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Originally Posted by zEdP
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I've tried to translate the complete review. But I must say my English and my German are not perfect, so I'm sorry if there is a part that is hard to understand.
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So, I'm back from Spain from the International Press-presentation af the new Z4. I want to share my first impressions with you.
To begin: I'm a driving-purist. I have my Z4 equipped with softtop and M-suspension. That's the way a roadster should be in my opinion: Hard and without compromises.
From that point I had serious doubts by the new Z4. If that would be justly in the end? I'll tell you later. Let's start with a systematic overview.
1. DESIGN
As with every BMW since Bangle, the new Z4 works first in reality. On pictures the proportions, light and shadowes don't give a realistic image. I have to say (attention: that's MY opinion): optical, the car is a dream, I like it much more than the previous model. Even with closed roof, the Z4 looks good. Also the interior is very nice, there's no more such thing as a failing dignity. But, if you want to give it the last really nice touch, you have to spend some money on options.
2. The engine and transmission
Unfortunately we only had the opportunity to test the top-model with biturbo, which means I can't tell you anything about the smaller variants. Off course, the turbo six in line is a fabulous driving mechanism. It has almost the characteristic of a diesel-engine: even in the lower revs you always have enough torque. In fact, it doesn't matter in which gear you are, you always have enough power. The sound is a dream, on the outside it's much better than the last Z4. On the inside it's a little different: the soundgenerator which made you hear the engine better in the interior is not fitted anymore on the new Z4. But it still sounds good enough, though!
Minus point: Fuel economy. During the testdrive in the mountains between Alicante and Benidorm we had an average fuel economy of 17l/100km!
But I believe that you should be able to reduce that to 11-14l/100km when you use the car in a normal way in Germany. Because the fuel tank is not very large, you will not be able to drive far before you have to fill it up again!
About the transmission: the 7-speed DCT is a must for the biturbo engine. It works better than the VW-DSG, and thanks to the shift-peddles and the possibility to shift manually, it's simply great fun to drive! But the DCT also is convincing while driving in automatic mode.
Downside: even in manual mode you have the kickdown-function. In my opinion: when manual, it must be completely manual.
3. Chassis and Handling
(I've copied this part from zEdP)
Now the part surprising for me. The new Z4’s suspension has become clearly more comfortable and targets a different kind of driver. But the sportiness did not suffer from it. The corning speed is very high. The Z4 remains always neutral, no under-steers at all. Even the moment I entered a U turn a little too fast, the car never pushed the front axle in under steer. The steering element fits: Precise, beautiful feedback - in addition, less difficult to operate than the old one. Again softly, like the whole car. The test driven car was equipped with the adaptive chassis option. The sDrive settings normal, sport and Sport+ differ however only in nuances. These have nearly no noticeable influence on the handling of the car. The only disadvantage of the new one with DKG: Getting the car into a drift is quite difficult. I have no idea what causes this, but one thing is clear. The new E89 one has more traction than the E85. The DKG seems to contribute to this also. In my opinion, my E85 is better suited to drift
4. Roof
And now the only real downside of the car: the hardtop. The advantages to a softtop are minimal, and more of a marketing point of view.
The disadvantages: the roof wheighs 30 kg more than a softtop. It makes the trunkspace with the roof down really small and almost unusable. The opening of the roof takes 20sec, twice as long as by the previous Z4. That will be too short sometimes to open the roof at a red light, because you can't open the roof while driving at a slow speed.
The only advantage is the better isolation from noises. At 180km/h the noise is as loud as with the old Z4, and at 200km/h you have to scream to your passenger!
Conclusion
The new Z4 is in almost every objective a better car than the previous. The chassis is really fantastic (especially when you realize that the new one wheigs 100kg more than the old one!), the biturbo is a dream and the DCT is a masterpiece. Everyone who has ordered one so far, should be glad!
It's not a car for me though. BMW looks for a different type of client in my opinion. I can imagine that in the future the most Z4's will be driven by a blond woman, with closed roof.
It's funny that the car is designed by 2 women.
It's really not a roadster anymore, but more a comfortable cabrio. For me it makes to much compromises, to fascinate me. But, it is a very good car!
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So, hopefully you'll understand a bit of my English.
