop drinking the Porsche cool Aid as are many on this forum. If you like Porsche so much, why not go to their site and provide your praise. Or do they complain about their messiah company too?

Are you like 16 years old????
I'm just saying Porsche can make a Boxster Speedster, Cayman R, GT3, GT3-RS, GT2, GT2-RS and sell them here for a profit, so why can't BMW bring is something similar to a GTS here? All those Porsche models need to be "certified" too and Porsche is TINY compared to BMW and the numbers of those cars they'll sell is also very small compared to what BMW could have done with a GTS here or even a GTS with the same motor we have now.
The parts of the GTS do not double it's price except for making a new engine.

.

[aus]

Originally Posted by deshields

Please explain to the rest of the class what lightweight pieces the car will have, since it hasnt been announced yet... you obviously have insider knowledge to what pieces it has, and also how much those pieces cost BMW is keeping it a closely guarded secret as to what the car will use to lighten things up and what the final weight of the car actually will be. So I dont see how you could make those wild speculations.

You are obviously making a judgement based on your opinion of BMW M, that they are overcharging and underdelivering? I've owned a few M products over the past 10 years, and not one of them has underdelivered, so not sure where you are getting this wild speculation from....

Not sure where I said anything about the CF pieces or what speculation you're talking about.
If you develop a new engine and only put it in 250 cars, then you have to spread out the cost of that development into thos 250 cars vs. maybe 2,000 cars. That should lower the price of the GTS. CS coils, Brembo calipers (with BMW rotors/hats), a half roll cage, extinguisher done add up to more than doubling the price of the M3.

[mkoesel]

All fair points. Keep in mind Porsche is known to have the highest margins in the industry, so that gives them more leeway for lower volumes. Also, those are purpose built sports cars and sports car have less of a stigma to overcome when it comes to high prices. Even with the performance and part content to back it up, an M3 GTS is still built on a 3 series chassis. BMW NA probably is not convinced there will be enough takers for a (lets say) 85k-90K M3.

It all comes down to money. I mean if BMW knew they could make a big profit off the GTS in the US, they would obviously make it happen.

Originally Posted by aus

I'm just saying Porsche can make a Boxster Speedster, Cayman R, GT3, GT3-RS, GT2, GT2-RS and sell them here for a profit, so why can't BMW bring is something similar to a GTS here? All those Porsche models need to be "certified" too and Porsche is TINY compared to BMW and the numbers of those cars they'll sell is also very small compared to what BMW could have done with a GTS here or even a GTS with the same motor we have now.

The parts of the GTS do not double it's price except for making a new engine.

[ihyln]

Originally Posted by erhanh

How is buying a heavy, less track oriented F10 M5 makes more sense? Relative to what?

pricing and availability

[mdosu]

I guess the E90 GTS will be the "GTS-Civic" version of the E92 GTS right?

I crack myself up.

[Matski]

Damn, I hope SCOTT doesn't feed as much information back to the company from this forum as he lets out on it... or else BMW BMW may run the risk of ever producing a car ever again!

I will probably never be able to buy a E90 M3 GTS (if that's what this is), but whether I can, or you guys can, or would, buy one is probably irrelevant, since there's probably more than enough people out there that would.

Different people find different things desirable, seems to me that if what you desire isn't a Porsche 911, then you get labelled as a BMW fanboy.

[aus]

Originally Posted by mkoesel

All fair points. Keep in mind Porsche is known to have the highest margins in the industry, so that gives them more leeway for lower volumes. Also, those are purpose built sports cars and sports car have less of a stigma to overcome when it comes to high prices. Even with the performance and part content to back it up, an M3 GTS is still built on a 3 series chassis. BMW NA probably is not convinced there will be enough takers for a (lets say) 85k-90K M3.

It all comes down to money. I mean if BMW knew they could make a big profit off the GTS in the US, they would obviously make it happen.

It's definitely all about money.
And I don't see why BMWNA doesn't see there's a market for such a car here. Look at the E30 M3. From everything I've read, it was a shock to BMW that it had so much demand. It was suppose to be just a few hundred units to qualify for racing, but they ended up making it (and improving it) for years.

.

[M_Time]

I want to see interior pics !!!

Better than the ones allready surfacing someone in Germany please do this before the M Festival.

[jonasaurus]

Originally Posted by mdosu

I guess the E90 GTS will be the "GTS-Civic" version of the E92 GTS right?

I crack myself up.

[mkoesel]

Originally Posted by aus

It's definitely all about money.
And I don't see why BMWNA doesn't see there's a market for such a car here.

I can only conclude that they have used their vast database of marketing and customer information to make that determination.

Look at the E30 M3. From everything I've read, it was a shock to BMW that it had so much demand. It was suppose to be just a few hundred units to qualify for racing, but they ended up making it (and improving it) for years.

Another good point but I'm sure they had determined they could make money on the car even at the low volume. Or it was subsidized by the racing efforts and the projected money to be made by the brand value those would provide. Either way, they probably just can't make the business case for cars like this today. IIRC, people have recounted here on the forum how the E36 LTW sat on lots for months for example. It doesn't mean there is zero demand for such cars. It just means BMW is probably not confident they know how to bring them to us and make a profit at the same time.

[antzcrashing]

Originally Posted by Bennettbrauer

Um, lots of people on this forum are car guys, not BMW guys. There's no reason to blindly follow a single brand, anyone who does that is a mindless ideologue that has been suckered by marketing. I love BMWs, and have owned several but I also am a fan of Porsche, Lotus, and a half dozen car models that are a blast to drive. I would love to own an R8 or a 458 or a McLaren F1, and would clearly take a variety of brands over an M3 at a given price point. It would be stupid not to. Free your mind, there are a lot of great cars out there that don't have an ///M attached to them.

I thought it was obvious that I am not promoting being a BMW guy. I am stating that it seems there are many people idolizing Porsche. My point is for people to be more brand neutral, as is your point.

Its very easy to think in the "grass is always greener" mindset, and I am seeing alot of that with the Porsche GT3 comments. If this thread is truly unbiased and brand neutral - why is there a cry out for BMW to have their own GT3 competitor - why not just buy the Porsche GT3?

I think the M3 GTS is a special car in its own way. Very BMW, Very M. If I could afford the GTS I probably wouldn't buy it either, but that's not the point.

[Nautik]

Originally Posted by aus

Are you like 16 years old????
I'm just saying Porsche can make a Boxster Speedster, Cayman R, GT3, GT3-RS, GT2, GT2-RS and sell them here for a profit, so why can't BMW bring is something similar to a GTS here? All those Porsche models need to be "certified" too and Porsche is TINY compared to BMW and the numbers of those cars they'll sell is also very small compared to what BMW could have done with a GTS here or even a GTS with the same motor we have now.
The parts of the GTS do not double it's price except for making a new engine.

.

You may be right if BMW had planned to build several thousand GTS type cars for the US market alone. But they don't and so long as they have plans to build very limited numbers, they can't justify the cost to bring them here.

Our only hope is to benefit from the technology they use on these cars.

[Jason]

UPDATE: Here's semi-official confirmation about the name badge for the Lightweight E90 M3. Bimmertoday noticed that BMW UK apparently made a small-ish mistake and gave away the final name by putting "M3 GTS Saloon" in the picture description of one shot.

We've checked the UK press site, and the photo including description is still up at their site. See the screenshot above.

[CrazyJoe]

interior pics?

[jeff@autocouture]

Originally Posted by Jason

UPDATE: Here's semi-official confirmation about the name badge for the Lightweight E90 M3. Bimmertoday noticed that BMW UK apparently made a small-ish mistake and gave away the final name by putting "M3 GTS Saloon" in the picture description of one shot.

We've checked the UK press site, and the photo including description is still up at their site. See the screenshot above.

Please tell me it's coming to the us, I want it

[OC3]

Originally Posted by Studntloan

Please tell me it's coming to the us, I want it

Me too